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Showing posts from September, 2017

These Windows 10 Keyboard Shortcuts Will Save You Clicks

Any time you can hit a key combination instead of rolling your mouse pointer across the screen, you save a lot of time. Windows 10 has a long list of keyboard shortcuts that help you launch new features such as Cortana, navigate around the OS or organize your desktop layout with ease. While you might know some of the traditional Windows keyboard shortcuts, you will be surprised to find some new tricks below. Cortana Shortcuts Windows + Q: Opens Cortana's Home View, enables search by speech or keyboard input. Windows + C:  Opens Cortana's speech prompt New in Windows 10 Windows Key + A : Opens Windows 10 notifications Windows Key + I : Opens Windows 10 settings Windows Key + Ctrl + D : Creates new virtual desktop Windows Key + Ctrl + F4 : Closes current virtual desktop Windows Key + Ctrl + Left or Right:  Switches between virtual desktops Windows Key + F1:  Opens Edge and Searches "How do I get help in Windows 10" with Bing (formerly opens Help)

What can I do to fix DVD & CD Drivers problems?

Reinstall the DVD/CD driver via Device Manager Sometimes, Windows may save the driver files incorrectly. This can manifest as a driver error when the operating system tries to access the driver in question. In addition, registry-related issues and infestation of driver files by malware may make a driver inaccessible. Such issues can be resolved by uninstalling and reinstalling the concerned driver. Let’s take a look at the steps you need to follow to manually reinstall a DVD/CD driver in Windows: Click the  Windows  icon in the taskbar, and then click  Control Panel Double-click  Device Manager Double-click  DVD/CD-ROM drivers Double-click the driver that is causing trouble Click the  Driver tab Click the  Uninstall  button Follow the screen instruction to complete the uninstall If asked  restart your computer Next,  insert the driver disc  in your DVD/CD ROM and follow the onscreen instructions to reinstall the driver If you do not have the required driver disc, locate

The Definition Of Idle In Windows

When is a computer idle? A friend of mine asked me that question the other day after playing around with the Windows Task Scheduler for a while. One of the conditions in the Task Scheduler is the on idle condition which executes the given task if the computer has been idle for a given amount of time. But what exactly does it mean, idle? I had troubles answering that question. I knew that it had to do with the resource utilization and user interaction, but was not able to provide exact figures. That sparked my interest and I managed to get the data. Here is the definition of idle in the Windows operating system: The computer is considered to be idle by Windows if there has not been user interaction via the mouse or keyboard for a given time and if the hard drives and processors have been idle more than 90% of that time. The Task Scheduler in Windows 7 for instance considers the computer to be idle if the above states returned true for a period of ten minutes. There are a few

What’s the Difference Between AppData Roaming and Local?

If you’ve done some digging into the filesystem on your Windows computer, you may have come across the AppData folder. It’s hidden by default so most users won’t see it or have a reason to access it. Short for Application Data , many programs store their data in this directory. While essential installation files are kept in the Program Files folder, AppData stores the settings that you’ve personalized for your account. You can take a look at it if you want, though it’s not particularly interesting. Open a File Explorer window and enter the following into the address bar: C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData When you arrive at this folder, you’ll see three folders: Local , LocalLow , and Roaming . Why are there three different subfolders, and what are they for? The answer concerns domain-connected Windows computers, like in a business environment. Any data in the Roaming folder would follow a user if they logged into another domain-connected PC at their company. Examples inc

How to block Ads in windows 10

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The world we lived in is full of advertising and Windows 10 is no exception. Naturally, these Ads have left people frustrated and annoyed, in this article, I will show you how to get rid of them. Disable Ads on the lock screen Open Settings > Personalization > Lock Screen and set the background to " Picture"  or " Slideshow"  instead of Windows Spotlight. Turn off the "Get fun facts, tips, and more from Windows and Cortana on your lock screen". Block start menu Ads Open " Settings" , click on " Personalization" , click on " Start" , and then turn off the "Occasionally show suggestion in start".  Get rid of Nagging Taskbar Pop-ups If you'd like to just use your own preferred applications, take the following steps:  Go for Settings --> System --> Notification & Actions , and then disable "Get tips, tricks, and suggestions as you use Windows".  Do you mind Wi

Be Prepared: Create a Recovery Drive for Windows

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Windows 8.1 and 8 Use the Recovery Media Creator to create a USB recovery drive on Windows 8.1 or 8. Tap the Windows key on your keyboard to access the Start screen, type Recovery drive , and press Enter to open the “Create a recovery drive” tool. Insert your USB drive and go through the wizard. This tool also gives you the option to move your recovery drive to the USB drive, deleting it from your system drive. This can help free up disk space on devices with small amounts of storage, but you’ll need the USB drive to refresh or reset your PC in the future. Windows 7 Windows 7 doesn’t allow you to create USB recovery media. You’ll have to create system repair disc on a CD or DVD. Press the Windows key to open your Start menu, type System Repair Disc , and press Enter to open it. A system repair discallows you top access tools like Startup Repair, which can fix problems that prevent your operating system from booting. On Windows 8, you can press Windows Key + R, type r

How to Troubleshoot Network Issues

The first place you should visit when you run into a network issue is the Command Prompt. We’ve already taken a look at the most important commands for networking, so we’ll summarize two of them here. First, ipconfig provides information about your current connection. One of the most useful entries here is the IPv4 Address — any address beginning with 169 means that your computer isn’t receiving a valid IP address from your router. Second, use the ping command to send a few packets of information to a remote server. Add the -t flag and it will continue to ping until you stop it. This is a much more efficient way to check if you’re connected to the internet than refreshing a web page over and over. A good address to ping is 8.8.8.8 — one of Google’s DNS servers. Typing ping 8.8.8.8 -t will try to reach a Google server every few seconds until you press Ctrl + C to stop the command.

Wise Folder Hider 4.22

Wise Folder Hider Pro keeps on its improvements, and the newly released notes are as follows: Minor tweaks and bug fixes. GUI and usability improvements. Updated various translations. More about Wise Folder Hider Download Wise Folder Hider

Wise Care 365 V4.72 was released

Wise Care 365 keeps on its improvements, and the newly released notes are as follows: Improved the feature of PC Checkup. Minor GUI improvements. Updated various translations. More about Wise Care 365 Download Wise Care 365

Disable Windows Defender Real-Time Protection in Windows 10

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Starting with the Windows 10 Anniversary Update in the Summer of 2016, Windows Defender can actually run alongside another antivirus app. When you install another app, Windows Defender itself isn’t disabled—just its real-time protection component is. That means your third-party app handles real-time protection, but you can still run a manual scan with Defender whenever you want. If you want to make sure that Windows Defender’s real-time protection is disabled—or re-enabled after uninstalling a third-party antivirus app—hit Start, type “defender,” and then select “Windows Defender.” In the main “Windows Defender” window, click the “Settings” button in the top right of the window. You’ll be presented with the “Settings window.” Note that you can also get here from Settings > Update & Security > Windows Defender. Just make sure that the “Real-time protection” toggle is set the way you want. There is one more thing you should be aware of regarding Wind

How to Turn Off Wi-Fi When Connecting Ethernet in Windows 10

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Windows does not turn off the Wi-Fi connection automatically when you connect an Ethernet cable. You have to do it manually — unless you use this nifty method that’s easy enough to do even if you aren’t tech-savvy. Disabling Wi-Fi When Ethernet Is Plugged In We will have to make a simple change to your network adapter settings. Before going ahead with these instructions, make sure you’re connected to Wi-Fi internet. Go to the System Tray icon and click on Open Network and Sharing Center . Alternatively, you can also type ncpa.cpl in the Run box and open your Network Connections. Click on the adapter icon for your connected Wi-Fi connection. The Wi-Fi Status window is displayed. Click on Properties . In the Wi-Fi Properties box, select the Network tab and click on the Configure button. In the new window, switch to the Advanced tab. All the Wireless Adapter Properties are displayed as a list. Go through the list and select the Disable Upon Wired Connect property. Now,

How Much Free Space Should You Leave on Your Windows PC?

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The 15% Rule of Thumb for Mechanical Hard Drives You’ll commonly see a recommendation that you should leave 15% to 20% of a drive empty. That’s because, traditionally, you needed at least 15% free space on a drive so Windows could defragment it. If you don’t have 15% free space, Windows won’t be able to properly defragment the drive. Windows will only partially defragment the drive, and it will grow increasingly fragmented over time. However, this just applies to mechanical hard drives that need defragmentation, and not the solid-state drives generally found in more modern PCs. The 25% Rule of Thumb for SSDs Is Probably Too Conservative Solid-state drives traditionally needed a large chunk of available free space, too. They slow down over time as they’re filled up. In 2012, Anandtech recommended leaving 25% of a solid state drive empty to avoid a decrease in performance based on their testing. However, modern solid state drives are “overprovisioned”. This overprovisioning

Wise Driver Care 2.1.908 is released

Wise Driver Care keeps on its improvements, and the newly released notes are as follows: Fixed a minor bug of Driver Restore. Improved PC Checkup feature. Improved Driver Backup. Added new language - Czech. More about Wise Driver Care Download Wise Driver Care  

How Much Free Space Should You Leave on Your Windows PC?

There’s no specific number or percentage that fits every Windows PC. All Microsoft will tell you is that you need 20 GB of space before you install a 64-bit Windows 10 system on a modern PC. After that, you’re on your own. The rules of thumb can help. If you have a mechanical hard drive, leaving at least 15% of it empty can reduce fragmentation in newly created files and make it easier for Windows to properly defragment the drive, which is something modern versions of Windows do automatically in the background. If you don’t leave enough empty space, Windows won’t be able to move files around to defragment them and the contents of the drive will become fragmented and slower to access over time. If you have an SSD, this doesn’t apply. If you have an SSD, leaving at least 25% of the SSD empty will ensure you have excellent performance. On modern SSDs with overprovisioning, this is probably much too conservative, and even 10% could be an okay number. It really depends on the

What Does the System Reserved Partition Do?

The System Reserved partition contains two important things: The Boot Manager and Boot Configuration Data:  When your computer starts, the Windows Boot Manager reads the boot data from the Boot Configuration Data (BCD) Store. Your computer starts the boot loader off of the System Reserved partition, which in turn starts Windows from your system drive.  The startup files used for BitLocker Drive Encryption:  If you ever decide to encrypt your hard drive with BitLocker drive encryption, the System Reserved partition contains the necessary files for starting your computer. Your computer boots the unencrypted System Reserved partition, and then decrypts the main encrypted drive and starts the encrypted Windows system. The System Reserved partition is essential if you want to use BitLocker drive encryption, which can’t function otherwise. Important boot files are also stored here by default, although you could store them on the main Windows partition if you preferred.

Wise Reminder - Manage Your Schedule as a Memo

Wise Reminder is a simple program, through which we will not forget about upcoming events. This tool can be used at work or in daily life. The interface of Wise Reminder is easy-to-use and simple. On the left side, you will find two tabs, which allow you to see the list of completed and unfinished tasks. On the right side, there is a list of duties that we have already done or should do in the coming time. Under the name of each task there is also an indication of how much time we have left to execute it. Adding more "task" to the application is very simple, so Wise Reminder also can be handled by less experienced computer users. When the time for the task is over, a window will appear on the screen. If our day plan is tight and we are very busy, we can use the snooze function to extend the reminder. Just click the "remind me later" button and select the appropriate time (e.g. 5 minutes or 2 hours). Wise Reminder runs in the background and consumes little

How to Roll Back a Driver from Device Manager

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Drivers can be particularly problematic. If you roll back a driver or install a different one yourself, Windows Update will continue downloading and installing that specific driver over and over, overwriting your preferred driver whenever it checks for updates. We’ll talk about how to stop that in a moment, but first, let’s talk about how to roll back the driver. To roll back a driver, right-click the Start button at the bottom-left corner of your screen or press Windows+X and select Device Manager to launch the Device Manager. Locate the device whose driver you want to uninstall, right-click it, and select “Properties”. Click the “Driver” tab and click “Roll Back Driver”. The option to roll back a driver was added in Windows 10’s Anniversary Update. Previously, you had to uninstall the device from your system and delete the driver so you could reinstall the original driver.

Fix Runtime Errors in Internet Explorer

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What is a Runtime Error? A runtime error is a software or hardware problem that prevents Internet Explorer from working correctly. Runtime errors can be caused if a website uses html code that is not compatible with the web browser functionality. Which runtime error do you need to fix? The solution to "runtime error" messages in Internet Explorer is different depending on the type of runtime error that you receive. Note This article provides a resolution only for an error message that looks like the following: Error A Runtime Error has occurred. Do you wish to Debug? Line: line number Error: nature of script error   Resolution Because this type of error message does not apply to you, you can prevent it from appearing. To do this, follow these steps in Internet Explorer: Click the Tools button , and then click Inter

Wise Registry Cleaner V9.47 was released

Wise Registry Cleaner keeps on its improvements, and the newly released notes are as follows: Fixed some issues from the users' feedback. Minor GUI improvements. Updated various translations. More about Wise Registry Cleaner Download Wise Registry Cleaner

How to Start a Command Prompt as an Administrator

This topic describes how to open a command prompt with full administrator permissions. If your user account is a member of the Administrators group, but is not the Administrator account itself, then, by default, the programs that you run only have standard user permissions. You must explicitly specify that you require the use of your administrative permissions by using one of the procedures in this topic. Administrative credentials To complete these procedures, you must be a member of the Administrators group. To start a command prompt as an administrator Click  Start , click  All Programs , and then click  Accessories . Right-click  Command prompt , and then click  Run as administrator . If the  User Account Control  dialog box appears, confirm that the action it displays is what you want, and then click  Continue . To start a command prompt as an administrator (alternative method) Click  Start . In the  Start Search  box, type  cmd , and then p