So, you get a new puter running Windows 10.
It’s speedy, and Windows 10 doesn’t look much different than Windows 7, so life is good.
But then you notice a little problem: Many new computers come with only the standard Recycle Bin icon on the desktop.
Computer / This PC is missing, along with Network.
Getting these icons back was a piece of cake in Windows 7, but it gets slightly more complicated in Windows 10 (naturally)…
OneDrive is Microsoft’s “cloud storage” for Windows. Beginning with Windows 8, it was installed by default.
If you didn’t want it, you could easily disable it.
Beginning with Windows 10 1703 – the “Creators Update” – the story changed a bit. OneDrive seems to keep popping up over and over.
Even if you tell OneDrive not to launch on startup, and even if you close it, it will still pop up in the latest version of Windows 10 at rather inconvenient times.
Now, in the past, the Group Policy Editor or a registry hack was required… But the good news is that it’s easier than ever to make OneDrive go away for good!
By now you’ve probably heard that the latest version of Windows 10, the Creators Update, was released to the masses on Tuesday, April 11, 2017.
This update is officially known as version 1703, which is supposed to represent 2017 March… And that explains why it was released in April 2017. Because, ya know, confusing people with meaningless numbers is always a good thing.
But anyway, the Creators Update is a full “upgrade” to Windows 10, which means a 3GB+ download in most cases, followed by an “upgrade install” of Windows 10 itself.
So, is it satanic? Does it work? What’s new? What about privacy concerns?
Read on!
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?
One of the best features ever in Windows is hibernation. You may never even have heard of this feature, but it’s one you should definitely know about – and use!
Of course, everyone is familiar with “Sleep mode”, and it’s probably what you’re already using. But there are certain advantages to hibernation, especially on laptops.
But what exactly is hibernation? How is it different than Sleep?
And most of all, why should you use it?
Everybody wants their Windows puter to start up faster.
We all know how painful it is to wait around for days while Windows reboots after applying updates, for example.
Of course, the #1 way to make your whole puter faster is to upgrade to an SSD.
But even with a super-fast SSD, Windows can still start to boot more slowly over time. Why? Startup programs!
So, how do you quickly and easily disable crap that runs at startup?
There’s a cool new feature in Windows 10 called Spotlight. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work much of the time.
Spotlight is an option for your Lock Screen where Windows will download new wallpapers in the background, and then show you a different purty image each time you go to unlock your puter.
It’s a very nifty feature, especially since the images are very nice.
But as I said, it doesn’t work at all much of the time.
Fortunately, there are two different ways you can fix this problem – without even needing Spotlight to work correctly!
Aside from all the hoopla about Windows 10 invading your privacy and sending your entire hard drive to Microsoft’s servers, there is another obvious question to ask: Is Win 10 gobbling up all of your internet connection’s bandwidth?
The answer may be yes, especially if you have a slower net connection.
I’m talking about the “Choose how updates are installed” option in Win 10. I did cover this in my post Protect your privacy in Windows 10, but I’m not sure it’s so obvious to everyone what this, “how updates are installed” option means in practical terms.
So, let’s take a look…
Windows 10 Anniversary Update, otherwise known as Windows 10 Version 1607, was released earlier this month.
Recent updates from Microsoft seem to indicate that only about 16% of machines running Windows 10 have actually been updated.
If you’ve got Windows 10, you’re going to get this latest update sooner or later. When you do, you’ll want to – once again – review your system’s settings to improve your privacy.
Fortunately, not much has changed…
You may have heard about “Bash on Ubuntu on Windows”. If not, you can check out my post on Bash for Windows 10.
First, you’ll need to make sure you have the Windows 10 Anniversary Update, which you’ve probably received automagically by now.
Then, you’ll need to manually install Bash on Ubuntu on Windows to get your bash prompt.
When you’re done, you’ll probably listen to Microsoft when they say “no GUI stuff!” on bash… But actually, you can set yourself up with a lovely development environment including git – and even gitk – right in Windows.
And it’s much easier than you might think…
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