In Windows 7 I created two users: a regular user that I log in as and an administrative user that I enter the password for whenever I did anything that required elevation. This seems to work well enough in the past, the Control Panel prompted me with a UAC prompt every time I changed system-wide settings.
Now after I upgraded to Windows 10 the Settings app seems to gray out most options that are not changeable by regular users. (e.g. uninstall apps, Windows Defender real-time protection, wifi metered connection status, etc). Is there a way of running the entire Settings app as Administrator so I can use it to change the settings without going to the trouble of switching users and starting a new session as Administrator? I tried right clicking on the app icon in the start screen but it did not display the "run as Administrator" option.
Best Answer
Why it's happening
This isn't the problem of not running the
Settings
app as an Administrator. Those settings are controlled by Group Policy.It appears by default regular users cannot change these settings (it does make sense).
I actually tried running the app as an Administrator from an elevated command prompt, Windows Powershell (
Start-Process "ms-settings" -runas /user:Administrator
), and also by right clicking and choosing "Run as Admin" on the actualSystemSettings
application located atC:\Windows\ImmersiveControlPanel
. Nothing workedThe answer to your question is basically because you're on a normal user account.
How to change group policy for non-administrators
So if you do want normal users to be able to access the greyed out settings I recommend you follow the following tutorial:
Local Group Policies - Apply to All Users Except Administrators
Yes, it says Windows 7 but most likely this will work for Windows 10. Here's a summary: