4:42 - It's a feature called "Hardware Cursor", which draws the cursor separately from everything else. It's a GPU feature, not specifically for Windows.
6:01 - Microsoft added hijacks to some shell calls on-the-go to Settings, including some Control Panel items (you probably know this already), but when they fail, they're supposed to either drop to Control Panel, or just create an error dialog box, which are both broken, so Control Panel does nothing.
8:52 - Edge would probably run on older Windows versions without DWM. Edge for Windows 11 comes with different UIs (for no reason) accelerated by DWM.
10:07 - Explorer context menus are special since Windows 10, as they're replaced on-the-go with "Immersive Context Menus". This supplies dark mode, but requires an appropriate visual style, hence they can't render properly.
10:40 - Same as above, but for the taskbar shell. Since app icons come from their respective executables, and the gear icon is quickly patched there in Windows 11 betas for testing the new quick settings without any reference, they can render themselves.
11:04 - UWP apps get their splash animation from the current visual style. When you removed Resources, they silently failed, but when you removed their files, no references exist, hence the empty window.

4:42 - It's a feature called "Hardware Cursor", which draws the cursor separately from everything else. It's a GPU feature, not specifically for Windows.
6:01 - Microsoft added hijacks to some shell calls on-the-go to Settings, including some Control Panel items _(you probably know this already),_ but when they fail, they're supposed to either drop to Control Panel, or just create an error dialog box, which are both broken, so Control Panel does nothing.
8:52 - Edge would probably run on older Windows versions without DWM. Edge for Windows 11 comes with different UIs _(for no reason)_ accelerated by DWM.
10:07 - Explorer context menus are special since Windows 10, as they're replaced on-the-go with "Immersive Context Menus". This supplies dark mode, but requires an appropriate visual style, hence they can't render properly.
10:40 - Same as above, but for the taskbar shell. Since app icons come from their respective executables, and the gear icon is quickly patched there in Windows 11 betas for testing the new quick settings without any reference, they can render themselves.
11:04 - UWP apps get their splash animation from the current visual style. When you removed Resources, they silently failed, but when you removed their files, no references exist, hence the empty window.


This just goes to show, what masterpiece Windows Aero was. It is still there but Microsoft won't keep it up to date to let it be accessed by us. 🫠