S mode is the name of this restricted variant. Comes on surface and low end devices mostly. You need to do the "add microsoft account, go to the microsoft store to leave S mode, go through what is effectively a OS reinstall, create local admin account, remove MS account" dance if you want to convert to a regular windows install from it.
Yeah, thinking about this from a business strategy perspective... it doesn't seem smart to lose an existing and future customer by handicapping a low end device. Especially when removing windows and installing linux restores the device to its full capability.
Can't you just format the hard drive without ever booting into what's on it out of the box and install one of those "lite" Windows builds from rutracker that ditch all the non-essential parts?
On the systems this applies to, probably not. There's not a keyboard shortcut to enter the UEFI and the reboot into UEFI from the OS option requires real local admin access which in turn requires you to leave S mode first.
