Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Question from Richard S.: Back in March 2011 I bought an HP Desktop computer with Windows 7 on it. I also bought a copy of Microsoft Office 2010 at the same time and got a discount on it because I bought it with the PC.
Now I want to upgrade Windows 7 to Windows 8.1, but I’m afraid that changing the Windows version will void my Office license since it came with Windows 7.
Can I safely upgrade my computer to Windows 8.1 without voiding my Office license?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
If you have ever had to re-install or upgrade Windows on a PC, chances are you have had to deal with “Unknown Devices” in the Device Manager.
These unknown devices are easy to spot because they are labeled with a small yellow shield that’s stamped with an exclamation point. In some cases they will even be labeled with the words “Unknown Device”.
We end up with unknown devices after completing a Windows installation if Windows failed to recognize one or more devices and install drivers for them. And unfortunately, this happens fairly often.
Oddly enough, Windows will sometimes recognize the device and install the driver if we ask it to perform a re-check. Here’s how to do it: [Read more…]
The guys and gals at Microsoft won’t tell you this, but it appears that they’ve grown weary of trying to rehabilitate the miserable reputation of Windows 8. And I believe in hindsight they know that miserable reputation was well-earned.
According to reports coming out of Redmond, Microsoft is planning to announce Windows 9 during the Build 2014 developer conference that’s coming up in April. [Read more…]
Question from Lisa: Whenever I click to open a folder on my laptop it will open up, then freeze for a LONG time. And it’s very annoying to say the least.
A little green bar will crawl across the top of the window, and when it finally makes it all the across the folder “unfreezes” and I can use it just fine.
How can I stop this from happening?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
Question from Aaron: The hard drive crashed on my Dell Inspiron 14z laptop so I took it to a guy I know who works on computers. He replaced the bad drive and installed a bootleg copy of Windows 7 since I didn’t have a set of recovery disks.
My question is if I buy a Windows 8 Pro upgrade will it make my Windows installation “legitimate”? I’m not out to rip off Microsoft, just get my laptop back “legal” with a fully working version of Windows.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]