Windows 10, by default uses a simple user picture with a grey background and the persona image represented by white curves. The user picture is visible during sign in, as well as in the Start menu as a small rounded thumbnail image. This post explains how to replace the simple user avatar/image with any other image of your choice. After completing the procedure below, new accounts use this image by default.Read more
Change Drag & Drop Sensitivity to Avoid Accidental Move of Files
Is your mouse or touchpad too sensitive which causes accidentally dragging of items on your desktop or File Explorer when clicked/tapped? By default, if you drag a file or folder by a distance of 4 pixels and release the mouse button, the default “drag and drop” action (move or copy, depending on whether you are dragging it to another folder on the same drive, or to a folder on another drive.) will take place.Read more
How to Clear Background (Wallpaper) History in Windows 10
When you change the desktop wallpaper, Windows remembers the file name and path of the last four wallpapers. The Personalize page (“Choose your picture”) displays the thumbnail image of five wallpapers; first thumbnail image is usually the current background, followed by thumbnails of previous four background images. This post tells you how to clear the wallpaper history using Registry Editor.Read more
Add “Settings” Cascading Context Menu on the Desktop in Windows 10
Microsoft has moved most of the Control Panel features into the Settings UI in Windows 10, and at some point the classic Control Panel may be removed altogether. The Settings panel has different categories: System, Devices, Phone, Network & Internet, Personalization, Apps, Accounts, Time & language, Gaming, Ease of Access, Cortana, Privacy, Update & security, and Mixed reality.Read more
How to View Your Windows 10 Product Key Using Script or Command-line
There are many tools to extract the Product Key from a live system or from the registry hive of an offline computer. Additionally, here is a neat little Vbscript that gets the Product Key of your current Windows installation–no third-party program required. The script works on Windows 7, 8 and Windows 10.Read more
Pin Any File or Folder to the Taskbar in Windows 10
Windows 8 and Windows 10 lets you pin folders to the Start screen, but pinning data files and folders to the taskbar is not allowed. The context menu entry Pin to Taskbar never exists for data files and folders. However, here is a neat little trick that lets you pin any file or folder (directory) to the taskbar.Read more
How to Replace Notepad With Notepad++ or Any Other Text Editor?
Notepad is a light-weight program suitable for users who need only very minimal text editing features. For additional features and functionalities, third-party editors like Notepad++ and Sublime Text are awesome with a lot of features built-in.
If you’re looking how to completely replace the plain old Notepad with Notepad++ or any third-party editor, this post tells you how to do it. Notepad++ is a free source code editor and Notepad replacement that supports several languages. Let’s see how you can replace Notepad with Notepad++ without replacing any system files.Read more
[Windows 10] “The Username or Password is Incorrect” Error at Every Restart
After installing a Feature Update like Fall Creators Update, you may face yet another weird issue. Whenever the computer is restarted, the first screen that may show up even before the login screen is: “The username or password is incorrect. Try again.“Read more
State Repository Service High CPU Usage in Fall Creators Update
After clean installing Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, some users face a problem where the State Repository Service consumes high CPU usage (anywhere between 20% to 100%) when an external link is clicked in Microsoft Edge. The system may stall for 20-30 seconds and then the link is opened.Read more
Windows 10 Media Creation Tool Error 0x80072f76 – 0x20017
When you run the Media Creation Tool (MCT), you may see the error 0x80072f76 - 0x20017:
There was a problem running this tool.
We’re not sure what happened, but we’re unable to run this tool on your PC. If you continue experiencing problems, reference the error code when contacting customer support. Error code: 0x80072F76 – 0x20017
We’re not sure what happened, but we’re unable to run this tool on your PC. If you continue experiencing problems, reference the error code when contacting customer support. Error code: 0x80072F76 – 0x20017
How to Disable Automatic redirection of unsupported sites in IE to Edge
Since Windows 10 version 20H2, Internet Explorer redirects users to Microsoft Edge (Chromium) when they visit websites that don’t support Internet Explorer. Microsoft Edge Chromium version 84 and higher have this feature.
Many modern websites have designs that are incompatible with Internet Explorer. When the Internet Explorer user visits an unsupported website (e.g., Facebook, Internet Archive, etc.), the user may get a message stating the website is incompatible with Internet Explorer.
Starting with Microsoft Edge version 84, Microsoft Edge supports this new capability that automatically redirects users from Internet Explorer. To make this switch possible, Edge installs a Browser Helper Object (BHO) that hooks into Internet Explorer. Microsoft also maintains a compatibility list of websites for this purpose.
On redirection to Microsoft Edge, the user is shown why the website is being redirected. The dialog also allows the user to import the browsing data, cookies, bookmarks, preferences, etc., from IE to Microsoft Edge.
This article explains how to disable the automatic redirection of unsupported sites in Internet Explorer to Microsoft Edge Chromium.Read more
Windows 7 Stuck at “Checking for Updates” Screen and Consumes High CPU
Your Windows 7 computer may hang or get stuck when checking for updates, and consume high CPU time, thus bringing the system to a halt. This happens even though you have the Windows 7 SP1 installed.
This post tells you how to fix the problem.Read more
What is PortableBaseLayer Partition in Windows 10 Disk Management
After upgrading to Windows 10 version 1903 (Codenamed “19H1”), the Disk Management window may show an additional drive named PortableBaseLayer of size 8191 MB (8 GB) When the PortableBaseLayer drive is right-clicked, all the options (except Properties) are grayed out. PortableBaseLayer also shows up in the defragmenter (“Optimize drives”) window as a virtual hard disk. … Read more
How to Prevent Installing Extensions in Microsoft Edge
It’s been more than a year since the Windows 10 Anniversary Update was released and Microsoft Edge got extensions support. To date, there are only 60+ Edge extensions available at the Windows Store, which is very less compared to the number of extensions available for mainstream browsers like Chrome or Firefox. Also, there are non-Store extensions that you can side-load into Edge.
Note: Information in this article does not apply to the new Microsoft Edge (Chromium). It’s applicable to the old Microsoft Edge browser only.
