Archive for the ‘Windows 11’ category

2 Methods to Add or Remove Default Desktop Icons in Windows 11

April 17th, 2023 by Admin

Desktop only shows the Recycle Bin icon, even when right-clicking the desktop and seeing that the View -> Show desktop icons menu is checked? How can I get the “This PC” icon to show on the desktop? In this tutorial we’ll show you 2 simple methods to add or remove default desktop icons in Windows 11.

Method 1: Add or Remove Default Desktop Icons via Settings App

  1. Right-click an empty space on your desktop, and choose Personalize from the pop-up menu.

  2. When the Settings app opens to the Personalization page, click Themes on the right pane.

  3. Under the “Related settings” section, click the “Desktop icon settings” option.

  4. When the “Desktop Icon Settings” window appears, you can tick the checkbox next to each of the default icons you want to add to your desktop, and untick the checkbox to hide & remove a default desktop icon.

  5. Click OK to save your changes.

Method 2: Add or Remove Default Desktop Icons via Run Command Box

  1. Hold down the Windows Key and press R on your keyboard to bring up the Run box. Type the following command and hit Enter.

    desk.cpl ,5

  2. This will open the “Desktop Icon Settings” dialog immediately, where you can choose the classic icons you want to display or hide on the desktop. These available icons are Computer, User’s Files, Network, Recycle Bin and Control Panel. For example, if you deselect the checkbox next to “Computer”, it will remove the “This PC” icon from your desktop.

  3. Once done, click OK and you can see if the legacy desktop icons appear or disappear as you expected.

That’s it!

How to Enable and Use Desktop Stickers in Windows 11

April 14th, 2023 by Admin

If you’ve upgraded to Windows 11 build 22621, you can turn on the hidden feature “Desktop Stickers”, which allows you to personalize your desktop by adding funny stickers. In this tutorial we’ll walk you through the steps to enable and use desktop stickers in Windows 11.

Part 1: Enable the Desktop Stickers feature in Windows 11

  1. Open Registry Editor and browse to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\current\device. In the left side pane, right-click the device key and choose New -> Key.

  2. Name the new key as Stickers, and then select it. In the right pane, right-click the empty space and select New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value.

  3. Name the DOWRD as EnableStickers, and then double-click it and set the value data to 1.

  4. Close Registry Editor. You need to log off or reboot before the desktop stickers feature is activated. Whenever you need to disable the desktop sticker, just change the value data of EnableStickers to 0.

Part 2: Use Desktop Stickers in Windows 11

  1. Before getting started, open the Settings app and go to: Personalization -> Background, make sure the “Personalize your background” drop-down list is set to “Picture“.

    Note: The desktop stickers aren’t available for Sideshow, Solid color and Windows spotlight.

  2. Right-click the blank area on your desktop, and choose “Add or edit stickers” from the context menu.

  3. In the pop-up window, you will be presented with a list of stickers. Clicking a sticker will add it to your desktop.

  4. You can resize or move the stickers you’ve added to any location on your desktop. To save your changes, click the X button at the top to exit the sticker editor.

  5. The stickers will look as if they are part of the desktop wallpaper, and you’re unable to move or resize them until you open the sticker editor interface.

That’s it!

3 Steps to Install Windows Sandbox on Windows 11

April 13th, 2023 by Admin

How can I enable Windows Sandbox using Command Prompt? Need to set up a Sandbox environment for testing an unknown software? Windows Sandbox is an optional feature that allows you to run a lightweight virtual machine, so you can run potentially dangerous programs without letting them harm your system.

You can turn on Windows Sandbox using Control Panel. In this tutorial we’ll show you an easier way to install Windows Sandbox in Windows 11, by using PowerShell or Command Prompt.

How to Install Windows Sandbox on Windows 11

  1. Right-click the Start button on the taskbar, and choose Terminal (Admin) from the menu that appears.

  2. When Windows Terminal opens a PowerShell window, type the following command and press Enter.
    Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName "Containers-DisposableClientVM" -All

    If Windows Terminal opens a Command Prompt window, run this command instead:
    dism /online /Enable-Feature /FeatureName:"Containers-DisposableClientVM" -All

  3. When prompted to restart your PC, type Y to proceed. After installing Windows Sandbox, you can use the Start menu to find the Windows Sandbox and run it with admin rights.

    If you need to uninstall Windows Sandbox later, run the following command in an elevated Windows PowerShell window:
    Disable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName "Containers-DisposableClientVM"

    or execute this command in elevated Command Prompt to disable & uninstall Windows Sandbox:
    dism /online /Disable-Feature /FeatureName:"Containers-DisposableClientVM"

That’s it!

How to Enable and Use Snap Layouts in Windows 11

April 12th, 2023 by Admin

Is there an easy way to arrange all open windows on the screen without overlapping? If you need to work with multiple apps and see all windows side by side, the Snap feature can improve your productivity by splitting up your screen with multiple windows, without using Alt-Tab to switch between apps. In this tutorial we will walk you through the steps to enable the Snap windows feature and use snap layouts in Windows 11.

Part 1: Enable the Snap Windows Feature in Windows 11

  1. Open the Settings app by pressing the keyboard shortcut Windows + I, and then select the System category and click the Multitasking option.

  2. Turn on the Snap windows toggle, and click the arrow icon on the right side to expand the settings. Make sure you check at least the following options:
    • When I snap a window, suggest what I can snap next to it.
    • Show snap layouts when I hover over a window’s maximize button.
    • Show snap layouts when I drag a window to the top of my screen.

  3. Once you’ve finished the above steps, you can proceed to use snap layouts to arrange multiple windows on a single screen efficiently.

Part 2: Use Snap Layouts in Windows 11

  1. Hover the mouse over the maximize button of an app window, and you’ll see four predefined layouts. If you need to arrange only two open windows, the first two layouts are good choices. In my example, I have three windows open, so I’ll use the third layout. Hover over the zone of your desired layout to place the current active window.

  2. All your other apps will appear as thumbnails in the second zone of the chosen layout. Simply click an app thumbnail, and it will be resized and snap into this zone.

  3. Use the same method to place other apps in the other zones of the layout.

  4. Now your screen shows the different programs you’re using, and you can work with multiple windows at the same time. However, if a window can’t resize into a zone of your snap layout, it may cause overlapping.

That’s it!

2 Methods to Turn off Show Desktop Button in Windows 11

April 11th, 2023 by Admin

Is there a way to disable desktop peek in Windows 11? When you hover on the far right end of Windows taskbar, a thin vertical line will appear and you can click the “Show desktop” button to minimize all your active windows. If you rarely use it to peek at the desktop, you can remove it from the taskbar. In this tutorial we’ll show you 2 methods to turn off Show Desktop button in Windows 11.

Method 1: Turn off Show Desktop Button in Windows 11 via Settings App

  1. Right-click on the empty portion of the taskbar, and then select “Taskbar settings” from the pop-up menu.

  2. The Settings app will launch and take you to the taskbar settings page. Click the “Taskbar behaviors” section.

  3. Simply uncheck the “Select the far corner of the taskbar to show the desktop” option, it will turn off the Show Desktop button immediately.

Method 2: Turn off Show Desktop Button in Windows 11 via Registry Editor

  1. Open Registry Editor and navigate to the location: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced. Double-click the DWORD TaskbarSd on the right pane.

  2. In order to disable the desktop peek feature, change its valued data from 1 to 0, and click OK.

  3. Close Registry Editor. This change will take effect immediately and you’ll find that the Show Desktop button is missing from taskbar.

That’s it!

How to Change Printer Port to Fix Printing Issues in Windows 11

April 7th, 2023 by Admin

Printer connected but not printing? My HP printer used to work without any problems but now it will only print to file? These printing issues usually happen when an improper port is assigned to your printer. To fix such problems, you may need to change the printer port. In this tutorial we’ll walk you through the steps to change printer port in Windows 11.

How to Change Printer Port to Fix Printing Issues in Windows 11

  1. Press the Windows + I keys to launch the Settings app. Head to the Bluetooth & devices category, then click “Printers & scanners” on the right pane.

  2. Select the printer which you would like to change the port for.

  3. Under the “Printer settings” section, click the “Printer properties” option.

  4. When the printer properties dialog box opens, select the General tab and click the “Change Properties” button in the bottom left corner.

  5. Go to the Ports tab and you can see which port is currently associated with your printer. The nul: port is generally used for testing, while the local port is mainly for virtual printers, such as XPS. I recommend you assign a standard TCP/IP port to your physical printer.

    If the existing TCP/IP port points to a wrong IP address, just delete that port and then create a new TCP/IP port with the proper IP address, and assign it to your printer.

  6. After selecting the new port, click Apply and then OK. Hopefully your printer will work without printing issues.

That’s it!

Easy Ways to Delete Unused Printer Ports in Windows 11

April 6th, 2023 by Admin

How can I delete unwanted TCP/IP printer ports? If you keep changing printers, the inactive ports associated with your old printers are left behind and your system can become sluggish or even hang. In this tutorial we’ll show you 2 simple ways to delete unused or inactive printer ports in Windows 11.

Notes: The LPT, COM, Local and USB ports cannot be deleted. You can use the following methods to delete TCP/IP port and WSD ports with ease.

Method 1: Delete Unused Printer Ports Using Settings App

  1. Open the Settings app (Win + I), select the “Bluetooth & devices” category and then click “Printers & scanners” on the right side of the window.

  2. Scroll down to the “Related settings” section, click the “Printer server properties” option.

  3. Go to the Ports tab, select the port which you want to delete from the list, and then click the “Delete Port” button.

  4. Click OK to confirm. After deleting, you can assign the freed port to another device in future.

Method 2: Delete Unused Printer Ports Using Windows PowerShell

  1. Right-click the Start button on the taskbar, and select “Terminal (Admin)” from the pop up menu.

  2. When it opens a PowerShell window, type Get-PrinterPort and press Enter. It will display a list of printer ports that are installed on your computer. You need to write down the name of unused or old printer port.

  3. To delete a printer port, execute the following command. Replace “your_port_name” with the actual name of the printer port you want to delete.
    Remove-PrinterPort -Name "your_port_name"

  4. It will quickly free up the old port which is occupied by your printer.

That’s it!

3 Steps to Change the Scrollbar Width in Windows 11 or 10

April 3rd, 2023 by Admin

The vertical scroll bar in Windows 11 is very thin and how can I make the scroll bars wider? For touch screen users, you may want to make the scrollbar bigger so you can operate easier. In this tutorial we’ll show you how to change the scrollbar width in Windows 11 or 10, without using third-party software.

How to Change the Scrollbar Width in Windows 11 or 10

  1. Open Registry Editor and browse to the location: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics​. Double-click the DWORD ScrollWidth in the right pane to modify its value data.

  2. The default value of ScrollWidth is -255 and it is based on this formula: -15 multiplied by the width you want in pixels, so you can figure out the default width of the scrollbar is 17 pixels. To make the scrollbar wider, I would like to change it to 20 pixels, so I enter -300 in the Value data field and click OK.

    Note that the value of ScrollWidth should be between -120 and -1500. There is also a similar registry entry called ScrollHeight, which allows you to adjust the height of the scrollbar.

  3. Close Registry Editor. You need to log out of your user account and then log back in to see the changes.

That’s it!

2 Methods to Disable / Enable Slideshow on Windows 11 Lock Screen

March 29th, 2023 by Admin

Lock screen slideshow is not working in Windows 11? The options to set up a slideshow are greyed out? The slideshow feature allows you to set up a rotation of your album to display on the Windows lock screen. In this tutorial we’ll show you 2 methods to disable or enable the slideshow on the lock screen of Windows 11.

Method 1: Disable / Enable Slideshow on Windows 11 Lock Screen via Group Policy

  1. Open Local Group Policy Editor and browse to: Computer Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Control Panel -> Personalization​, then double-click the “Prevent enabling lock screen slide show” policy on the right pane.

  2. Choose the Enabled option to turn off the slideshow feature, or select “Not Configured” if you don’t want to prevent the slideshow feature.

  3. Click Apply and then OK. The change will take effect immediately. If you’ve disabled the slideshow feature, open the Settings app and go to: Personalization -> Lock screen, you’ll find that many slideshow settings are greyed out and you’re unable to add an album for your slideshow.

Method 2: Disable / Enable Slideshow on Windows 11 Lock Screen via Registry Editor

  1. Open Registry Editor and navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows. Right-click the Windows key in the left sidebar and choose New -> Key.

  2. Name the new key Personalization and select it. Next, right-click the blank area in the right pane and choose New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value.

  3. Name the DWORD NoLockScreenSlideshow, and then double-click it and set its value data to 1. This will disable the slideshow feature and prevent a slide show from playing on the lock screen.

    Whenever you need to enable the slideshow feature, just delete the NoLockScreenSlideshow entry and you’re good to go.

That’s it!

Easy Ways to Find Duplicate Files in Windows 11 / 10 / 8 / 7

March 16th, 2023 by Admin

How can I find duplicate files or images on my computer? After using the computer for a while, duplicate files may accumulate or clutter up your photo albums. If you are tired of duplicate files, you can use the following methods to quickly find duplicate files in Windows 11 / 10 / 8 / 7 so you delete them to free up disk space.

Method 1: Find Duplicate Files Using File Explorer

A duplicate file usually has the same name as the original file, but with the word “- Copy” in the file name. Using File Explorer you can easily find such types of duplicate files on your computer.

  1. Open File Explorer and browse to the location (for example, “This PC”) where may contain duplicate files. Enter the keyword “copy” in the Search box in the upper right-hand corner.

  2. Click the “Search options” button in the toolbar, make sure the “File contents” menu is unchecked.

  3. The system will quickly locate all folders and files which contains the keyboard “copy” in the file names. Then you may need to manually verify which files are duplicate.

Method 2: Find Duplicate Files Using Batch

  1. Open Notepad or other text editor, copy and paste the following code, then save the file with .bat extension and close it.

    @echo off
    setlocal EnableDelayedExpansion
    
    rem Group all file names by size
    for /R %%a in (*.*) do (
       set "size[%%~Za]=!size[%%~Za]!,%%~Fa"
    )
    
    rem Show groups that have more than one element
    for /F "tokens=2,3* delims=[]=," %%a in ('set size[') do (
       if "%%c" neq "" echo [%%a]: %%b,%%c
    )
    
    echo Press any key to exit
    set /p input=


  2. Move the newly-created .bat file to the location where you would like to scan for duplicate files, and double-click it to run the batch.
  3. It will check each file in the current folder and subfolders by file size. If two or more files have the same size, the batch will treat them as potential duplicate files, and display their file names in the same line but separated by a comma.

Method 3: Find Duplicate Files Using Freeware

If you want to find identical files in one or more directories with 100% accuracy, the freeware SearchMyFiles could be of help. This software is distributed as zip archive.

  1. Download SearchMyFiles from Nirsoft website. After unzipping, double-click the executable file in the extracted directory to launch the program.
  2. When the Search Options dialog box pops up, click the Browse button to add a target folder for finding duplicate files. If you want to scan duplicates across multiple folders or drives, just click the Browse button to add the locations one by one.

  3. Click the Start Search button. It will compare all files with equal size. When it find two or more files with identical content, they are added to the duplicates list in the main window.

  4. If you want to delete duplicate files, just select them and right-click to choose “Delete Selected Files” from the pop-up menu.

That’s it!