Computer Tips Archives - Rick's Daily Tips

How to bypass the Logon screen in Windows 10

Posted on April 21, 2019

By default, Windows 10 displays a Logon Screen requesting that you enter a password before it will finish booting up into Windows, and it will display this screen even if you haven’t created a password for your user account.

Dealing with the Logon Screen can be an unnecessary annoyance if you know you are the only person that will ever have access to your computer.

Luckily, Microsoft made it fairly easy to configure Windows 10 to skip the Logon Screen and have the machine boot straight to the Desktop. Here’s how: [Read more…]

Five free programs that will keep your PC running like new

Posted on April 20, 2019

As you probably know, Windows computers tend to slow down over time due to junk build-up on the hard drive, malware infections and various other reasons.

Today I’m going to tell you about five powerful free downloads that you can use to keep your PC running just as fast as the day you bought it:

Note: The programs listed are all available in both free and premium versions. I recommend that you download the free version of each. [Read more…]

6 tips for doing your own Tech Support for most any tech problem

Posted on April 20, 2019

I often hear from readers how much they hate having to contact “Tech Support” when an issue arises with their computer or one of their other gadgets.

As you probably know, calling Tech Support is usually about as much fun as having a tooth pulled without numbing it first.

Well, truth be told, the Tech Support experience is intentionally designed to be frustrating because most companies would rather have you resolve the issue on your own instead of contacting their Support personnel.

Luckily, there are a few things you can try that just might help you resolve your issue without having to call Tech Support at all: [Read more…]

How to select text on a Windows tablet so you can copy it

Posted on April 18, 2019

I’ve been answering questions on Quora for a while now, and as you might expect some questions tend to get asked over and over on there.

For example, I recently answered the following question (for the third time) over there:

“How can I select text to copy using a Windows tablet?”

That’s a great question so I thought it might be a good idea to also answer it on here.

There are actually two different ways to select text on a Windows tablet, depending on how you prefer to use it: [Read more…]

17 Linux applications to replace some of the most popular programs that run under Windows

Posted on April 17, 2019

A while back I wrote a post entitled Give an old PC new life by replacing Windows with Linux as a means of extending the useful life of older PCs.

After that post was published I received a number of emails asking for a list of Linux programs that can replace the Windows programs they’d leaving behind if they made the switch.

I decided that it might be a good idea to publish that list in its own blog post, and here it is: [Read more…]