Archive for the ‘Others’ category

How to Enable USB Write Protection in Windows 10, 8 and 7

October 1st, 2016 by Admin

Worry about someone copying files off your PC via USB drive? The most common solution is to disable or restrict the usage of USB ports. In this tutorial we’ll show you another way to enable write protection of all USB drives that are connected to your Windows operating system.

How to Enable USB Write Protection in Windows 10, 8 and 7?

Press the Windows key + R to open the Run box. Type regedit and press Enter.
This will open the Registry Editor. Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control
Right-click on the Control key in the left pane, select New -> Key. Name it as StorageDevicePolicies.
Select the StorageDevicePolicies key in the left pane, then right-click on any empty space in the right pane and select New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value. Name it WriteProtect.
Double-click on WriteProtect and then change the value data from 0 to 1.
The new setting takes effect immediately. Every user who tries to copy / move data to USB devices or format USB drive will get the error message “The disk is write-protected“. We can only open the file in the USB drive for reading, but it’s not allowed to modify and save the changes back to USB drive.

So this is how you can enable write protection to all connected USB drives. If you want to disable write protection at a later time, just open Registry Editor and set the WriteProtect value to 0.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8

Tags: enable write protect usb drive how to enable usb write protect

7 Ways to Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10

September 30th, 2016 by Admin

Windows includes a disk-cleanup utility that’s helpful for freeing your computer from temporary and unnecessary files. In this tutorial we’ll show you 7 ways to open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10.

disk-cleanup

Method 1: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 from Run

Press the Windows key + R to open the Run box. Type cleanmgr and press Enter. This should be the quickest way to open Disk Cleanup utility in Windows 10, 8 and 7.

cleanmgr-via-run

Method 2: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 Using Cortana Search

Just click the Cortana Search icon in the Windows 10 taskbar and type disk cleanup. Click the Disk Cleanup shortcut appeared at the top of the list.

Method 3: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 from Control Panel

Open Control Panel in Large icons view in Windows 10. Click Administrative Tools.

administrative-tools

From there you can then see the Disk Cleanup shortcut.

disk-cleanup-in-control-panel

Method 4: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 from Command Prompt

Open the Command Prompt in Windows 10. At the Command Prompt, type cleanmgr and press Enter to launch Disk Cleanup.

disk-cleanup-via-cmd

By default the cleanmgr command will clean your system drive only. If you want to run disk cleanup for your other partition, type:
cleanmgr.exe /d D:

Note: Replace D: with the drive you want to clean up.

Method 5: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 from Drive Properties

Open File Explorer in Windows 10. Right-click on the drive (or partition) that you want to regain hard drive space, select Properties from the drop-down menu.

When the Drive Properties dialog opens, click the General tab. From there you can click the Disk Cleanup button to free up space on your drive.

drive properties

Method 6: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 Using File Search

Open File Explorer and browse to the root directory of your Windows partition. Type cleanmgr in the search box at the top-right of the window.

Double-click on the cleanmgr.exe program from the search result.

Method 7: Open Disk Cleanup in Windows 10 from PowerShell

Open the PowerShell in Windows 10. Type cleanmgr and press Enter.

cleanmgr-powershell

That’s it!

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Tags: open disk cleanup windows 10 windows 10 disk cleanup

5 Ways to Remove the Administrator Password in Windows 10

September 27th, 2016 by Admin

Do you want to clear the administrator password and let Windows boot directly into the desktop? How to remove Windows 10 password if you’ve forgotten it? In this tutorial we’ll show you 5 ways to remove the administrator password in Windows 10.

Option 1: Remove Windows 10 Administrator Password from Control Panel

Open the Control Panel in Large icons view. Click on User Accounts.
Under the “Make changes to your user account” section, click Manage another account.
You’ll see all the accounts on your computer. Click the account you’d like to remove the password for.
Click the “Change the password” link.
Enter your original password and leave the new password boxes blank, click on Change password button. It will remove your administrator password immediately.

Option 2: Remove Windows 10 Administrator Password from Settings

Open the Settings app by clicking its shortcut from the Start Menu, or pressing Windows key + I shortcut on your keyboard.
Click on Accounts.
Select Sign-in options tab in the left pane, and then click the Change button under the “Password” section.
Next, enter your current password and click Next.
To remove your password, leave the password boxes blank and click Next.

Option 3: Remove Windows 10 Administrator Password from Command Prompt

Open up an elevated Command Prompt.
At the Command Prompt, type the below command and press Enter.
net user Administrator *
When you’re prompted to type new password, just press Enter twice and it will remove your Windows administrator password.

Option 4: Remove Windows 10 Administrator Password Using Local Users and Groups snap-in

Press Windows key + R to launch Run, type lusrmgr.msc and click OK.
When the Local Users and Groups snap-in opens, click Users from the left pane, then right-click the Administrator in the center pane. Select Set Password.
Now click Proceed in the following window.
Leave the New password and Confirm password boxes empty and click OK. This will remove your Windows user password instantly.

Option 5: Remove Windows 10 Administrator Password Using PCUnlocker

PCUnlocker is a handy Windows password removal tool that runs from a boot disk. It allows you to remove forgotten Administrator password for any Windows-based PC you can get physical access to.

Start by burning the PCUnlocker ISO file onto a CD (or USB flash drive) using the freeware ISO2Disc.
Boot your locked computer from the CD.
Once booted to the PCUnlocker program, select the Administrator account and click on “Reset Password” button.
This will remove your forgotten Windows administrator password quickly. Reboot your computer without CD, you can then log into your Windows 10 administrator account without a password.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10

Tags: clear windows 10 password remove windows 10 administrator password remove windows 10 password remove windows administrator password

How to Reset Installed Apps to Default in Windows 10

September 26th, 2016 by Admin

If an app crashes repeatedly, freezes or doesn’t work properly on your PC, Windows 10 allows you to reset the app to the default settings. Although you’ll lose your preferences and sign-in details from the app that causes problem, resetting it can be helpful in certain situation. In this tutorial we’ll show you to reset your installed or built-in apps to default in Windows 10.

How to Reset Installed Apps to Default in Windows 10?

Open the Settings app by clicking its shortcut from the Start Menu, or pressing Windows key + I shortcut on your keyboard.
Click on System.
On the left side of the window, click on Apps & features. You’ll see all the apps and programs you’ve installed on your computer. Find an app you want to reset, and click on it. Then click the “Advanced options” link under the app’s name.
Click the Reset button to reset an app’s settings.
You’ll have to click the Reset button to confirm you want to clear the app’s data and sign-in details. After a while you’ll be told that the app has been reset.

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Tags: reset default apps in windows 10 reset windows 10 apps windows 10 app reset

3 Ways to Remove / Disable Action Center in Windows 10

September 24th, 2016 by Admin

In Windows 10, Action Center can be accessed by clicking the square speech bubble icon located on the right-hand side of the taskbar. Action Center shows you your latest notifications, emails, updates and app messages all appear in a drawer that pulls out from the right hand side of the screen.

If you hate having to clear annoying notifications all the time, or you feel like the Action Center is useless, you can get rid of it. In this tutorial we’ll show you 3 ways to remove / disable Action Center from the taskbar in Windows 10.

Method 1: Disable Windows 10 Action Center Using the Settings app

Open the Settings app either by clicking its icon in the Start Menu or pressing Windows + I keyboard shortcut.
Click on Personalization.
Select Taskbar from the left-hand navigation, and then click the link titled “Turn system icons on or off“.
Toggle the switch against Action Center to the Off position. This will remove & disable the Action Center icon right away.

If you’re running an old build of Windows 10, follow these steps:

Open the Settings app.
Click on System.
Click the “Notifications & actions” category on the left. On the right, click the “Turn system icons on or off” link.
To remove Action Center icon from taskbar, toggle Action Center to Off.

Method 2: Disable Windows 10 Action Center Using Group Policy

Open the Local Group Policy Editor. Navigate to: User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Start Menu and Taskbar.
On the right-hand pane, find the “Remove Notifications and Action Center” policy and double-click it.
Select the Enabled radio button, and click OK to disable the Action Center.

Just restart your system to make the changes take effect.

Method 3: Disable Windows 10 Action Center Using Registry Editor

Open the Registry Editor. Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer
Right-click any empty space on the right pane and select New > DWORD (32-bit) Value. Name it DisableNotificationCenter. Next double-click on it and give it a value of 1.
Exit Registry Editor and restart your computer. The Action Center icon has completely disappeared from the taskbar. If you want to bring it back in future, follow the same instructions but set the DisableNotificationCenter value to 0.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10

Tags: disable action center windows 10 remove action center windows 10 windows 10 action center windows 10 disable action center notifications

How to Remove Shortcut Arrow from Desktop Icons in Windows 10 / 8 /7

September 23rd, 2016 by Admin

By default, Windows places a small arrow in the bottom left corner of the desktop shortcut icon. The arrow can help you distinguish a shortcut from an application or file. If you are not happy to see the shortcut overlay icon, you can get rid of it completely. In this tutorial we’ll show you how to hide / remove shortcut arrow from desktop icons in Windows 10/8/7.

How to Remove Shortcut Arrow from Desktop Icons in Windows 10 / 8 /7?

Open the Registry Editor. When prompted Do you want to allow this app to make changes to your PC? Choose Yes.
In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons

If the Shell Icons key does not exist you’ll need to create it. To do so right-click the Explorer key in the left pane, then select New > Key and name it Shell Icons.
In the right pane of the Shell Icons key, right-click on any empty area, and select New > String Value. Name it 29.
Double-click the 29 entry to modify it. In the Value Data box, copy and paste the following:
%windir%\System32\shell32.dll,-50
Click OK and exit Registry Editor. Reboot your computer and you should no longer see the little arrow in your desktop shortcuts. That’s it!

Problem of Black Square:

Everything worked just fine but after a second shut down, all shortcut icons have a blank square superimposed over the lower left side.

To fix this issue, just open the Registry Editor and navigate to KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons. Double-click the 29 entry in the right pane, leave Value Data empty and click OK.

Reboot your computer and it should work now!

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8

Tags: hide shortcut arrow windows 10 remove arrow from shortcut icon windows remove shortcut arrow windows 10 remove shortcut arrow windows 8

How to Backup and Restore Device Drivers in Windows 10 / 8 / 7

September 21st, 2016 by Admin

Every time you reinstall Windows, you have to download and install drivers again. But what to do if you don’t remember where you downloaded all your individual drivers from, or you lost the disc provided by your computer vendor? Luckily Windows comes with a built-in command line tool – DISM, which can make a backup of all installed drivers from a working PC.

In this tutorial we’ll show you how to use the DISM command to backup your device drivers and then restore them in Windows 10, 8 and 7, no need to use any third-party software.

Part 1: Backup Third Party Device Drivers

Open the Command Prompt as administrator.
Type the following command at the Command Prompt and press Enter.
dism /online /export-driver /destination:C:\drivers-backup

Replace the destination path (“C:\drivers-backup“) with the actual folder where you will store the drivers. It can be a folder on a separate partition or USB thumb drive. Make sure that folder is created before you run the above command.
It begins to grab the drivers from your system drive and store them in your destination location. When it’s done, your destination folder will be filled with the driver files (.inf, .cat, .sys).

Part 2: Restore & Install Device Drivers

Once you’ve reinstalled Windows, you can manually restore and install the driver from your previous backup. Follow these steps:

Open Device Manager. Due to lack of driver installation, some devices have a little yellow question mark over its icon, and they should have more descriptive names.
Select a device from the device tree, right-click on it and select “Update Driver Software” from the drop-down menu.
In the pop-up window, you will see two options. Click Browse my computer for driver software.
Click on Browse to find the location of the driver files you backed up previously and click Next. Make sure the “Include subfolders” option is checked.
After a while you’ll see the message saying “Windows has successfully updated your driver software” and now the device name should be displayed correctly.

Updated: This method also works with Windows 11. However, there are other ways available for you to restore Windows device drivers from Command Prompt rather than Device Manager.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8

Tags: backup and restore drivers backup drivers windows 10 how to backup device drivers in windows

3 Ways to Hide or Show Email Address on Windows 10 Login Screen

September 20th, 2016 by Admin

By default, Windows 10 will display your email address (if you’re using a Microsoft account) on the login screen. However, none of us would want everyone to see our email address when at public place with our computers. In this tutorial we’ll show you 3 ways to hide or show email address on Windows 10 login screen.

show-or-hide-email-on-login

Method 1: Hide or Show Email Address Using Settings App

To get started, you need to open the Settings app. Click the Start button in Windows 10 and select Settings, or press the Windows key + I keyboard shortcut.
On the main Settings screen, click on Accounts.
Click the “Sign-in options” tab on the left-hand side. On the right-hand side, scroll down to the Privacy section and you will see the option named “Show account details (e.g. email address) on sign-in screen“. By default, the option is turned on. Toggle the switch to turn off it if you want to hide your email address on Windows 10 login screen.

However, those computers running old builds of Windows 10 probably don’t have the “Show account details (e.g. email address) on sign-in screen” option. In that case, you need to use the methods below to hide / show email address on the sign-in screen.

Method 2: Hide or Show Email Address Using Group Policy

Open the Local Group Policy Editor in Windows 10. In the left-hand pane, drill down to Computer Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> System -> Logon.
On the right pane, find the “Block user from showing account details on sign-in” policy and double-click it. Set it to Enabled if you need to hide email address on the login screen, or set it Disabled or Not Configured if you allow email address displayed at the sign-in screen.
When finished, exit the Local Group Policy Editor and restart your computer to test the changes.

Method 3: Hide or Show Email Address Using Registry Trick

If Local Group Policy Editor is not available in your Windows system, this registry hack can help you tweak the group policy setting. Both of these methods work in the same way, but the Group Policy Editor is a bit more user-friendly.

Open the Registry Editor in Windows 10. Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\System
Find the BlockUserFromShowingAccountDetailsOnSignin value on the right pane and double-click it. Set the Value Data to 1 if you want to block Windows 10 show email address on the login screen. Or set the value to 0 and this will leave your email address visible at the sign-in screen.

Note: if the BlockUserFromShowingAccountDetailsOnSignin value doesn’t exist, right-click on the empty space to create a new DWORD (32-bit) Value and name it with BlockUserFromShowingAccountDetailsOnSignin.
Exit Registry Editor and reboot your computer. When you come to the login screen, you can check if your email address is shown or hide on Windows 10 login screen.

Notes:

If you’ve turned on the “Show account details (e.g. email address) on sign-in screen” option through the Settings app but your email address is still not shown at login, it’s possible that you’ve enabled the group policy “Block user from showing account details on sign-in“.

If you want to hide both your name and email address from the login screen, then you need to take use of the “Interactive logon: Do not display last user name” group policy.

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Tags: Block user from showing account details on sign-in email address shows on windows 10 log in screen hide email address on windows 10 login hide email address on windows 10 sign-in Show account details on sign-in screen

How to Take Ownership (Permission) of Protected Registry Key in Windows 10

September 20th, 2016 by Admin

Sometimes you might encounter some registry keys that are protected by Windows. When you try to edit, rename or delete a protected registry key or value, you’ll get one of the following errors:

“Cannot edit {value_name}: Error writing the value’s new contents.”

“The Registry Editor cannot rename {key_name}. Error while renaming key.”

“Unable to delete all specified values.”

“Cannot delete {key_name}: Error while deleting key.”

error-edit-registry-value

Even you’re logged in as Administrator, you might still lack permissions to edit a protected registry key. In such cases, you need to take ownership of that particular key and grant full permissions to your signed-in account. This step-by-step tutorial will guide you how to take full ownership of protected registry key in Windows 10.

How to Take Full Ownership of Protected Registry Key?

To start, press the Windows logo key + R on your physical keyboard, type regedit and press Enter to open the Windows Registry.
Navigate to the protected key you want to take ownership of. For this example, we chose the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SystemProtectedUserData\S-1-5-21-1176301877-597599738-4051979053-1001\AnyoneRead\Logon
Right-click on the protected key, and select Permissions from the context menu that appears.
In the Permissions window that appears, Click Advanced.
In the Advanced Security Settings dialog, you can see the current owner (SYSTEM or “TrustedInstaller“) of your selected key. Click on Change button.
This will open a new dialog box. Now type your user account name, and then click on “Check Names” button to convert the username to correct format. Click OK.
Now you’ll see that your user account is showing up as the owner. Check the “Replace owner on subcontainers and objects” option if you also want to take ownership of the subkeys. Click OK.
When back to the Permissions window, select the desired user name and then check Allow checkbox under the Full Control row, and click OK.

If your user account is not shown under the Group and user names list, click on Add button.
Close Registry Editor. Now you’ve taken ownership of a protected registry key and grant your account full permissions. That’s it!

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Tags: change registry permissions take ownership of registry key take ownership of windows registry take ownership registry windows 10

8 Ways to Open Computer Management in Windows 10

September 19th, 2016 by Admin

Computer Management is a handy console included in Windows that allows you to view event logs, partition your hard drive, manage the devices and services, etc. In this article we’ll show you 8 ways to open Computer Management in Windows 10.

Option 1: Open Computer Management from Start Menu

Click the Start button, select All Programs -> Windows Administrative Tools, and then click on the Computer Management shortcut.

Option 2: Open Computer Management by Right-clicking My Computer

Right-click on This PC icon on your desktop (or on the left pane of File Explorer), select Manage from the context menu. This will launch Computer Management in Windows 10.

right-click-this-pc

Option 3: Open Computer Management from Run

Press the Windows logo key + R to open the Run box. Type compmgmt.msc and press Enter to open the Computer Management console.

compmgmt

Option 4: Open Computer Management by Pressing Win + X Keys

Press the Windows logo key + X to open the power user menu. Then click the Computer Management shortcut.

Option 5: Open Computer Management from Command Prompt

Open the Command Prompt in Windows 10, type compmgmt.msc and hit Enter.

open-compmgmt-via-cmd

The Computer Management console will start immediately.

Option 6: Open Computer Management Using Cortana Search

The fastest way to open Computer Management in Windows 10 is to use the Cortana Search. Click on Cortana Search box from the taskbar, enter the words “computer management” and then click the Computer Management shortcut.