Most people are NOT power users.
We all still need to get stuff done…
After many years of watching eyeballs widen when I do something on a Windows PC, my wife suggested it was time to make this video!
Without further ado, these are 20 time-saving tips and tricks so that you can get the most out of your puter time – and maybe even save your sanity in the process!
The Windows 11 22H2 feature release is out in the wild. Unfortunately, there are a few problems with it…
On my modern laptop, I upgraded to 22H2 and everything seemed to be going well…
Until I did a hard reboot a few hours after the upgrade was complete.
I got a Blue Screen before Windows even loaded with the message that my PC/Device needs to be repaired: The Boot Configuration Data file doesn’t contain valid information for an operating system.
Well, golly gee whiz Mr. Johnson, that’s just swell!! What to do now??
Well, this is a fun one.
One day, you go to run some application. Instead of loading like normal, you get this weird error stating that code execution cannot proceed because VCRUNTIME140_1.dll was not found.
The error message may have a slightly different name, but VCRUNTIME gives us a clue as to how to fix it – and fast!
Let’s take a peek…
These days, updating Windows is like playing Russian Roulette.
Microsoft keeps breaking things, and I have to continually figure out how to fix them.
I recently had ANOTHER problem with Windows Update.
After trying everything, this is the solution that finally worked for me!
Don’t worry: they’ll break it again soon enough!
So, this one is fun. All of a sudden, when you lock your puter, the “currently playing” video appears with playback controls on the lock screen.
Now, this might be a useful feature, except that in many cases it’s rather broken.
Both Chrome and Firefox on my puter will show the most recently played video on my lock screen – not one I’m currently watching.
This is pretty annoying because A) I don’t watch vids when my puter is locked and B) I don’t need the rest of the world to see what I’ve watched recently.
Fortunately, you can turn it off!
On the one hand, NVMe drives are blazingly fast. On the other hand, getting them to work with Windows – or even your BIOS – can be a bit of a nightmare.
I recently upgraded several computers that had SATA SSDs. I wanted to upgrade each one to an NVMe drive.
So, I used Paragon Hard Disk Manager and just copied the SATA C: to the new NVMe drive, upgraded the hardware in each puter, and then tried to boot: NO DICE!
Windows 10 kept giving me a blue screen at boot with the message: INACESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE.
Worse yet, it seemed the BIOS/UEFI wouldn’t even detect the NVMe drive properly. WTH?!
If you have an MSI puter that you upgraded to Windows 11, you probably noticed an annoying little error. Every time you boot up, you got a popup window that states:
UPDATEBIOS.exe could not be started. Do you want to view information about this issue?
So of course you click Yes, and then you get another error message.
Obviously, the problem has something to do with the built-in Dragon Center software trying to do a BIOS update check – and failing.
Not to worry – the fix is pretty simple!
If you have no idea why you might want Windows 11, you’re not alone.
Microsoft is terrible with the whole marketing thing.
Nevertheless, I happened to discover by accident a handy new feature in Win 11 just the other day.
How many more are hiding in the shadows just waiting to be found???
Windows 11 has been here for awhile, but it’s not available to everyone.
There is a list of requirements that are quite confusing – and changing.
What’s worse, certain Win 11 requirements seem like they’re too much trouble to fix. I mean, who wants to risk converting their MBR drive to GPT and borking everything?!
Well, it turns out it’s not that hard – if you have Scottie’s Guide To Making your PC work with Windows 11!!
Everybody needs a backup, but not everybody wants all their data stored in the cloud. Until now, File History was good enough.
Starting with Win 11, it’s effectively crippled to push everyone to use OneDrive. Ug.
So, what to do?
I’ll tell you what: Back up Windows like a Pro! The robocopy command and a handy script I wrote is all you need.
And it only takes 5 minutes to set up!
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