Tag: upgrade | Scottie's Tech.Info

Windows 10 Buffet: Fixing a failed upgrade to the latest version

It’s been several months since Windows 10 1709 was released. Even now, not all puters out there have received the update. As with all versions of Win 10, Microsoft rolls them out slowly over time.

Sometimes, you might not get the latest version because of some incompatibility or other issue. Other times, maybe your internet sucks and it just takes a long time to download 3GB in the background!

In any case, you’ll get the update soon enough – but that doesn’t mean it will work.

The following is my collection of fixes that usually work to convince a puter to successfully install the latest flavor of Windows 10…

Upgrade your motherboard without reinstalling Windows 10

You’ve upgraded to Windows 10. All is well.

But then one day, you decide to upgrade your motherboard, processor, and RAM…

With Windows 7, you didn’t have anything to worry about. Most likely, Windows would reactivate after your upgrade, and if it didn’t, an automated phone call to Microsoft was all it took to get back up and running.

But then came Windows 10: You now have a digital entitlement, which then changed to a digital license, which means… ??? Furthermore, until recently your ONLY option was to reinstall everything.

So how the heck do you reactivate Windows 10 after a major hardware upgrade?

Microsoft gives you Windows 10 whether you like it or not

Ooooh, man…

Well, it’s finally happened: Microsoft is basically tricking users into installing Windows 10.

That’s right. You now have to be VERY careful if you don’t want Win 10 to automagically download and install.

By now, we’re all used to M$ making decisions for us, but this one is just a bit over the top.

For the time being, there are still ways around it – but I’m not holding my breath…

Scroll inactive windows: The best reason to upgrade to Windows 10

For those of you who have been avoiding the free upgrade to Windows 10, there is one very good reason why you might want to rethink your plans.

The most obvious reason is that apparently, Windows 10 will no longer be a free upgrade after July of this year. And one way or another, eventually you will get a new puter, and the only supported OS will be Windows 10, anyway…

But if that doesn’t convince you, how about this: Windows 10 let’s you scroll inactive windows just by hovering the mouse pointer over the window.

What on Earth am I talking about?

Quick Fix: My Favorites are missing after Windows 10 upgrade

If you used Internet Explorer in Windows 7 or 8, all your bookmarks were saved in your Favorites folder.

After the upgrade to Windows 10, you may discover that in the new version of IE, called Microsoft Edge, your favorites are missing!

You’d think the import of your bookmarks/favorites would happen automatically during the Windows 10 upgrade, but alas…

Not to worry though, because it’s a piece of cake to restore all of your missing Favorites!

Windows 10: What you need to know

In just 10 days, Microsoft will officially unveil their latest OS, Windows 10.

Windows 10 comes after the much-hated Windows 8, so many people are wondering if it’s actually worth the upgrade.

I can’t tell you if the upgrade is right for you, because I’m not sure I even have the final build as a “Windows Insider” (I have been testing Win 10 builds on my laptop as they are released for some time now).

I can tell you some simple facts that will help you make up your mind, and hopefully cut through some of the rather ridiculous hype that has popped up in recent days related to the new OS.

SSD: How to upgrade your computer with a Solid State Hard Drive

If you haven’t seen Part 1, it’s here:

SSD: Why you need to upgrade your computer with a Solid State Hard Drive

With Part 1 out of the way, you’ve decided to take the plunge. Great!

How do you actually do the upgrade? Well, that can get a bit complicated.

There are a few things you’ll need to know before you even think of a DIY upgrade.

After covering those, I’ll discuss a few options for the different upgrade cases you might encounter.

SSD: Why you need to upgrade your computer with a Solid State Hard Drive

Everyone is always looking to make their computer faster, whether they realize it or not. Usually, it’s only after an upgrade that we realize just how pokey our machine was running beforehand.

These days, there isn’t a huge difference between a 2-year-old computer and a brand new one. Oh, sure, newer puters will always be faster… But unless you’re doing something hardcore like video editing or gaming, you probably won’t notice much of a difference.

There is one upgrade, though, that makes a huge difference pretty much across the board: the addition of an SSD.

At this point, you probably have 2 questions:

What is an SSD?
How do I add one to my puter?

Severe GRUB Problem in Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwhal

If you’re using Ubuntu Server 10.10 and you get the upgrade notice for 11.04 “Natty Narwhal”, you might want to hold off a bit before taking the plunge and typing “do-release-upgrade”.

It seems there is a rather severe problem with GRUB 2. If you have a RAID setup – and even if you don’t – GRUB may not load at all upon reboot, leaving you with a bricked server.

There doesn’t seem to be a fix for it. In fact, I do believe the name of the release should be changed to “Nasty Narwhal”.

Here’s the scoop.

Save Time and Preserve Your Sanity with Windows Easy Transfer

Easy Transfer If you’re like me, when it comes time to upgrade Windows or the hardware inside a computer, you do things the old fashioned way: you manually copy all the user’s desktop, settings, and data onto a backup drive, and then restore it all after the upgrade.

Recently I have discovered a much, much easier and faster way to do the same thing. It’s called Windows Easy Transfer, and it’s present in Vista, Windows 7, and you can even install it on an old XP box. Best of all, it comes with Windows.

While it won’t transfer programs themselves from the old machine onto the new, it will save you a lot of time and frustration. Since Microsoft isn’t very big on explaining how it all works, I decided to share my recent experiences to illustrate just how handy it is.

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