How-To Geek

We’ve covered several solutions for accessing your desktop remotely over the Internet, including TeamViewer and VNC. However, if you have a Professional edition of Windows, you already have Windows Remote Desktop installed.

Windows 8’s advanced startup tools function differently than the tools on previous versions of Windows. If your Windows 8 system can’t boot properly, the tools will appear automatically so you can fix the problem.

Windows 8 allows you to create a recovery drive (USB) or system repair disc (CD or DVD) that can be used to troubleshoot and restore your computer. Each type of recovery media gives you access to Windows’ advanced startup options.

If you’re not sold on the functionality of the now ubiquitous Windows key, can you reassign it to a more useful task? Read on to see how.

Installing RAM should be as simple as placing the new RAM into the slots and powering on your computer. However, a number of issues – both hardware and software related – can cause problems when installing new RAM.

If you’re a recent convert to Windows 8, you might be missing speedy access to your recently accessed items/documents. Read on to see how you can still access your recent activities.

Windows 8 has a new File History backup system that replaces Windows 7′s backup tools. However, Windows 8 still contains the Windows 7 backup tools. They’re particularly useful for creating full system image backups.

We have already shown you how flexible the Linux shell can be, but that’s not to say Windows is any further behind. Here’s two techniques you can use depending on your shell preference, cmd or PowerShell.

Start Windows in what?!!

Windows Live Mesh is set to shut down on February 13, 2013. If you still depend on Windows Live Mesh, you’ll need to find some alternatives soon. Remember to download your files before the deadline, too!

One of the noticeable changes in Windows 8 was the exclusion of the Wireless Profile manager that was included in Windows 7. While there are a lot of third-party tools to change the priority of the networks you connect to, we’re going to show you how to do it natively in Windows 8.

You know your computer isn’t cutting edge, but there’s no need for Windows 7 to constantly remind you. Read on to see how you can disable its constant nagging to adjust your color scheme to improve performance.

Nearly every component of Windows 8 can be customized to suit your needs, some settings however are buried deep into the registry.

Windows 8 includes a built-in antivirus solution that runs in the background. You might, however, be surprised that there is no obvious way to scan an item on demand. Here’s how to launch the Windows Defender GUI as well as add a scan option to the context menu.

Have you ever searched for an app only to find that its not available in your country? Luckily for us there is a work around for the Windows Store.

By default notifications in Windows 8 are set to display for 5 seconds, however, you may want them to stay around for a bit longer.

Windows is quite adept at telling you if you have a properly functioning Internet connection, but how exactly does it do so? Digging into how Windows handles the problem offers insight into Windows connectivity messages.

Windows 8 comes with a new Hybrid Boot feature, which decreases boot times. But from time to time you may find you need to do a classic, full shutdown. Here’s how to do just that without disabling Hybrid Boot.

Robocopy, or “Robust File Copy,” is a command line directory replication tool from Microsoft. It is available as part of Windows 7 and Vista as a standard feature, and was available as part of the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit.

By default Windows 8 only allows you to pin a few file types to the Start Screen. Read on to find out how you can change that by editing the registry.

If you often open a lot of applications at once, a virtual desktop program can help you keep all those windows on your desktop organized. A virtual desktop program allows you to put open applications into separate virtual desktops, cutting down on your desktop clutter.

We’ve all had programs crash on us in Windows at one time or another. You can take the time to manually start the program again, or you can have a simple program like ReStartMe restart it automatically for you.

If you have ever upgraded your Windows installation without formatting, you have probably come across the Windows.old folder which houses all the files from your previous installation. Here’s how to use it to restore your files.

Who doesn’t love animations? They make everything look so cool. But in some cases, animations are a distraction, and the same is true for Windows 8′s start screen (the “Modern UI”). Fortunately, there’s a very simple way to disable all those animations. Keep reading to find out how it’s done.

You might be surprised to see us reviewing a Windows 8 book, especially considering we recently launched our own book, The How-To Geek Guide to Windows 8 – but since we don’t (yet) have a paperback version, we may as well give you another option.