Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Like it or not, the future of Windows computers lies in Windows 10.
After all, Windows 7 is scheduled to officially be abandoned by Microsoft in January 2020.
Windows 8.1 will be around for a couple years longer but it’s scheduled to be abandoned as well in January 2023.
Windows 10 has been slowly increasing its foothold in the marketplace for a while now, and according to the latest stats from NetMarketShare it’s now running on over half (50.99%) of all the world’s personal computers.
Do you have a laptop or desktop PC that has a touch screen, but you prefer to use only the mouse and keyboard for navigation and selecting items on the screen?
If so, you can easily disable the touch screen in order to prevent accidental “clicking” with your elbow or an errant finger.
Follow the steps below to disable the touch screen in either Windows 8.1 or Windows 10: [Read more…]
Do you still have a laptop or desktop PC that’s running Windows 8.1?
If so, you should know that Microsoft ended the “Mainstream Support” cycle for that version of Windows on January 9.
In a nutshell, that means they won’t be releasing any new feature updates for Windows 8.1.
However, they will continue releasing security updates and major bug fixes throughout the “Extended Support” cycle (which is scheduled to end on January 10, 2023). [Read more…]
Question from Kevin B.: When Windows 10 was released I installed it, but I also decided to also keep Windows 8.1 so I could boot into either version at any time.
I had been booting into Windows 8.1 every now and then to access some files I have on there, but I recently discovered that the Windows 8.1 installation is no longer activated because its product key was transferred to Windows 10.
I guess that means I won’t be using Windows 8.1 any longer.
How can I have my computer skip the Boot Menu and boot directly into Windows 10? I’d just delete the Window 8.1 partition but I have a bunch of files in there that I don’t want to lose.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
Question from Jacinda P.: The other night I was typing away when the File Explorer window popped into view. I closed it and thought nothing of it at the time.
The problem is I must have hit something to make the Ribbon disappear in File Explorer because it’s been gone ever since that night. I feel like such a dummy!
I use the ribbon a lot and I really miss it. Can you tell me how to get it back? My computer is an Acer All-In-One with Windows 10.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]