Win 10 Desktop Background

[GrtArtiste]

Computer #1 runs Win 10 Home and is 4 years old. Usually it gets booted every day and shut down when I'm done using it. I log in as admin with my MS account. Every few months I change the desktop wallpaper to a new image, which I always save somewhere on the hard drive. I was using the same image for approx 4 months.

Computer #2 is a recent acquisition and runs Win 10 Pro. Typically it is left on for many days at a time although it does get restarted occasionally. I log in as admin with the same MS account. Network discovery and sharing is turned off (which is how I want it) and the computers are not visible to each other. Without any prompting from me, getting #2 set up resulted in it using the same wallpaper as #1...so I conclude that this image is linked in some way to this one MS account. Not a problem for the time being.

I changed the desktop wallpaper again on #1 about a week ago. Nothing was out of the ordinary until today when I booted #1 and discovered that...without any prompting by me...it has reverted to the same wallpaper that I used previously. The image in use on #2 always remained the same.

Question: Is it not possible to maintain different wallpapers on separate computers if I am using the same MS account? If I want a different wallpaper, must I change both computers to use the same image? I'm not interested in forcing any kind of solution. I'm just wondering why it works the way it does. TIA.

 

[GrtArtiste]

Looks like I need to turn Theme Sync off on both computers. But that leaves me wondering why I was able to change the image on #1 in the first place, and why that change lasted for a week before it reverted to the prior image. Oh well.

 

[Superflan]

I believe I encountered this behavior when one of the computers needed to verify identity. From https://www.petri.com/windows-10-tip-verify-identity :

Quote
To verify your identity in Windows 10, you'll need to confirm a challenge/response code either via an alternate email address, or phone by SMS or call. In Windows 10, if you have 2FA set up on your Microsoft account, the device will be trusted automatically without any additional steps.

To verify your identity in Windows 10:

Open the Settings app from the Start menu.
Click Accounts in the Settings app.
On the Your info screen, if your identity needs to be identified on the PC, you'll see the option to Verify identity on the right.
Follow the on-screen instructions to confirm your