Corrupted Chunks in Minecraft [Fix]

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

There’s nothing worse for a Minecraft player than for his long-developed world to have corrupted chunks. This is, luckily, not as common, especially if you stick to the vanilla version.

Though chunk corruption happens more often, and it’s usually followed by game crashing. So, here we are with the ways to find and fix corrupted chunks in Minecraft.

How do I fix a corrupted chunk in Minecraft?

1. Erase the corrupted chunks

If you don’t have any saves, you can erase the corrupted chunks and allow Minecraft to regenerate them. This would be instant in most cases.

fix corrupted chunks minecraft

Of course, if you’ve built something there, we’re afraid it will be gone afterward. So, you might want to consider the next option in this case.

2. Use a dedicated tool

For users who get a corrupted region chunk in the Minecraft world, the best way to deal with it is by using one of the numerous third-party tools. You can either load the previous backed-up version and fix those affected chunks in no time.

The best tools you can use to fix corrupted chunks in Minecraft are:

3. Disable the mods

Another thing you should consider is disabling mods, as some of them might be the reason for the corruption in the first place. Remember, this helps prevent future corruption of chunks in Minecraft, but won’t fix the current ones.

In addition, if you’re loading a newer world with an outdated client, corruption is almost imminent.

While you can delete the chunk manually by using the correct coordinates, and it just re-explores him later, the most reliable way is to stick with the MCEdit tool. Just run it, and you’ll see all modded blocks causing the chunk corruption.

Before you leave, do check some quick tips to reduce CPU usage by Minecraft, and subsequently improve the computer’s performance.

If you have anything to add to this explanation, we encourage you to do so in the comments section below.

Repair Corrupt HTML Files: Recover Them Using Notepad

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

Working with any file, including the HTML, requires timely backups. Some users got themselves in a tricky position as the files got corrupted for some reason. If the HTML file is corrupted, you must repair it.

If we’re not looking at the encoding error, there’s hardly anything you can do. However, if the encoding made the text all scrambled, we have a quick solution to get things up and running.

How do I fix a corrupt HTML file?

Tip icon Tip
The chances that your HTML file will get corrupted are pretty low. Still, it’s always suggested to create multiple backups of all your projects and save them in different locations. There’s only a slight chance you’ll be able to recover corrupted HTML files if they’re not properly saved.

Using Notepad

  • Open the document and cycle through all available encoding schemes until you find the one which fits the current scheme.fix corrupt HTML file
  • If that doesn’t help, you can use (if available) the File History feature. This way, you can restore an older version of the HTML file before the corruption occurs.

When facing the problem, you can utilize some tools within the editing tools (Notepad ++ or Microsoft Word) to try and fix the corruption. Though, we won’t hold our hopes high!

In addition, sometimes the tool won’t be able to decode the character if you’ve copy-pasted special characters or concatenated (linked) two different encoding schemes.

If that doesn’t help, start over, and don’t forget to back up your files timely to avoid data loss in the future and eliminate the need to repair a corrupt HTML file.

Before you leave, check the best HTML5 editors for Windows and get one today!

In case you’re aware of an alternative way to deal with the HTML corruption, do tell us in the comments section below.

How to use 2 USB headphones at once on Windows 10/11

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

Different needs require different approaches. For example, some users fancy using two USB headphones at the same time instead of sticking with one. However, this isn’t as simple as it sounds.

There’s a way to use a standard 3,5mm jack headphones and a USB, but using two USB headphones at once on Windows 10 requires some tweaking. We made sure to explain 3 possible ways to achieve that below.

How to set up and use two USB headphones at the same time on PC

  1. Use system resources
  2. Try with the Audio VoiceMeeter Banana
  3. Acquire audio USB splitter

Method 1 – Use system resources

This might or might not work depending on a variety of things, but some users managed to replace the input device for a playback device. That way, in theory, you should be able to use two playback devices simultaneously without any issues.

However, have in mind that headphones won’t perfectly sync and you’ll experience a slight delay on the second playback device (headphones in this case).

Here’s how to use system settings to enable two USB headphones at once on Windows 10:

  1. Right-click on the Sound icon in the notification area and open Sounds.
  2. Choose the Playback tab and select the first headphones as your default playback device.
  3. Now, move to the Recording tab.
  4. Right-click on the empty area and enable “Show disabled devices“.
  5. Right-click on Stereo Mix and enable it. If you can’t find it, just install the latest Realtek sound drivers and codecs.
  6. Double-click on the Stereo Mix to open Properties.
  7. Choose the Listen tab in Properties.
  8. Check the “Listen to this device” box and select your second headphones from the drop-down menu.listen tab stereo mix choose default playback device
  9. Now, open Advanced tab and uncheck the “Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device” and confirm changes.disable Allow applications to take exclusive control of this device

Method 2 – Try with the Audio VoiceMeeter Banana

There are tons of software tools for both professionals and casual users out there. Some of them allow you a lot of freedom when it comes to tweaking audio output or input on your PC. In addition, they allow you to use multiple output devices, like headphones, and this seemingly worked for many users.

The application we run into the most is Audio VoiceMeeter Banana. This is a free-to-use virtual audio device mixer and it grants users with a myriad of features. Also, it includes an option to create multiple output devices and use, like in this scenario, two USB headphones at the same time on Windows 10.

Here’s how to do it in a few steps:

  1. Download Audio VoiceMeeter Banana, here.
  2. Extract the ZIP content into a new folder and run the application.
  3. Set up the first audio input (headphones 1) as Headset 1.
  4. Set the second audio input (headphones 2) as Headset 2.
  5. Proceed to select the output 1 and 2, as well.
  6. Try it out.

Method 3 – Acquire audio USB splitter

Finally, if the software leaves a lot to be desired, the hardware should address this. There’s a variety of USB splitter, both for audio jack and USB devices. They are mostly inexpensive and can mean a lot in the right circumstances. We suggest going for the more-affordable solutions if you’re a casual user who just wants some dual-headphone action on their Windows 10 PC.

Of course, if you want to use two USB headsets on PC without a splitter, then use one of the two solutions listed above and skip the third one.

And, on that note, we can conclude this article. In case you have anything to add or take, do tell us in the comments section below. We always look forward to your feedback.

RELATED STORIES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

New Chrome tech support scam freezes the browser and Windows 10 OS

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Time to welcome in the New Year and what better way than for a bunch of scambags to try and con us out of our hard-earned Christmas money with a Chrome bug. Fortunately, you need not worry… all is not lost.

This is pretty much your run-of-the-mill Chrome bug tech support scam; although, as support scams go, it’s a pretty good one.

Here is what happens

If your browser gets infected, here’s what happens. You’ll get a pop-up saying something along the lines of:

—————————————————————–

Confirm Navigation

YOUR ISP HAS BLOCKED YOUR PC

ERROR # 258D3

Call Microsoft immediately at (a big telephone number)
Do not ignore this critical alert.
If you close this page, your PC access will be disabled to
prevent further damage to our network.

—————————————————————-

There is more but you get the gist, I think. It then goes on to say a load of other nonsense about how your credit card details, your ISP account login details, and photos stored on your PC are being stolen.

Your Christmas photos may be at risk

I like that last bit about the photos. I’m guessing that works well on people who have got dodgy pics of horrible Christmas photos of jumpers or hook-ups at the office party. Personally speaking, if anyone was stealing my photos, they’d probably pay me to take them back. But as usual, I am digressing.

Cyber Security

Basically, this entire Chrome bug works in a loop. This means that every time you close your browser, it immediately opens up again, displaying the same message. While this is happening, the malware uses more of your CPU, giving you the impression that your PC has indeed been hacked.

How to fix this

Of course, this is all rubbish, so before you go spending a fortune on nothing, here are a few steps you can do to fix it.

Press ctrl + alt + delete to bring up the Task Manager. The ‘Processes’ tab should be showing (click on it if it isn’t). Then select Google Chrome and right click your mouse. Click ‘End task’ (or click ‘End task’ in the bottom right-hand corner of the window) and Chrome will close down.

When you open your Chrome browser again, you may get a notification asking you whether you would like to restore your tabs. Don’t say yes or you will just open the same Chrome bug, which means that you will have to go through the whole process again.

How to avoid these types of scams

In case you want to be secure while surfing the internet, you will need to get a full-dedicated tool to secure your network.  Install now Cyberghost VPN and secure yourself. It protects your PC from attacks while browsing, masks your IP address and blocks all unwanted access.

For those of you who are wondering how to avoid these kind of scams, the answer is easy. You will never get a pop-up like this from Microsoft (or anyone else) demanding money. If you ever get something like this, just follow the steps above to end the task.

If you are still nervous as to what to do, go on another computer, and search for the information about the attack. Or just head over directly to Windows Report as I am sure we will have written something about it.

Wrapping it all up

At the end of the day, these types of attacks look pretty scary, but they are pretty primitive. A few simple steps usually gets rid of them, and as long as you are running anti-scambag software, the chances that you will have to pay to sort things out are pretty much nil.

Anyone been hit by this particular Chrome bug (or anything else similar)? Let us know what it was in the comment box below, and if it was a stubborn son-of-a-gun to get rid of, what you did. Thanks.

RELATED ARTICLES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

7 ways to fix CtHelper.exe high CPU issues on Windows 10

Posted on by Ivan Jenic

7 methods to fix CtHelper.exe high CPU usage

  1. Disable CtHelper.exe auto-start function
  2. Use MalwarebytesAdwcleaner
  3. Clean up computer with “cleanmgr” (Disk Cleanup)
  4. Use System Restore
  5. Run SFC scan
  6. Install the latest Windows updates
  7. Uninstall & Reinstall CtHelper.exe’s Creative Sound Blaster

If you are having the issue of CtHelper.exe high CPU on your computer, this article is for you. CtHelper.exe is an executable computer file, installed alongside Creative Sound Blaster (a sound card) which is a product of Creative Technologies, a renowned digital solution company that specializes in the production of computer sound and video boards.

What is CtHelper.exe?

The file is an essential third-party component of computer’s audio system, especially on Mac and a host of Windows versions. It is also an automated process that runs in the background.

Is CtHelper.exe a virus?

CtHelper.exe is often misconceived by many as a virus. However, the file is not a virus; rather, it is an utility file. Nevertheless, various forms of malicious contents are known to attack computers, ranging from malware to trojan to spyware. These files often adopt similar name and file size as CtHelper.exe on your computer system (especially on Windows). As such, it could cause significant damage to your computer, in the guise of being a CtHelper.exe file.

In light of the foregoing, malicious files can result in the “Cthelper.exe high CPU” issue, by building up irrelevant entries on the file, which use more CPU space.

While CtHelper.exe file is normally harmless, it exposes computer systems to a host of errors and external attacks, ranging from malware attack to the more significant high CPU error, which can affect the overall performance of a computer system.

In this article, we have compiled some solutions, which can be adopted to fix the issue of “CtHelper.exe high CPU” and other related errors on your computer.

Aside the more significant CtHelper.exe high CPU issue, there are other CtHelper.exe errors, which can disrupt the overall performance and functionality of your system. Some of these errors include:

  • CtHelper.exe failed
  • CtHelper.exe application error
  • CtHelper.exe Not found
  • CtHelper.exe is not running
  • Cannot find CtHelper.exe

Some of the above outlined errors are caused by corrupt CtHelper.exe Windows affiliate programs, incomplete installation of Sound Blaster, malware or trojan attack and more.

However, as emphasized above, the most notorious of these errors is the CtHelper.exe high CPU issue. You can try the methods listed below to fix it.

How to fix CtHelper.exe high CPU issues

Method 1: Disable CtHelper.exe auto-start function

Cthelper. exe is notorious for dominating a computer’s CPU space. It basically utilizes CPU in excess, and most times, it runs your CPU up to full capacity (100%), thereby inundating your system. To fix this issue and reduce CPU usage, you need to remove the automation capability of the file by disabling it from starting on boot. To do this, follow the steps below:

  • Boot up your computer system, navigate to the “Start” menu and open it.
  • Under the menu, select “Run”.
  • Type in “msconfig” (system configuration utility) in the space provided and click enter.
  • Navigate to the “Startup” bar and click on it.cthelper.exe high cpu
  • Under the options brought forth, locate the CtHelper.exe checkbox.
  • Clear the checkbox
  • Press “OK” and exit the utility configuration program.
  • Restart your system and you are all set.

Upon restart, the CtHelper.exe will not start with your computer and you can rest assure that there will be no unnecessary build up on your CPU.

Method 2: Use MalwarebytesAdwcleaner

MalwarebytesAdwcleaner is one of the most reliable malware cleaning tools for Windows. It can be adopted to detect and remove malwares disguising as CtHelper.exe from your system.

Follow the steps outlined below to run the program on your computer system.

  • Download malwarebytesAdwcleaner and install it on your system.
  • Open the program by right-clicking the icon and selecting the “Run as Administrator” option.
  • Select the “Scan” option to commence the scanning operation.
  • After the scan, select the “Clean” option
  • After the clean up, shut down your system and restart it.

The above outlined process should clear any malware on your system, including the one affecting your CtHelper.exe file. Nevertheless, you can try a host of other malware clearing tools like Emsisoft, CCleaner, and others.

Clearing malicious contents on your computer system would normally increase the operability of your system. However, accumulated non-malicious junk files and programs would still be present and this could, in a way or another, result in the CtHelper high CPU issue. Hence, it is recommended you clean up your system.

Method 3: Clean up computer with “cleanmgr” (Disk Cleanup)

Accumulated files and programs could be a pain in the ass. Most of these are usually retained or left over files from web browsers, system or installed apps. If this log of unsolicited files is left to build up, it can disrupt the operability of CtHelper.exe.

With this, the file uses more CPU space than normal, thereby resulting in CtHelper.exe high CPU issue. The in-built tool for cleaning up system log is “Disk Cleanup“.

Follow the steps below to run the Disk Cleanup (cleanmgr) program.

  • Boot up your Windows device and click on the “Start” button.
  • Type “cleanmgr” in the displayed box.cthelper.exe high cpu
  • On the pop up checkbox options, check the boxes of files you want to clear
  • Tap “OK”
  • Restart your system

— READ ALSO: Fix: High CPU temperature in Windows 10

Method 4: Use System Restore

If the CtHelper.exe file on your device is occupying excessive CPU space or it encounters other errors, you can easily restore your computer system to an earlier settings.

This will clear recent files and modifications, and restore your system to when everything was working perfectly. This is essentially a Windows function, and you can run it on all Windows devices, ranging from Windows XP to Windows 10.

Follow the steps below to execute the system restore process on your computer system.

  • Open your computer.
  • Navigate to the “Start” button and click on it.
  • Enter “System Restore” in the search box.
  • Select “System Restore” on the pop up results.system restore breakpoint has been reached
  • Input your password
  • Follow the guidelines in the “Wizard”
  • Select “Restore”

This action will set your system back to an earlier time, and every unwanted latest files would be cleared. This would, no doubt, reduce your computer’s CPU space.

Method 5: Run SFC scan

SFC is a Windows tool, designed to assist you in scanning corrupt files on your system. As such, SFC is able to check for CtHelper.exe errors, including excess CPU usage.

Follow the steps below to run a system file check.

  • Power up your system and click “Start”.
  • Input “command” in the provided space. Don’t press enter yet.
  • Press Ctrl+Shift and Enter, simultaneously
  • Select “Yes” in the pop up dialog
  • Type “sfc/scannow” in the open box and click “Enter”.cthelper.exe high cpu
  • Wait (the scan often takes a few minutes).
  • Follow the command prompt after the scan
  • Restart your system.

The system checker will scan your computer’s CtHelper.exe file and other programs for errors. Any detected error is fixed and automatically restored by the SFC tool.

You can also try the next method, if this one doesn’t work for you.

Method 6: Install the latest Windows updates

Windows is regularly updated by Microsoft, and the primary function of these updates is to improve the overall performance of computers. In this case, installing the latest update could be the ultimate solution to the CtHelper.exe high CPU issue and other related errors.

Follow the steps below to check for updates and install them on your Windows computer systems.

  • Open your computer and locate “Start”.
  • Click on the “Start” button and locate “Windows Update” or you can simply search for the keyword – Windows Update.cthelper.exe high cpu
  • This will reveal to you if there is any available update. If update is available, select “Install Updates” and wait for it (it takes a few minutes).
  • Your computer would automically restart upon successful installation.

If the above method is unable to fix CtHelper.exe error and reduce the file’s CPU usage, you can then adopt the next (last) solution.

Method 7: Uninstall & Reinstall CtHelper.exe affiliated program – Creative Sound Blaster

If, after exhausting all available options, you are still battling with the issue of CtHelper.exe high CPU and other related errors, you can try uninstalling & reinstalling the CtHelper.exe-affiliated program.

Note: Procedures for uninstalling programs differ across Windows boards. As such, each Windows version has its specific means of running this operation. For convenience, we’ll stick with Windows 7.

To uninstall the Sound Blaster on Windows 7, follow the steps below.

  • Open computer and click “Start”
  • Tap on “Control Panel”
  • Select “Programs”
  • Select “Programs and Features”Programs and Features
  • Locate the CtHelper.exe file proprietary program (Sound Blaster).
  • Click on the program and select “Uninstall”.
  • Follow the command prompt to complete installation
  • Reinstall the program

Conclusion

CtHelper.exe is a utility file, which is an associated function of Sound Blaster; an essential component of a computer’s audio system. The file is known to occupy significant CPU space, which could run up to 100%. This is the basis for the CtHelper.exe high CPU issue.

This post has provided a total of eight solutions, which can be adopted to solve the CtHelper.exe high CPU issue and other related errors on your computer. Depending on your system specs, one or more of the solutions should work for you.

RELATED STORIES YOU NEED TO CHECK OUT:

How to bypass ‘This Hotfix Is No Longer Available’ errors

Posted on by Madalina Dinita

Microsoft hotfixes were meant to provide swift solutions to small but teething issues in various programs to enable users and administrators to restore software’s functionality soonest. As a result, hotfixes have been pretty popular among Microsoft products users.

But now Microsoft has killed this service and users are met by the message “This hotfix is no longer available” when attempting to access any recommended Hotfix.the KB2588507 hotfix download is no more available

Now, if you have been left scratching your head looking for a solution, then you are in luck:

There are multiple ways of resolving issues that previously needed a hotfix.

Here I will show you how to overcome the “this hotfix is no longer available” matter and solve any program mishap that traditionally needs a hotfix. Let’s go.

What to do if hotfix is not available

  1. Search for the specific hotfix on the Microsoft Update Catalog
  2. Install the latest updates
  3. Upgrade to Windows 10
  4. Upgrade Your Office (Or other products)

Fix 1: Search for the specific hotfix on the Microsoft Update Catalog

Thankfully, it seems that Microsoft hasn’t removed most of the actual hotfix files from the Microsoft update catalog page. You can thus simply search for the specific hotfix from there and download it.

Here is what I would do it assuming I am looking for the hotfix KB2980746 (for Windows 8.1).

  1. Go to Microsoft Update Catalog page.
  2. Type “hotfix kb2980746” in the search window then click search.windows 2012 hotfix download
  3. I will then click download.

Well, while that’s pretty easy, not all the hotfixes will be available through the update catalog page. But it’s not really a big bother since there are several hacks that are known to help. Here they are.

Fix 2: Upgrade To The Latest Available Updates For Your Microsoft Product

Even though they take a little longer than hotfixes because they are larger, the latest product updates contain almost all the required fixes for the known issues and is an assured way of eliminating common bugs.

Here is how to get the Windows operating system updates:

Windows 7

  1. Click Start then go to the provided search box and type “update”.
  2. Click Windows Update.
  3. Click Check for updates. Microsoft Windows will now look for the latest updates for your Windows. Wait until it finishes.Hotfix for MMC
  4. Click Install updates.this hotfix is no longer available

Windows 8/8.1

  1. Move the mouse pointer to the bottom-right corner of the screen then click Search.
  2. Click Settings.
  3. Look for the search box area and type Windows Update.
  4. Click install optional updates.
  5. Click Check for updates then wait.
  6. Install all the updates when the option comes up.

 Windows 10

  1. Click the Start
  2. Click 
  3. Select Update & Security.
  4. Click Windows Update.
  5. Click Check for updates and install everything.check for updates printer operation

The above steps will update your operating system.

Now observe the following instructions to update your Office programs (If the missing hotfix was for an office app).

The latest versions of Office

  1. Open any Office application such as Excel.
  2. Create a new spreadsheet (File>new).
  3. Go to Filethen Account (If you have opened Outlook its Office Account).
  4. Look for Product Information and choose Update Options.
  5. Click Update Now.this hotfix is no longer available

Tip:  Click Enable Updates to enable updates if the Update Now option is missing.

 Older versions of Office

  1. Open any Office application, such as Microsoft Word
  2. Create a new document.
  3. Go to File (or the Office button) and click Help
  4. Click Check for Updates.this hotfix is no longer available
  5. Choose InstallUpdates or follow the listed steps to update your office.
  6. Close the window after you are done installing updates.

Let’s now look at the steps to update other Microsoft products like browsers or Xbox.

  1. Go to Microsoft Download center (click the link).
  2. Choose the relevant application (Here I choose browsers assuming I wanted an Internet Explorer hotfix).this hotfix is no longer available
  3. The current and previous updates will all be shown. Try to locate the updates you are yet to add and proceed to download and install. Click view more to access everything.this hotfix is no longer available

It’s a bit cumbersome but it helps.

Fix 3: Upgrade to Windows 10

Windows 10 includes the most up-to-date patches and many other essential features and you can once and for all eliminate the “This hotfix is no longer available” difficulty by upgrading to it. Price starts at $139 for Windows 10 home edition.

— RELATED: This is how you can force your PC to upgrade to Windows 10

Fix 4: Upgrade Your Office (Or other products)

Similarly, you may have to upgrade your office suite to a latter office version to get the best experience. The same applies to every other Microsoft product needing a hotfix.

Conclusion

You can circumvent the “this hotfix is no longer available” challenge by either searching for the applicable hotfix from the Microsoft catalog center or by updating the concerned programs.

Of course, the best solution is by ensuring that your Microsoft software are up to date and that you’re working with the latest editions of your favorite apps.

RELATED CONTENT:

How-To Holiday Guide: Getting started with Surface Pen

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

You’ve received a new Surface for Christmas – or you’ve put one on your wish list and want to be ready for the big day – and now you want to get started with Surface Pen. Surface Pen is Microsoft’s digital stylus accessory for the Surface range which provides an extremely accurate digital inking experience using dedicated internal hardware.

With Surface Pen, you can create digital drawings and take notes with a level of fidelity akin to that of a real pen. The latest Surface Pen has 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity, so the only thing stopping you from reaching a true like-for-like experience is the smooth feel of the glass touchscreen itself. With use, you’ll soon get used to it though – it’s similar to writing on a whiteboard.

Before following this guide, make sure you read our “How to set up your new Surface” tutorial if you’re only just arriving in the Surface ecosystem.

Pairing your pen

First, the basics. You need to get your pen connected to your Surface. Check Bluetooth is turned on by heading to the Settings app (open the Start menu, type Settings, press enter) and opening the “Devices” category from the main menu.

Windows 10 Pen settings

On the first page that appears, toggle the “Bluetooth” switch to “On.” Now, click the “Add Bluetooth or other device” button at the top of the display. On your Surface Pen, press and hold the top button on the end of the pen until the pen’s indicator light starts flashing green.

Back on your Surface, you should see “Surface Pen” appear in the devices list of your open Bluetooth pairing window. Tap its name to complete pairing.

Get inking

Your pen is now ready to use and you can try it out immediately. Press the button on the end of the pen and you should see Windows Ink Workspace open after a few seconds. This can also be accessed from the icon on the taskbar.

Here, you can select from several built-in experiences. Choose Sketchpad to open a blank canvas where you can immediately start scribbling down your thoughts. If you need to erase anything, just flip the pen and rub out your pen strokes by holding the end button against the display – it’s as natural and seamless as the eraser on the end of a real pencil.

Windows Ink Workspace flyout screenshot

Sketchpad includes the ink toolbar, which is common to all Windows 10 apps using Windows Ink and lets you change the ink colour, pen type and stroke width. Experiment with the options to get familiar with using your pen. Notice how responsive the pen is to different pressure levels and tilt angles.

The other Windows Ink Workspace apps include Snip & Sketch, so you can annotate screenshots, and Sticky Notes. This allows you to scribble virtual sticky notes on your desktop, using your pen. With the recent Sticky Notes 3.0 release, they’ll be available across all your devices.

Screenshot of Windows Ink sticky notes

There are many other inking apps available, including Microsoft’s OneNote for note-taking, and Windows Photos and Maps which both support inking experiences. In the Windows Store, you can find more apps which fully support Windows Ink. Your pen will also work with most industry-standard professional graphics packages which support stylus input.

Finally, the pen will work as a mouse cursor in almost all Windows apps – whenever you see a button, you can click it by tapping the pen against it. Holding the barrel button on the pen while tapping will usually display the right-click menu.

Configure your pen

Once you’ve finished your initial experimentation, head back to the Settings app to configure how your pen works. You can customise what happens when you press the end button, as well as the behaviour for different pen features.

You’ll find the options on the “Pen & Windows Ink” page back in the Devices category. At the top of the page, you’ll first see a dropdown menu that lets you select whether you’re left- or right-handed – this alters how ink flows relative to the direction of the pen.

Windows 10 Pen settings

Next, there’s a series of checkboxes to control the visual experience. You can choose to hide or show visual effects and the pen cursor (we recommend disabling the latter for a more natural experience), as well as whether the pen can act as a mouse in desktop apps. The final checkbox lets you disable the touchscreen when using the pen, but this shouldn’t normally be necessary – the Surface has built-in palm rejection to automatically block touch inputs caused by you leaning on the screen to write.

The next section of the page controls the handwriting experience when you use your pen in regular form fields. Windows 10 now lets you use your pen in any textbox, so you can tap to reveal a handwriting panel you can write in. You can change the panel’s font and choose when it appears – by default, it’s whenever you’re using the Surface without a keyboard, but you can restrict it to only when Tablet Mode is enabled in Windows.

Windows 10 Pen settings

At the bottom of the screen, you can customise what happens when you click, double click or hold the button at the end of your pen. Use the dropdown menus to configure each individual behaviour. The options are launch an app, open the Windows Ink Workspace, open OneNote (Windows Store or 2016) or take a screenshot. Press and hold can also be used to launch Cortana voice assistance.

Advanced pen configuration

You can customise more pen options using the Surface app which should be preinstalled on your device. Open it up from the Start menu and switch to the Pen page from the navigation menu on the left. Here, you can customise the pen sensitivity to change how “light” or “heavy” it feels. Use the slider and test area to adjust the sensitivity to your liking. If you tap the “Advanced” link, you can view a realtime pen pressure graph to visualise how hard you’re pressing against the display.

Surface app pen settings screenshot

The Surface app also lets you check the battery level of your pen. Open the “Battery level” page to check its current status and view its serial number. Your battery life will vary depending on how often you use the pen, but you can expect to go months or even a couple of years without recharging.

Surface app pen settings screenshot

With that, your Surface Pen should now be ready to use. Keep on experimenting using Sketchpad or your favourite app to get familiar with the pen and how it feels. Microsoft is continuing to work on inking technologies and more apps are adding support, so you can expect the experience to get even better with time.

Fix Windows Fax and Scan fatal error using these 4 methods

Posted on by Madalina Dinita

Windows Fax and Scan is an integrated faxing and scanning application. If you have a computer that has a fax modem, you can send and receive faxes and you can also scan documents. If you don’t have a fax modem, you can email scanned documents and forward faxes as email attachments from your computer.

Windows Fax and Scan is included in Windows Vista Ultimate and as an optional component in Windows Vista Enterprise, as well as in all the versions of Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10.

Keep in mind that Windows Fax and Scan is not available on Vista Home or Vista Home Premium.

Fatal error when sending faxes on Windows 10

Sometimes Windows users encountered the “fatal error” while trying to use Windows Fax and Scan and they usually describe it like that: Windows Fax and Scan keeps showing “Fatal error” when trying to scan my documents.

For a fax transmission to succeed, there are some conditions: the fax line should not be busy, in order to transmit the fax there should be a dial tone. Moreover,  a fax device should answer the call and, of course,  a fatal error should not occur during the transmission of the fax.

What to do if Windows 10 Fax and Scan displays fatal errors

If you are also facing this problem and you are searching for a solution to fix this error, here are a few solutions that may help you fix your problem:

Method 1: Review the activity log

You can find further details and potential solutions. Here are the steps to follow in order to access the fax activity log:

  1. Open Windows Explorer and click on the disk that contains the operating system.
  2. Click the View tab to
  3. Click “Show Hidden Files and Folders”show hidden files
  4. Close the dialog box.
  5. In Windows Explorer, navigate to %systemdrive%ProgramDataMicrosoftWindows NTMSFaxActivityLog
  6. Check the file InboxLog.txt. Each row in InboxLog.txt is an incoming fax job.
  7. In the row for a given failed incoming fax transmission, review the Status and Extended Status fields and you could find information about the failure.

Method 2: Update your drivers

Download and reinstall the latest device driver updates like the modem and the chipset drivers. If you don’t know how to do that, you can find all the information on the manufacturer’s site.

To automatically install the latest drivers on Windows 10, we recommend using a dedicated third-party tool that scans your device and finds the right drivers within seconds. With a simple click, you can set it to install the drivers and bring your OS to optimal condition.

Most of the time, the generic drivers for your PC’s hardware and peripherals are not properly updated by the system. There are key differences between a generic driver and a manufacturer’s driver.

Searching for the right driver version for each of your hardware components can become tedious. That’s why an automated assistant can help you find and update your system with the correct drivers every time, and we strongly recommend Outbyte Driver Updater.

⇒ Get Outbyte Driver Updater

Method 3:  Re-enable Windows Fax and Scan from Windows Features

Some users said that disabling and then re-enabling Fax and Scan helped them fix fatal errors. Here are the steps to follow:

  1. Click the Start button, Control Panel, and then Programs
  2. Turn Windows features on or offturn windows features on off
  3. To turn Windows Fax and Scan feature off, you need to:
    1. Expand Print and Document Services
    2. Uncheck Windows Fax and Scan
    3. Click OK and restart the computer
  4. To turn Windows Fax and Scan feature on:
    1. Select the check box next to Print and Document Services
    2. Check Windows Fax and Scan
    3. Hit OK and reboot your computer

Method 4: Verify that the fax server is correctly configured

There are two ways of sending a fax using the Windows Fax and Scan feature: you can use a fax device attached locally or use a fax server.

For using a fax server you need to use a computer running Windows Vista Enterprise, Windows Vista Ultimate, Windows Vista Business, or Windows Server 2008.

To confirm that the fax server is configured correctly and it can send faxes, you need to:

  1. Send a test fax.
  2. Be sure that the server is configured to send. Here are the exact steps to follow:
    1. Open Fax Service Manager >  hit Start
    2. Point to Administrative Tools > click Fax Service Manager
    3. In the left pane, right-click Fax > hit Properties
    4. On the General tab, confirm that the Disable transmission of outgoing faxes check box is cleared so that faxes can be sent.
  3. Confirm that the device is correctly configured:
    1. Open Fax Service Manager > click Start
    2. Go to Administrative Tools > Fax Service Manager.
    3. In the left panel, double-click Fax and then ouble-click Devices and Providers > click Devices.
    4. Confirm that there are devices listed under Devices.
    5. In the right pane, right-click the device and then do the following:
      1. Click Properties, and then confirm that the values for Description, Transmitting Subscriber Identification (TSID), and Called Subscriber Identification (CSID) are correct.
      2. Confirm that Send is enabled.
  4. Confirm that outgoing routing is configured correctly:
    1. Open Fax Service Manager > click Start
    2. Navigate to Administrative Tools > Fax Service Manager
    3. In the left pane, double-click Fax > go to Outgoing Routing
    4. In the left pane, click Groups, and then in the right pane, verify the device or devices listed.
    5. In the left pane, click Rules, and then in the right pane, verify that the country/region code and area code are correct, and that the rule is being applied to the correct device or routing group
  5. Confirm that the Fax service is running. You can manage the Fax service using Fax Service Manager or the Services snap-in. To confirm that the Fax service is running using Fax Service Manager you should follow the steps:
    1. Open Fax Service Manager > click Start
    2. Go to Administrative Tools
    3. Click Fax Service Manager
    4. In the right pane, right-click Fax, and then view the menu.
    5. Confirm that Start is grayed out and that Stop is active on the menu.

Remember that you cannot install or configure fax components unless you are a member of the Administrators group or you have been given the authority.

Hopefully, one of the four methods listed in this article helped you solve this annoying problem affecting Windows fax and scanning.
Let us know in the comments section below if you managed to solve this fatal error and which of the solutions listed here worked in your case.

This is how you can fix corrupted EVTX files

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

As Murphy’s Law suggests, if something might go wrong, it will. And Windows occasionally has a mind of its own, with all those critical errors, BSODs, and crashes. Now, the only reliable way to find out what’s causing those is with the Windows Event Log.

If a critical error strikes, the culprit is to be found in the log files with the EVTX extension. However, there is not a lot use of those if they get corrupted.

How to fix corrupt Windows Event Log (EVTX file)

The Windows Event Log is the primary and only diagnostic tool a knowledgeable user needs to find out about system issues. Inspecting the log thoroughly will lead to determining the culprit for a variety of critical system issues.

However, if your PC shuts down before the logs are written, the Windows Event Log file will get corrupted. And, thus, unusable.

You can always delete the corrupted file and wait again for the error to appear. On the other hand, you can try and repair the corrupted EVTX file or export it as a CSV file, but that can take some expert knowledge. There are a few tools which allow to extract the binary values from the corrupted file and allow you to access it. They require Python, which might be an issue for an uninformed user.

So, the best way to deal with the corrupted files is to just remove them and allow the system to make new logs. These can be manually deleted, so we recommend a batch file (script) to clear all of them. You can also try with the Disk Cleanup built-in utility, but the batch has proven to be a more reliable way.

You can download the batch file, here. Extract the file to your desktop, right-click on it, and run it as an administrator. Once you run it, the script will erase all logs from the Windows Event Log. Next time you run into a problem, the EVTX log file won’t be corrupted.

With that said, we can conclude this article. If you have any questions or alternative ways of retrieving data from corrupted Windows Event Log files, do tell us in the comments section below.

RELATED STORIES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

What to do if pop-up window won’t go away on Windows 10/11

Posted on by Ivan Jenic

8 solutions to remove stubborn pop-up windows

  1. Force-close the pop up window
  2. End background process
  3. Reboot your computer
  4. Use Windows’ built-in maintenance function
  5. Restore your system to an earlier time
  6. Use Malwarebytes or Adwcleaner
  7. Install Windows Updates
  8. Uninstall & reinstall programs

Pop ups are relatively common features of Windows computers today. More often than not, a pop up serves as a notification or short cut on a computer’s screen, and this would normally go away on its own or simply by clicking exit. However, at times, due to a host of individual or combined factors, a pop up window won’t go away.

If you are having this problem, you are in the right place. This article is developed to proffer solution(s) to the pop window won’t go away problem.

Basically, pop ups are some kind of unsolicited messages or notifications from computer programs (system and installed programs). This is inclusive of web browsers like Chrome, Firefox and others programs that use the Internet. Most times, these pop ups request your approval or decline, and at times, it could constitute a lot of nuisance.

This becomes worse when a pop up window won’t go away, and no matter how hard you try, it just stares right back at you on your computer screen.

While there are many factors that could make a pop up window not to go away, the most significant of these factors is malware or virus attack, which disrupts computer system’s performance.

Other factors, which could be responsible for the pop up window error include incomplete installation of  program(s), high CPU (frozen system), apps running in background, corrupt .exe files and more.

Nevertheless, this article has provided some of the best, proven, solutions to resolve this issue.

What you can do if pop up window won’t close

Solution 1: Force-close the pop up window

This is the basic method for shutting down a program, and it can also be employed to close a pop up window. To force-close a pop up window on your computer, simply press the Alt + F4 keys.

If a pop up window won’t go away as a result of a minor technical issue, then force-closing it should ensure it doesn’t show up again. However, if the error is caused by more severe factors like file corruption, system malfunction or malware attack, this method might be ineffective. In this case, you can try the next solution.

Solution 2: End background process

A program running in the background might become infected, thereby resulting in a pop up window that won’t go away.

To end such infected process, follow the steps outlined below.

  • Press Ctrl + Alt + Delete
  • Click the “Task Manager” icon.
  • Select “Processes”.pop up windows wont go away
  • Right-click on an infected process and select “End process”.

If the pop up window won’t go away, try the next solution.

Solution 3: Reboot your computer

At times, a pop up window won’t go away from your home screen simply because of a minor system malfunction, which could range from clogged up files to a technical glitch. In this case, a simple reboot is usually the ultimate solution. System reboot automatically clears off temporary files from your computer, and this, most times, fixes the pop up window won’t go away error.

To reboot your computer system, simply restart it or outrightly power it down and power it up again. If this action fails to remove the pop up window, you can try the next solution.

Solution 4: Use Windows’ built-in maintenance function

This solution is specific to Windows users, who are having the issue of pop up notifications that won’t go away. Windows maintenance function should clear the notification pop ups from your screen.

Follow the steps below to execute this function:

  • Click on the “Start” button.
  • In the search box, input the keyword – Control Panel and press “Enter”
  • Navigate to the top right of your computer screen and locate “View by”.
  • Change the default “View by” option from “Category” to either “Large Icons” or “Small Icons”.
  • Click on “Security and Maintenance”.
  • Select “Change Security and Maintenance Settings”.pop up windows wont go away
  • Navigate to “Maintenance Messages” and locate the “Windows Backup” checkbox.
  • Uncheck the box.
  • Save your changes by selecting “OK”.
  • Reboot your computer system.
  • After your computer has restarted, repeat the steps up to the sixth step.
  • At the seventh step, under “Windows Backup” checkbox, check the box.
  • Select “OK” and restart your computer.

Note: This process is specifically recommended on Windows 10. If, after trying this method, your pop up window still won’t go away, you can try the next solution.

Solution 5: Restore your system to an earlier time

System restore could be the ultimate solution to the pop up window won’t go away error. This is because; it restores your system to an earlier time, before the error.

To run a system restore, follow the steps outlined below.

  • Click the “Start” button.
  • Input the keyword “restore or system restore” in the space provided.
  • On the pop up options, select “System Restore“.system restore breakpoint has been reached
  • Click on “Next”
  • Select “Next” again.
  • On the displayed window, click “Finish”.

This action will automatically restart your system, and your computer will be restored to an earlier time; a day, two days or more. If the system restore process fails to permanently remove the pop up window, proceed to the next solution.

Solution 6: Use Malwarebytes or Adwcleaner

If a pop up window won’t go away, the most likely problem is virus or malware attack. Hence, the way to go is to run a scan and clear off malware, and viruses from your system. Two recommended tools in this regard are Malwarebytes and Adwcleaner. These tools will free up your system and remove the malignant pop up window from your screen.

You can try the next solution, in case the problem is not related to malware or virus attack.

Solution 7: Install Windows Updates

Installation of latest Windows update will improve the operability of your computer. As such, it will repair some corruptions on your computer system (even the pop up window won’t go away error).

Basically, Microsoft occasionally notifies users of new updates. However, you can check for updates and install them directly. To do this, follow the steps outlined below.

  • Click “Start”.
  • Type “Windows Update” in the searchbox and click Enter.
  • Install all available updates (if any), by clicking on Select “Install Updates”.pop up windows wont go away
  • Wait for a couple of minutes for all the updates to install.
  • After successful installation, Windows will automatically restart.

Installing all available updates on your Windows computer should remove the pop up window from your screen. If this process is ineffective against the pop up window error, you can try the next method.

Solution 8: Uninstall & reinstall programs

If a pop up window is associated with a corrupt or damaged app, the ultimate solution might be to uninstall the app (and reinstall it), provided all other options have been exhausted.

You can uninstall any program on your computer by following the steps below.

  • Click the “Start” button.
  • Tap on “Control Panel”.
  • Select “Programs”.
  • Under “Programs, click “Programs and Features“.Programs and Features
  • Locate the affected app and click on it.
  • Select “Uninstall” and let the process run.
  • After uninstalling the program, you can download it again and reinstall it.

To uninstall a program on Windows 10, you can also follow the simple steps outlined below:

  • Click on “Settings” and select “Apps”.
  • Under “Apps”, click “Apps & Features“.apps&features windows 10
  • Click on the affected/desired app or program.
  • Click the “Uninstall” button
  • Confirm the uninstall by clicking on the pop up “Uninstall” key.
  • Follow the prompt command to complete installation
  • Download & reinstall the program.

Conclusion

Pop ups are common occurrences on computer systems today, and they are especially common on systems with web browsers and internet connections. At times, a pop up window won’t go away no matter how hard you try to close it. This is caused by many factors.

In this article, we have compiled some of the best solutions to fix the pop up window won’t go away error on your computer system. Essentially, at least one of the above outlined solutions should permanently remove a stubborn pop up window from your computer screen.

RELATED STORIES YOU NEED TO CHECK OUT:

Fix a Corrupted Save File: 5 Ways to do it

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

Imagine all your in-game progress lost in a matter of seconds. Hours of playthrough lost due to a game save corruption! Though not that common, corrupted game save files is still a possibility, and you will need to fix them.

And if that’s not a good enough reason to act with caution, we don’t know what it is. Either way, if that happens and you can’t play games, you can still (sometimes) fix a corrupted game save file in Windows.

What causes a save file to corrupt?

Here are a few reasons the saved files corrupt:

  • Abrupt shutdown: Abrupt shutdown is the primary reason behind the problem because it affects the process, and some vital piece of data goes missing.
  • Malware infection: Malware or virus can also affect the game saves, and render them unreadable. You could use a reliable third-party antivirus to scan for these.
  • Missing or corrupt app files: When vital app files are missing, it would affect the app’s functioning and process of saving the progress.

How do I fix corrupted game saves?

1. Scan for malware

  1. Press Windows + S to open Search, type Windows Security, and click on the relevant search result.
  2. Click on Virus & threat protection.virus & threat protection
  3. Click on Scan options.
  4. Choose the Full scan option and then click on Scan now.full scan to fix how to fix a corrupted save file

Often malware or virus affects the game files and leads to a corrupted state. To fix things, your primary approach should be eliminating or quarantining the threat. Remember, this will not fix the file but will prevent further issues.

To perform this, you most probably need an effective antivirus with strong detection tools. Hence, it’s advised to use professional antivirus technology like the one below.

⇒ Get TotalAV

2. Verify the integrity of game files (Steam)

  1. Launch Steam, navigate to the game Library, right-click on the affected game, and select Properties.library
  2. Go to the Installed files tab, then click on Verify integrity of game files, and wait for the process to complete.

When facing corrupted game save files on Steam, a quick solution is to verify their integrity. It will help restore any critical files triggering the issue and should get things running.

3. Re-establishing mods

The other reason falls to mods. Many games have an active community that puts out tons of mods. This makes it harder for the game to configure a save file. Much harder than the vanilla version.

So, removing and re-establishing mods might help. This also helps fix a broken save file in Sims 4.

4. Run the SFC scan

  1. Press Windows + R to open Run, type cmd, and hit Ctrl + Shift + Enter.cmd
  2. Click Yes in the UAC prompt.
  3. Now, paste the following commands individually and hit Enter after each for the DISM tool:DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
  4. Next, execute the following command for the SFC scan:sfc /scannowsfc scan to fix a corrupted save file
  5. Once done, restart the computer.

Corrupt system files may also lead to issues with game saves by either conflicting with the process or preventing it altogether. A quick solution here is to run the DISM tool and the SFC (System File Checker) scan.

5. Save game data locally

A slow Internet connection or intermittent loss of network connectivity can affect the game saves done on the cloud. When you lose connectivity, some files may not be uploaded, corrupting the entire game save.

So, if you don’t have a reliable Internet connection, we recommend saving the game data locally on the PC. This will also help load things quickly, though it takes up significant disk space.

To avoid this problem in the future, make sure not to pile up saves for a single game (20 should be the top limit). Furthermore, backup saves regularly and avoid relying on the autosave feature. Creating game saves manually is the way to go!

Before you leave, do check some quick tricks to boost gaming performance in Windows.

Don’t forget to tell us about the exact game that is bothering you with the corrupted save, and we’ll do our best to help you. The comments section is just below.

How to fix Microsoft Message Analyzer errors

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

The most used Network troubleshooting tool for IT professionals is provided by a first-party. Yeah, Microsoft Message Analyzer is commonly used to monitor and resolve network errors. If you fall into that group, you must have run into occasional errors.

In this guide, we listed some common solutions, but for the thorough and in-depth explanation, check Technet and elaborate on your problem. They usually help users in need.

Steps to fix Microsoft Message Analyzer errors

Solution 1 – Load Windows Parser

Let’s start by loading Windows Parser from the News menu in the Message Analyzer. For some reason, the automatic update of the Windows Parser isn’t enabled by default.

Here’s what you need to do:

  1. Open Microsoft Message Analyzer.
  2. Choose the News.
  3. Select Asset Manager under Tools.
  4. Click Sync all displayed items.

Solution 2 – Increase the number of filter drivers

Some users managed to resolve certain errors by increasing the value of filter drivers you can load. By default, this value stands at 8 and we recommend increasing it to 14.

Here’s how to increase the number of filter drivers via Registry Editor:

  1. Open Registry Editor.
  2. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network
  3. Change the MaxNumFilter value from 8 to 14. If there’s no dword MaxNumFilter, create it manually.

Solution 3 – Reinstall Message Analyzer

Finally, the usual troubleshooting step is to reinstall and re-configure the Message Analyzer. Don’t forget to clear all locally-stored configuration files and start from scratch. Some users had better luck with an older Windows iteration and downgraded from Windows 10/8 to Windows 7.

With that said, we can conclude this article. The best way to resolve any Microsoft Message Analyzer errors is to ask good folks at Technet as there’s a lot of IT professionals there, always willing to offer a helping hand in need. Don’t forget to share your experience with Message Analyzer errors in the comments section below.

RELATED STORIES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

What to do if Windows 10/11 dialog box has no text

Posted on by Ivan Jenic

How to troubleshoot empty dialog boxes on PC

  1. Use a third-party system optimizer
  2. Restart your PC
  3. Use Windows 10 built-in repair tool
  4. Uninstall & reinstall affected program
  5. Run a system restore
  6. Clean install Windows 10

If you are getting blank dialog boxes on your Windows 10 computer, this article will provide you with methods to fix it. Normally, a dialog box is designed to facilitate decision making on your computer system. It comes up like a pop up window, either to request your approval/decline on a task or to simply present you with options on the execution of a task (or tasks).

At times, a dialog box comes up empty, with no option or information whatsoever; just blank.

Various reasons could be responsible for this error. However, the most notorious ones are those associated with Windows updates. Some of these include:

  • Incompatible graphics driver after Windows update
  • Outdated driver(s)
  • Incompatible Antivirus or other security programs
  • Bug attack after a system update
  • Corrupted system file after an update

Typically, a dialog box might come up empty as a result of one or a combination of some of the above outlined technical and security errors. In this post, Windows Report team has compiled various levels of solutions to help you resolve the Windows 10 empty dialog boxes error.

5+ solutions to fix Windows 10 empty dialog boxes

Solution 1: Use a third-party system optimizer

This type of program has built-in functions designed to fix Windows errors and improve the performance of your device.  Moreover, it frees up space on your disk, removes malware, and restores the registry values to their default settings.

Corrupted system files are often the cause of Windows errors such as empty dialog boxes. With the help of professional repair software, you can simply replace broken files with healthy ones within just a few minutes.

Solution 2: Restart your PC

Restarting a computer system is a basic troubleshooting method (probably the most basic) used to fix various forms of system errors. This method can be used to fix the Windows 10 empty dialog boxes error.

Rebooting (or restarting) a system clears off temporary files from such computer. It also closes running tasks, which could be the reason for the empty dialog boxes error. However, simply restarting a computer system to fix this error is usually ineffective; therefore, it is a necessity to use a repair tool.

Solution 3: Use Windows 10 built-in repair tool

This tool serves as the first line of defence, to combat all forms of corruptions, damages and errors on your system. The error of empty dialog boxes is no different. If, while operating your computer system or using a program, a dialog box comes up blank, then you should try the system Repair option.

Provided the error is only a minor technical issue and not caused by any serious corruption or incompatible driver, the repair tool should effectively fix the error.

To execute the Windows Repair function, follow the steps outlined below:

Note: The guideline below entails steps for repairing an error or corruption associated with MS Office.

  • Close the empty dialog box by clicking Alt + F4.
  • Navigate to the “Start” button and click on it.
  • Select “Control Panel”.
  • On the displayed window, select “Programs”
  • Under “Programs”, click on “Programs and Features”.Programs and Features
  • On the displayed window, locate “Microsoft Office” and click on it.
  • Select “Change” > “Repair”.repair microsoft office
  • Complete repair by following the command prompt on your screen.
  • Close the window and navigate to MS Office’s location.
  • Open it and execute a command to bring up the dialog box.
  • Check if the problem is resolved.

This process can be applied to all programs (system and installed) on your Windows 10 computer. To run the repair function on any program, follow the steps outlined below:

  • Under “Programs and Features”, locate the program you want to repair and right-click on it.
  • Click “Change” > “Repair”.
  • Complete repair by following the on-screen command.
  • Close the window.
  • Navigate to the repaired program’s location and click on it.
  • Execute a command to bring up the dialog box and check if it is no longer empty.

If there is no form of severe corruption, outdated system driver or acute bug attack, this simple repair should resolve the empty dialog boxes error. In case the problem persists, try the more advanced process in the next method.

Solution 4: Uninstall & reinstall affected program

As far-fetched as this method may sound, it might be the ultimate solution to the empty dialog boxes issue. This method is, however, only applicable if the error is specific to a particular program.

To uninstall a program on your Windows 10 computer, follow the steps below:

  • Close the empty dialog box by clicking Alt + F4.
  • Click on “Start” and type “settings” in the searchbox.
  • Select “Settings” from the displayed options.
  • On the displayed window, select “Apps“
  • Under “Apps“, click on “Apps & Features”.windows 10 empty dialog boxes
  • Locate the program you want to uninstall and click on it.
  • Click the “Uninstall” button
  • On the pop up window, select “Uninstall” to confirm uninstallation.
  • Follow the on-screen command to complete the process.

After the process, you can then navigate to Microsoft Store (or the program’s official download site) to download and install a new app afresh. If this doesn’t fix the issue, you can try the next solution.

— RELATED: Empty Task Manager? Fix it using these 5 solutions

Solution 5: Run a system restore

Restoring your system to an earlier time will remove recently installed updates, apps, drivers and others. This makes a system restore more effective than ordinary reinstallation, in fixing errors on computers.

To run a system restore process, follow the steps below.

  • Click on “Start” > “Control Panel”.
  • Locate “Recovery” and click on it.
  • Select “Configure System Restore” and click on “Configure”.
  • Select “Turn on system protection” (if not already on) to display restore points.can’t factory reset Windows 10
  • Navigate back to “Recovery” under “Control Panel”.
  • Select “Open System Restore” and click “Next”.open system restore
  • Select the recent apps, drivers, files and updates on the displayed list.
  • Click on “Scan for affected programs” and modify the date/restore point (back or forth), if needed.
  • Click “Next” and select “Finish”. This action should auto-restart your system.

After your system has restarted, reinstall any affected app. The dialog boxes should now come up just fine. However, in case your dialog boxes are still coming up empty, you can go for the last straw; the ultimate solution.

Solution 6: Clean install Windows 10

This process is the last resort and it should only be executed after all available options have been exhausted. Clean installation of Windows 10 might look too advanced for an issue as trivial as empty dialog boxes.

However, this the ultimate solution for resolving the background cause(s) of such error, as well as other inherent errors on your system.

To run a clean installation of Windows 10 using Media Creation, follow the steps outlined below:

Note: This action will clear off every app, driver, setting and all other installed programs, with the exception of system apps and personal files. Hence, it is strongly recommended that you back up every essential program and setting on an external storage medium.

Ensure you have a stable internet connection; preferably to a Wi-Fi network. This is to facilitate the downloading of the Media Creation tool.

  • Download the tool from Microsoft Website.
  • Open the tool and “Accept” the licence terms (upon review).
  • On the displayed window, select “Keep personal files”.Reset Windows 10 - Keep personal files and apps
  • Select “OK” to commence the clean installation.
  • After clicking “OK”, the rest of the process is automated.
  • After the new Windows 10 installation, install missing drivers manually under “Settings”.
  • Reinstall apps from Microsoft Store or other official download sites (for utility and social apps).

With the successful implementation of the clean installation, you can rest assured that your “Windows 10 empty dialog boxes” error (and other errors) would be resolved and your system will come up clean.

We recommend using a reliable program that installs Windows drivers automatically and prepares driver backups. Blank dialog boxes can be caused by outdated drivers too. The chances to experience these errors again with driver updater software will be minimal.

⇒ Get Fortect Driver Updater

Conclusion

Windows 10 empty dialog boxes could be the aftereffects of an isolated error (corruption or incompatibility of a driver), which affects only a specific program. Conversely, it could be a general issue that affects the whole system. Either way, it has the propensity for causing further damage if left unfixed.

This post has provided several solutions, ranging from the basic troubleshooting method (rebooting) to the most advanced method (clean installation of Windows 10). One of these solutions should be ideal for you, in fixing the Windows 10 empty dialog boxes error.

RELATED STORIES YOU NEED TO CHECK OUT:

How to fix Windows 10/11 Update CPU not supported errors

Posted on by Madalina Dinita

4 solutions to fix Windows 10 Update CPU not supported

  1. Check Windows 10 Minimum Hardware requirements
  2. Update the Compatibility Appraiser
  3. Turn On the NX (No-eXecute) Bit
  4. Disable CPU Overclocking

If you have been receiving the error “Windows 10 update CPU not supported” when attempting to upgrade to Windows 10, don’t fret because you are not alone.

Well, the problem has been a bother since the earliest days of Windows 10 but now there are multiple solutions. And there is a good chance that one of them will work for you.

In this guide, we will take you through the foolproof solutions that work for the Windows 10 Update CPU not supported issue when updating from Windows 8/8.1. Let’s delve right into this.

Steps to fix Windows 10 Update CPU not supported

Fix 1: Check Windows 10 hardware requirements

Like every other Windows, Windows 10 may not install on machines which doesn’t meet its least hardware requirements (or may install but run inefficiently) so you may have to reconfirm your machine’s hardware specifications before anything else.

Specifically, your CPU should have a minimum speed of 1 GHz. You should thus start by going to your windows properties windows to verify this.

Steps to follow:

Windows 7

  1. Click Start then type “system” in the provided search box from the menu.
  2. Click System (near the top of the results)
  3. The system specifications are displayed.

Windows 8

  1. Press the WIN key and the pause break key simultaneously on the keyboard.
  2. The system specifications are displayed.

You will, of course, need to upgrade the CPU before restarting the update. Otherwise, skip to the rest of the suggested fixes if your CPU turns out okay.

Fix 2: Update the Compatibility Appraiser

One of the causes of this error is a bug in the compatibility appraiser that comes with Windows 10 update files. Microsoft has since released the relevant updates to upgrade the tool and the error should disappear as soon as you run the updates.

Here are the required updates depending on the Windows you are currently running:

Steps To Install The Update:

Windows 7

  1. Click Start then type “update” in the provided search box from the menu.
  2. Click Windows Update (near the top of the results)
  3. In the subsequent pane click on the Check for updates. Windows will look for the recent applicable updates for your PC. Wait as it may take some moments.

cpu not supported windows 7

  1. To progress, click the message that pops up alerting you that some optional/ important updates are available, or requiring you to review optional/ important updates.
  2. In the displayed list (important updates), select the check box next to KB/2952664 then click OK (important updates).windows 10 upgrade says cpu not supported
  3. Lastly, click Install updates.

Windows 8/8.1

  1. Point to the bottom-right corner of your screen with your mouse then click Search. You can also swipe into Windows from the right end of your screen then tap Search.
  2. Click/ tap Settings.
  3. Type Windows Update in the search dialog box area.
  4. Click/ tap install optional updates.
  5. Click Check for updates and wait.
  6. The various updates will again be shown. Click/tap the message to access all the updates.
  7. In the displayed list (important updates), select the check box next to KB/2976978 then click/tap OK. Finally, click Install updates 

Wait for the update to run then reboot your computer. You can now turn on the PC and make a fresh attempt to update to Windows 10.

If all went well, the system should no longer report this error.

Fix 3: Turn On the NX (No-eXecute) Bit

The NX technology allows the processor to segregate areas in the memory where program code including Windows can or cannot run and can cause the annoying Windows 10 update CPU not supported error.

The solution is to disable the technology either via the settings or the BIOS.

Your computer needs to be repaired blue screen

Turn Off The NX Bits from the Windows settings

On Windows 7:

  1. Click start then type “control panel” in the provided search box from the menu.
  2. Click control panel (near the top of the results).
  3. Click system and security.
  4. Click system in the next window.
  5. Click advanced system settings.
  6. Click the advanced tab.
  7. Now select performance.
  8. Click data execution prevention option.
  9. Choose turn on DEP for all programs and services except those I select.CPU not supported - Windows 10
  1. Click ok now to close.
  2. Retry the Windows 10 installer.

On Windows 8 or 8.1:

  1. Pressthe WIN key and the pause break key simultaneously on the keyboard.
  2. Click the advanced system settings tab on the left-hand side.
  3. Click the advanced
  4. Now select performance.
  5. Click data execution prevention
  6. Choose turn on DEP for all programs and services except those i select.

Turn Off The NX Bits From BIOS

For most machines, changing the setting from the BIOS works like a charm. Here are the steps to boot to the BIOS:

  1. Turn off your computer.
  2. Press the power button to bring the computer on. Start pressing the correct key immediately the manufacturer logo has appeared and until the BIOS screen appears. For example, for HP/Compaq computers, pressing F10 takes you to BIOS. For others, it’s the F2/Esc keys.
  3. Locate for the NX settings under the BIOS advanced configuration
    Enable this setting by pressing the indicated key to change.
  4. Save the changes as you exit BIOS.
  5. Proceed to boot the computer and try to update.

TIP: NX can also be labeled EDB (execute disabled bit), Execute Disabled Memory Protection, EVP (enhanced virus protection), or even No Execute Memory Protect so enable whatever option your system provides.
Some laptops/desktops don’t provide the enable NX settings BIOS option so you may have to retry the earlier method or raise a ticket with the manufacturer.

Hopefully, the Windows 10 update program will be happy with your CPU so restart the upgrade. 

Fix 4: Disable CPU Overclocking

Sometimes the windows update program will refuse to work because of an overclocked CPU.

To maneuver this problem, you will need to reverse the overclocking.

Here are the steps:

  1. Turn off your computer.
  2. Press the power button to bring the computer on and then repeatedly press the correct key immediately the manufacturer logo has appeared (Until the BIOS screen comes up). The right keys are still as aforementioned.
  3. Look for the option to reset the BIOS back to the factory settings.
  4. Save the changes as you exit.
  5. Restart the Windows 10 upgrade process.

 

Wrapping It Up 

The Windows 10 update CPU not supported error can be caused by an unsatisfactory CPU (below 1.0GHz) so start there. Other causes include an outdated Windows 7/8.0/8.1 so try to install the highlighted updates.

Other triggers include overclocking your CPU or disabled NX bits so also try the specified solutions if the first ideas fail.

MORE RESOURCES:

How to fix corrupted SD card on Raspberry Pi

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

Raspberry Pi community was often struck by the lack of proper troubleshooting steps for certain issues. Of course, there’s a good probability the OEM puts all users in the same experienced journeyman category. One issue which isn’t quite common but it happens from time to time is the SD card failure. Corrupted SD card on Raspberry Pi can be quite infuriating, especially if you haven’t backed up your work. Even though they’re scarce, there are a few ways to deal with this.

How to fix corrupted SD card on Raspberry Pi

The only thing making this worse is the absence of backups for the affected SD card. If you don’t have backups, you have low chances of retrieving the content of the corrupted SD card.

There are various reasons why an SD card will get corrupted on your Raspberry Pi, but the most common one is powering off without the ”halt” command. In addition, if you’ve meddled with the CPU clocks, power problems might break SD cards, as well.

So what you can do when this happens? You can format the SD and use backups to restore Raspbian on your SD card. However, if you’ve made a mistake to work without timely backups, there are only two things you can try. There’s the “fsck” command, which will unlikely fix your corrupted SD card.

On the other hand, the second and a more reliable way is to use an alternative SD card and build a fresh copy of Raspbian. After that, use the USB adapter and attach the affected card. Once it’s there, you might be able to fix it within the new system.

At the end of the day, you should be able to scavenge at least some of the data. Once you’ve got what you can, and fancy using the SD card again, use any third-party formatting tool (or digital camera) to format it.

With that said, we can conclude this article. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to tell us in the comments section below.

RELATED STORIES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

How to disable Activity history and protect your privacy

Posted on by Milan Stanojevic

Activity history is a new feature introduced in the April update, and although this feature can be helpful, many users have privacy concerns. This feature can send your information, such as applications you use, as well as documents and websites you view to Microsoft, and many users don’t want that. If you’re one of the users concerned about their privacy, today we’ll show you how to disable Activity history feature on Windows 10.

What is Activity history and how to disable it?

As previously mentioned, Activity history feature was introduced in April update along with Timeline. By using Timeline and Activity history, you can easily see all the documents or web pages that you visited on a certain date and switch back to them with just a single click.

This feature stores all this data locally, but if you want, you can enable synchronization and sync your data with Microsoft’s servers. By doing so, you can sync your activity with other devices and continue working on documents or visit the websites on other devices. Although this sounds quite useful, many users have privacy concerns, so today we’ll show you how to disable activity history on your PC.

Here are some methods that you can use to disable Activity history on your PC:

  1. Change your settings
  2. Change your Group policy
  3. Edit your registry
  4. Clear your activity history
  5. Clear your history from your Microsoft account

Solution 1 – Change your settings

According to users, the best and easiest way to disable Activity history is to disable it from the Settings app. This is quite simple, and you can do it by following these steps:

  1. Open the Settings app. You can do that quickly by using Windows Key + I
  2. One the Settings app opens, navigate to the Privacy section.
    privacy activity history
  3. From the left pane select Activity history. In the right pane uncheck Let Windows collect my activities from this PC and Let Windows sync my activities from this PC to the cloud options.
    disable activity history

After disabling these options, Windows won’t collect any activity history on your PC. If you still want to use the Timeline feature but you don’t want to share your history with Microsoft, you can use Let Windows collect my activities from this PC option.

Solution 2 – Change your Group policy

According to users, you can also disable Activity history feature right from Group policy settings. This is quite useful if you’re managing multiple PCs or you simply want to enforce this rule on the entire PC. To disable Activity history, you just need to do the following:

  1. Press Windows Key + R and enter msc. Now press Enter or click OK.
    group policy run activity history
  2. When Group Policy Editor opens, in the left pane navigate to the Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\System\OS Policies In the right pane, double-click the Allow publishing of User Activities policy.
    group policy activity history disable
  3. Now select the Disabled option and click Apply and OK to save changes.
    disable policy activity history
  4. Optional: You can also set Enable Activity Feed and Allow upload of User Activities policies to disabled. This isn’t mandatory, but it might help you out.

After making these changes, your PC won’t gather activity history and your data won’t be uploaded to Microsoft’s servers.

Solution 3 – Edit your registry

Using a Group Policy Editor to disable Activity history on your PC is a great method, but some versions of Windows don’t have Group Policy Editor available. If you don’t have Group Policy Editor, you can disable this feature from Registry Editor. To do that, just follow these steps:

  1. Press Windows Key + R and enter regedit. Press Enter or click OK.
    regedit activity history disable
  2. When Registry Editor opens, navigate to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\System key in the left pane.
  3. Right-click anywhere in the right pane and choose New > DWORD (32-bit) Value.
    new dword activity history
  4. Enter PublishUserActivities as the name of the new DWORD. Double-click the new DWORD and set its Value data to 0.

After doing that, restart your PC or simply log out of your account and log back in again. After doing that, the activity history feature will be disabled.

Solution 4 – Clear your activity history

If you’ve already disabled Activity history on your PC, you should know that your data is still stored online on Microsoft’s servers. However, you can fix that easily simply by clearing your history from the Settings app. To do that, follow these steps:

  1. Open the Settings app and navigate to the Privacy > Activity history.
  2. In the right pane navigate to the Clear activity history section and click the Clear button.
    clear button activity history
  3. A confirmation dialog will now appear. Click OK.
  4. Windows will start clearing your activity history. This can take a minute or two, so be patient.

After doing that, your history will be cleared and all your data removed from Microsoft’s servers.

Solution 5 – Clear your history from your Microsoft account

If you’re worried that your information is still available on Microsoft’s servers, you can remove it right from your Microsoft account. This is useful if you don’t have the access to your PC but you want to ensure that your activity history isn’t available online.

To clear your activity history, do the following:

  1. Open your browser, and go to Microsoft’s activity history page.
  2. Now sign in with your Microsoft account.
  3. Select from the menu on the left Apps and services. Now click Clear activity in the right pane.
    activity history apps and services
  4. A confirmation dialog will now appear. Click the Clear

After a couple of moments, your activity history will be removed from Microsoft’s servers.

Activity history can be a useful feature, especially if you want to quickly hop back to a certain project that you were working on earlier. However, if you’re concerned about your privacy, feel free to try some of our solutions and use them to disable activity history on your PC.

READ ALSO:

Windows Sandbox allows you to run apps safely in isolation

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

News from Microsoft tech department. Soon we will be able to run applications that we are not sure about in an “isolated, temporary desktop environment” called Windows Sandbox.

What is Windows Sandbox?

The idea is that when a user installs any software in Windows Sandbox, it will stay in the sandbox, keeping whatever is outside sandbox safe.

When you have finished testing the software, you can either install it on your machine in the normal way if you like it and if you don’t, you just close down Windows Sandbox and the software, with all its files, will be permanently deleted.

We have a nifty looking screenshot that I got from the Microsoft blog. This shows how Windows Sandbox will look on your desktop. Basically, it will look just like your desktop.

Windows Sandbox

Here is a quick rundown of the properties of Windows Sandbox:

  • Part of Windows – everything required for this feature ships with Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise. No need to download a VHD!
  • Pristine – every time Windows Sandbox runs, it’s as clean as a brand-new installation of Windows
  • Disposable – nothing persists on the device; everything is discarded after you close the application
  • Secure – uses hardware-based virtualization for kernel isolation, which relies on the Microsoft’s hypervisor to run a separate kernel which isolates Windows Sandbox from the host
  • Efficient – uses integrated kernel scheduler, smart memory management, and virtual GPU

What you will need to run Windows Sandbox

And here are the prerequisites you will need if you want to use Windows Sandbox:

  • Windows 10 Pro or Enterprise Insider build 18305 or later
  • AMD64 architecture
  • Virtualization capabilities enabled in BIOS

And you will need at least:

  • 4GB of RAM (8GB recommended)
  • 1 GB of free disk space (SSD recommended)
  • 2 CPU cores (4 cores with hyperthreading recommended)

I’m not going to include all the instructions that you can find on the Windows blog itself. Just head over here if you are interested.

The wrap-up

Gotta say. It’s a shame we can’t use Windows Sandbox for Windows Updates. Yes, I know that doesn’t make sense, I was only joking.

Sadly, I can’t ask any of you about your experiences as Windows Sandbox will not be available until Windows 10 Pro or Enterprise, build 18305 or newer next spring, so please feel free to talk amongst yourselves.

RELATED ARTICLES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

Fix Corrupt FIT File: Do it With a Repair Tool

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

There is no doubt that data corruption of any file can be a hardship. FIT files, which are important for sports enthusiasts who fancy tracking their running or cycling routes with the faithful Garmin navigation, are often corrupt, and you will need to fix them.

Once they get corrupted (usually due to GPS readings), users can’t access them with Garmin Connect or similar services for tracking the routes, which provide map display. Luckily, this is far from being unrepairable, and we have two ways to fix corrupt FIT files on your PC.

How do I fix a corrupted FIT file?

1. Use Garmin Online Fit Repair Tool

  1. Navigate to the Garmin Online Fit Repair Tool’s website.
  2. Sign in or sign up, as the case may be.
  3. Upload your FIT file and let the auto-fix tool work its magic.online fit repair tool
  4. Additionally, you can choose to convert it to the CSV format.

If you’re trying to access the file with the FIT extension to no avail, don’t worry. A few tools might come in handy when it comes to repairing corrupted FIT files.

One of those is the free Garmin online FIT repair tool that allows you to upload a corrupted FIT file to download the uncorrupted version afterward.

2. Try the FIT File Repair Tool

  1. Download Fit File Repair Tool. You might need Microsoft Access installed in order to run it.
  2. Extract the tool and run it.
  3. Click on the Import and repair file button and add your corrupted FIT file (or batch of files).import and repair to fix fix corrupt fit file
  4. Run the tool, and the FIT file should be fixed and accessible again.

For users who are dealing with numerous FIT files daily, a premium tool is probably the best solution.

Fit File Repair Tool is a utility that allows you to access and restore corrupted FIT files with small or no effort. However, it’s a paid solution, so you’ll need to purchase the license after a free trial period ends.

There are some other options, like FIT SDK, which allows you to deconstruct and convert FIT files to CSV format. That way, you can edit them or restore their integrity. On the other hand, the two tools mentioned above should be enough for an inexperienced user.

If you are looking for alternatives, check out the most reliable handheld GPS for hiking and cycling.

With that said, we can conclude this article. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to tell us in the comments section below.

Chromebook will soon support Windows 10 dual-boot

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Many people use Windows on a daily basis for their computing needs. They use it because of their work, because they write about it, I have even heard that some people use Windows because they like it. What I don’t understand is why you would want to use Windows on a Chromebook.

Advantages of Chrome OS

Correct me if I am wrong (in the comments below, please), but I thought that the entire point of people owning a Chromebook was because they were fed up of spending their money on over-priced, bloated software that is pretty much guaranteed to screw up your machine at some future point due to a dodgy update that wasn’t checked before release.

Before I continue, I should point out that in the interests of openness, I am not a Chromebook user, but I have been toying with the idea of making the move for more than a year now. However, since I have not used one, forgive any mistakes I make.

Chromebooks will lose security

Google promotes Chromebooks and the OS that goes with it as being highly secure. Of course, when Google says ‘highly secure’ it means from hacking. Giving any information to Google means you are pretty much agreed that your life is compromised from that moment on, but that’s for another post.

By Google letting Windows onto its machines, even if it is ‘just’ as a alternative OS, means that your Chromebook is now more likely to be compromised. It doesn’t even need to mean that Windows is less secure. If you are running two OS’s on one machine, there are more ways it can be compromised.

Chromebook

Chromebooks are inexpensive

Additionally, Chromebooks have dinky little hard drives, don’t they. There is no way you are going to get Windows OS onto a 32 GB hard drive. So presumably, Chromebooks are going to come with bigger drives making them more expensive. Of course, I am assuming that whatever Windows OS is being used will come pre-installed, since why would anyone download it voluntarily.

How many will really use Dual-Boot?

I am a bit confused about the whole ‘Dual-Boot‘ thing as well. I used to run a laptop with dual operating systems, Windows 7 (I think it was) and Ubuntu. One thing I remember was that changing between OS‘s was a pain in the neck. So much so that if I booted up in Windows, I stayed in Windows for the rest of the day. If I booted up in Ubuntu, I’d stay in Ubuntu.

Why would Google want to give people an OS that if they booted up using it, would probably just stick with it? Google might as well just take out a full-page ad saying they are giving up, and all Chromebooks will be Windowsbooks in the future.

Everything will end up the same

Why would you want to allow Microsoft any access at all to anything that has an OS on it that isn’t Windows? Perhaps Google feels that it is big enough and strong enough that if Microsoft starts putting in demands, Google will be able to stand up to Microsoft. Well, that may be true but I wouldn’t bet my Chromebook on it.

Wrapping it all up

I am not an over-cynical person, I don’t think, but I really don’t see how this has any advantages for Google and any disadvantages for Microsoft. I think this is a bad move for Google, and will end up making it a junior partner in something that it started in the first place.

RELATED STORIES TO CHECK OUT:

Microsoft details Windows 10’s upcoming Windows Sandbox feature

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Earlier this year, we learned that Microsoft was working on an “InPrivate Desktop” feature for Windows. In the Windows 10 Feedback Hub, Microsoft described InPrivate Desktop as “a throaway sandbox for secure, one-time execution of untrusted software.

This handy VM solution has apparently been rechristened as “Windows Sandbox,” and Microsoft has provided more details about this feature on the Windows Kernel blog yesterday. Just like the previous “InPrivate Desktop” feature, Windows Sandbox will provide Windows admins a temporary desktop environment where they can safely test untrusted software. “Any software installed in Windows Sandbox stays only in the sandbox and cannot affect your host. Once Windows Sandbox is closed, all the software with all its files and state are permanently deleted,” Microsoft explained in the blog post.

Compared to traditional VM solutions, the company highlighted the following advantages for Windows Sandbox:

  • Part of Windows – everything required for this feature ships with Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise. No need to download a VHD!
  • Pristine – every time Windows Sandbox runs, it’s as clean as a brand-new installation of Windows
  • Disposable – nothing persists on the device; everything is discarded after you close the application
  • Secure – uses hardware-based virtualization for kernel isolation, which relies on the Microsoft’s hypervisor to run a separate kernel which isolates Windows Sandbox from the host
  • Efficient – uses integrated kernel scheduler, smart memory management, and virtual GPU

The timing for the announcement is quite interesting as this same blog post mentions that Windows Sandbox requires Windows 10 Pro or Enterprise build 18305 or later. Microsoft released the 19H1 build 18298 last week for Fast Ring Insiders, and we hope the build 18305 will be released this week, right before the holidays. FYI, Microsoft mentioned that Windows Sandbox will require at least 4GB of RAM, 1 GB of free disk space and at least 2 CPU cores. We’re looking forward to test this new feature, sound off in the comments if you think this could become a new killer feature for Windows 10 Pro.

Windows 10 Twitter app secretly adds new list and emoji improvements

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

The official Twitter app for Windows 10 devices updated last week with a host of improvements but two other changes appear to have been made to it since then.

Over the last few days, the Twitter app gained a new emoji picker within the compose box (see above image). When clicked on, this emoji picker opens and users can now scroll through and select an emoji to use.

In addition to the emoji picker, the Windows 10 Twitter app now displays whether a user has already been added to a list by displaying a blue checkmark next to list names during the “Add to list” process. Previously, there was no way to tell if a user had already been added to a list without manually scrolling through all list members one-by-one-beforehand. Other Twitter apps have had this basic feature for a while now so it’s good to see it finally come to Windows 10 users.

Have you noticed any other changes with the Windows 10 Twitter app recently? Let us know in the comments below and then follow us on Twitter for more Windows 10 news.

Twitter
Twitter
Download
QR-Code

Twitter
Developer:
Twitter Inc.
Price:
Free

Warning! Nasty new Office 365 phishing attack doing the rounds

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

A new and very nasty phishing attack has been doing the rounds, and it is extremely difficult to spot. Here is what you need to look out for.

First of all, we should thank Xavier Mertens for being the first to spot it. If you want to see the code that the phishing attack uses, pop over to this website.

How does this attack work?

A recipient gets a Non Delivery Receipt (NDR) from what looks like a trusted account. It tells the recipient that “Microsoft found several undelivered messages”.

Non Delivery Receipt

The next step that the phisherman wants you to do is click the ‘Send Again’ button. This will take you to a page that looks very much like the Office 365 page.

Fake phishing attack login page

Not the Office 365 Login
Check out the website address in the image above. It is obviously not the address of Office 365, Microsoft, Windows, or anything remotely linked to Microsoft, and yet I am sure many people entered their login information.

When you do enter your login info, you get sent to Outlook, so it looks very much like you have not been phished. Unfortunately, your Office 365 login details have just been sent to the bad guys, and they now have access to your Office Account and everything that goes with it.

Genuine Non Delivery Receipt

Genuine NDR Notice

Now, you all know how much I love to rant against Microsoft (in a constructive way, of course), but I really don’t think we can blame Microsoft for this. While the email address for the original phishing attack looks like it is ‘sort of’ official, there is no way that anyone should fall for the login address.

In case you want to be secure while surfing the internet, you will need to get a full-dedicated tool to secure your network.  Install now Cyberghost VPN and secure yourself. It protects your PC from attacks while browsing, masks your IP address and blocks all unwanted access.

Guys, always check the web addresses and if you are in any doubt, do NOT login from a link. Go into your browser and type in the address you want in the normal way, and then login. It ain’t rocket surgery, guys, just basic online safety rules.

Have you received this phishing attack. Did you spot it as phishing immediately, or did you have to double check? Or did you fall for it? Don’t worry if you did; I fell for a PayPal phishing scam once. The address was PayPel. In my defence, it was about 10 years ago. Let us know in the comments below.

RELATED ARTICLES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

Want to learn more about containers? Check out the latest in the Windows Insider Internals series

Posted on by Kip Kniskern

For some of us, “computing” means reading Twitter, checking email, and playing games. On the other end of the spectrum are the IT professionals who spend their work life building websites, business apps, and even Internet of Things solutions and next generation Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning applications. Still, there are some who are somewhere in the middle, interested in what’s going on in a computing world beyond Twitter, but not quite sure what all the fuss about IoT, AI, Machine Learning, and containers really means.

One of the members of the Windows Insider team, Brandon LeBlanc, has started an occasional series called “Windows Internals,” where he highlights Microsoft posts on subjects that aren’t quite mainstream, but still could be interesting to Windows Insiders looking to learn more about the computing world around them. In the latest in his series, LeBlanc focuses on containers, which he defines as “virtualized “boxes” that allow app developers to easily port their apps to different platforms.” These containers, well, contain everything an app needs to run, including dependencies, libraries, binaries, etc., making it easier to develop and maintain apps. LeBlanc then links to a couple of Microsoft posts on how to learn more.

The internet is great at throwing phrases around, kind of just assuming that everyone knows what they mean, and it’s difficult sometimes to “crack the code.” We applaud the Windows Insider team for giving computer novices a place to go to begin to learn more. Check out Windows Internals, and keep up the good work, Brandon!

How to view your Windows 10 Sticky Notes on the web

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Microsoft has been expanding its popular Windows 10 app Sticky Notes, adding a slew of useful new features. In recent months, the app has gained cross-device syncing and some initial integrations into Microsoft’s other products.

As a consequence of these changes, you can now view your Sticky Notes on the web when you’re away from your PC. Likewise, you can create notes online and see them appear within Windows 10’s Sticky Notes app when you get back to your desk.

First, create a new test note on your PC by opening the Sticky Notes app and writing some content. You will see your new note show up in the app’s notes list. It will immediately sync to the cloud using your Microsoft account.

Sticky Notes screenshot

Now, you’re ready to view your note online. To do so, just visit onenote.com/stickynotes. You’ll see a simple interface that displays all your notes in a list on the left. You can click each note to show its full content on the right. Editing tools and note background colour options are available in the same manner as Sticky Notes for Windows 10.

Sticky Notes screenshot

To create a new note, click the “+” button next to the search bar. Type your content and then wait a moment to see the note show up in the notes list in your Windows 10 Sticky Notes app.

Needless to say, this is a simple but extremely useful experience. With Sticky Notes now syncing across devices and to the web, you’ve got a much better chance of keeping track of your thoughts. If you’ve got a Surface, or another device with an active stylus, you can scribble down thoughts on sticky notes using Windows Ink and then consume them wherever you happen to be.

Sticky Notes screenshot

It’s worth noting it’s still quite early days for Sticky Notes on the web. The current experience is exceedingly basic and may well be expanded over time. Microsoft has chosen to put Sticky Notes under the OneNote umbrella but, so far, the two seem to be completely separate except for the domain. Unless you already know the URL, you won’t find Sticky Notes easily either – there’s no links to it from any of the other Office 365 apps.

Still, the core functionality is there and is ready for you to use today. Microsoft’s also testing Sticky Notes integration in the OneNote apps for Android and iOS, giving you even more options when you need to note something down.

Crossplay could be in the future for Xbox and Steam gamers

Posted on by Kareem Anderson

Microsoft has repeatedly expressed its interest in smudging the line between traditional console and PC gaming audiences. As the rumors continue to surface about Microsoft’s next batch of console and game streaming hardware and services, it seems that Steam may be quietly preparing for a future where Xbox One and PC players coexist more natively.

Buried in the most recent Steam beta release is a line of code that could be pointing to cross-platform integration from the PC gaming storefront. While originally spotted on ResetEra (via Windows Central), the specific source code can be found at Steam Beta GitHub’s repository.

For a bit of context, Steam and Xbox Live have been cross-play buddies for a few years now on titles such as PC-first Rise of Nations and console first Killer Instinct. yet, this new line of code looks like it’s intended for use by more developers seeking deeper integration with features such as Xbox networking using more standardization with Valve’s Steamworks toolset.
Open sourcing this level of integration could spur and streamline more cross-platform development from all types of game developers and not just the console blessed AAA approved ones.

Microsoft has a long road ahead of itself in bridging the gap between console and PC audiences as well as navigating its ‘future-of-gaming’ story, but, taken this code find with a grain of salt, if Steam is prepping for more cross-platform development, Microsoft might be headed into 2019 in decent gaming shape.

Razer unveils its first keyboard and mouse designed for Xbox One consoles

Posted on by Kareem Anderson

The Xbox One will soon be receiving its first official wireless keyboard and mouse combo from the gaming-centric Razer hardware department.

You’d be forgiven if you thought that five years into the Xbox One’s lifecycle, the console would have had an official first-party wireless keyboard and mouse combo to tout, but Microsoft left it to the experts in gaming to produce a truly game focused experience.

News about Razer’s first wireless Xbox One-supported mouse and keyboard has sort been all over the place with the company first announcing its intent to create the combo almost half a year ago.
Since the announcement, fans have only been treated to teaser images along the way with a full image reveal happening in late Novemeber, 2018.

Adding to the convoluted timeline is Razer’s most recent promotions of formal announcement of the mouse and keyboard happening January 8th, around the time of the Consumer Electronics Showcase.

Without details on specs, pricing or availability, all fans have to go on is the below video that highlights the development journey of Razer’s wireless keyboard and mouse.

There are a few details that can be parsed from the video that shines a light on the specific features that are coming with the mouse and keyboard that are Xbox oriented such as a dedicated Xbox button on the keyboard and slide-out mouse mat for lap gaming. Other spotted features include a color changing Chroma backlit powered keyboard that Xbox One developers were rumored to have access to in order to enhance gaming experiences.

While the wireless keyboard and mouse are welcomed additions to the Xbox One family of peripherals, the combo raises the question of how they’ll change the landscape of competitive gaming on the console as well as how Microsoft will position its next set of consoles alongside its Windows 10 gaming ambitions.

Windows 10 October 2018 Update now available to download for “seekers,” some upgrade blocks still remain

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

It’s now been a little more than a month since Microsoft re-released the Windows 10 October 2018 Update, and the Redmond giant quietly announced yesterday that the major release is now available for all “seekers.” In an update posted on the Windows 10 update history page (via Windows Latest), the company explains that “Windows 10, version 1809, is now fully available for advanced users who manually select “Check for updates” via Windows Update.”

The release of the October 2018 update has been a PR nightmare for Microsoft, as the company had to quickly pause the rollout after a file deletion bug surfaced. John Cable, Director of Program Management, Windows Servicing and Delivery explained last month that the October 2018 update would have a slower rollout to “more carefully study device health data”, and the new bits now being available for all Windows 10 users checking for updates doesn’t change this. If you’re not in a hurry to get it, it’s probably better to wait for Microsoft to push this update to your PC.

It’s worth noting that there are still several upgrade blocks in place: if you’re PC has incompatible Intel display drivers, AMD Radeon HD2000 and HD4000 series graphic processor units (GPUs), F5 VPN clients or rend Micro’s OfficeScan and Worry-Free Business Security software installed, you won’t receive the October 2018 for now. Microsoft is still working with partners to fix these issues, and you can learn more details on the Windows 10 Update history page.

For Honor Complete Edition launches on Microsoft’s Xbox One consoles

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

The For Honor Complete Edition is now live on Xbox One. This new repackaging of the game comes with the base game and all of the additional content that’s been released since its initial launch.

Here’s the official list of content for For Honor Complete Edition:

Get the entire ultimate For Honor experience with the base game, Marching Fire Expansion, the Year 1: Heroes Bundle, and the Year 3 Pass.

  • The base game includes: 12 Heroes, 7 Multiplayer Modes, and Story Campaign.
  • The Marching Fire Expansion includes: 4 new Heroes (Shaolin, Nuxia, Jiang Jun, and the Tiandi) and Unlimited solo or co-op PVE Arcade Mode.
  • The Year 3 Pass includes: 4 new Heroes coming in 2019 (1 week early access), 4 Elite outfits, one per new Hero, 30 days of Champion Status, 5 Scavenger Crates, and An effect for all Heroes.
  • The Year 1: Heroes Bundle includes: 6 additional Heroes (Centurion, Shinobi, Gladiator, Highlander, Aramusha and Shaman),  6 Elite Outfits (one per Hero), 30 days of Champion Status, 3 Scavenger Crates, 1 Exclusive Sunbeam effect for all Heroes, and 3 Exclusive Emblem Outlines.

For Honor is an action and adventure video game set within a chaotic world where Vikings samurai, and knights collide. The game features a single-player story campaign but the main focus is on its online battles which allows players to strategize and fight against each other.

Are you a fan of For Honor or will this be your first time playing? Let us know in the comments below and then follow us on Pinterest for more Xbox content.

FOR HONOR - Complete Edition WW
FOR HONOR - Complete Edition WW
Download
QR-Code

FOR HONOR – Complete Edition WW
Developer:
Ubisoft
Price:
Free

Hit video game Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice joins Xbox Game Pass

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, one of the most-popular video games of the past year or so, is now available to play for free for Xbox Game Pass subscribers on Xbox One.

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice originally came out on Sony’s PlayStation 4 console and PC in August 2017, but eventually made the jump to Microsoft’s Xbox One consoles in April 2018. The game is a blend of action, puzzle-solving, and horror and is set during the 8th century. It was praised by many for its exploration of mental illness and won numerous awards for its visuals, gameplay, audio, game design, and narrative.

Xbox Game Pass is a Netflix-like video game subscription service on Microsoft’s Xbox One consoles. Traditionally, new games would be added to the Game Pass library at the beginning of the month but, recently, several titles have been added a few weeks in.

Have you played Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice yet and will you give it a go with Xbox Game Pass? Let us know in the comments below and then follow us on Pinterest for more Xbox gaming content.

Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
Download
QR-Code

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice
Developer:
Ninja Theory Ltd
Price:
Free

The Printer Couldn’t Print: 5 Easy Methods You Can Use

Posted on by Matthew Adams

Printers are a vital part of most modern-day computers, especially in office setups where users require documenting stuff. But, the device is known to throw errors more often than others. And one such is The printer couldn’t print error on Epson, HP, and other manufacturers.

When you can’t find the printer, it at least makes sense as to why the print jobs are stuck. But, when everything looks in order, the printer is visible, set as default, and has no warning sign, troubleshooting is slightly trickier. So, let’s find out how you can fix things!

Why does my HP printer say it can’t print?

Here are a few reasons The printer couldn’t print test page in Windows 10:

  • Improper connection: Some older ones can only print when connected via a cable, and if that’s not the connection type, the error message will appear.
  • Issues with the driver: If the printer drivers are outdated, incompatible, or corrupt, it will have trouble printing and will throw a range of errors, including The printer couldn’t print in Microsoft Word.
  • Critical services not running: A few services need to be running for the printing jobs to go through effectively.

How can I fix The printer couldn’t print error?

Before we start making changes to the two devices, here are a few quick things you can try:

  • Restart both the computer and the printer.
  • Verify that the connection between the two is in order. To be sure, unplug the cable from both ends and reconnect it.
  • If the problem is limited to limited, download the HP Print and Scan Doctor tool to automatically identify and eliminate problems. Once done, check whether The printer couldn’t print a full page photo problem is fixed.
  • Assign a static IP to the printer. This could be done from the embedded web server accessible via the printer’s IP address. The interface for each manufacturer would be different, so we recommend you check the official website for the exact steps.

If these didn’t work, move to the changes listed next.

1. Run the Print Spooler service

  1. Press Windows + R to open Run, type services.msc in the text field, and hit Enter.services
  2. Locate the Print Spooler service, right-click on it, and choose Properties.properties
  3. Select Automatic from the Startup type, and click the Start button if the service is not running.automatic to fix the printer couldn't print
  4. Once done, click Apply and OK to save the changes.save changes

In most cases, it turns out to be the Print Spooler service to blame when The printer couldn’t print message shows up. So, make sure it’s active. Also, restarting the service should do the trick if it is already running.

2. Clear the print queue

  1. Stop the Print Spooler service as described earlier.
  2. Press Windows + E to open File Explorer, paste the following path, and hit Enter:C:\Windows\System32\Spool\PRINTERSclear queue to fix the printer couldn't print
  3. Press Ctrl + A to select all the files here and hit Delete to clear them.
  4. Once done, restart the Print Spooler service.
  5. You can now try printing and check whether the error message disappears.

3. Reinstall the printer driver

  1. Press Windows + X to open the Power User menu, and select Device Manager.device manager
  2. Expand the Printers entry, right-click the problematic printer, and choose Uninstall device from the context menu.uninstall device to fix the printer couldn't print
  3. Now, tick the checkbox for Attempt to remove the driver for this device and click Uninstall.uninstall
  4. Once done, restart the computer, and Windows will automatically install a fresh copy of the best available driver.

Another quick solution when you get The printer couldn’t print message is reinstalling the driver as shown in the guide above.

If this doesn’t work out, you can certainly rely on a smart driver app that can help you solve any PC driver matters in a short time.

4. Turn off the offline mode

  1. Press Windows + S to open Search, type Control Panel, and click the relevant search result.control panel
  2. Click on View devices and printers.view devices and printers
  3. Right-click on the affected printer and select See what’s printing.see what's printing
  4. Now, click on the Printer menu, and uncheck the Use Printer Offline option.disable to fix the printer couldn't print

5. Soft reset the printer

  1. Turn off the printer and disconnect the power cord from its rear end and also that of the router.
  2. Now, power off the computer and wait for 30 seconds.
  3. Next, turn on the router by connecting the power cable and wait for it to get ready. It usually takes 30 seconds to 1 minute.
  4. Turn the computer back on, and once Windows fully loads, connect the power cord to the printer and turn it on.

That’s it! This is how you soft reset a printer. While the steps are for an HP device, the process is similar for other manufacturers. In case you face issues, check the official website.

One of the solutions here should have helped get rid of The printer couldn’t print message, and you should be able to use the device again. If the problem persists, we recommend you replace the cable used for the connection.

If you use the PC a lot, check some quick tips to manage your device and printer settings and how to improve the performance of Windows to make it faster than ever.

For any queries or to share another solution with us, use the comments section below.

More Surface Pro 4 devices to be replaced due to faulty hardware

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Around the middle of this year, a firmware update for Microsoft Surface Pro 4 devices was released. Quickly afterwards, reports started coming in of display and pen issues among many other things, and another update fiasco began to unfold.

What was the original problem

What happened was that Microsoft issued a firmware update in July 2018 that was meant to give the Surface Pro 4 lots of new improvements. Unfortunately for Microsoft, what the update allegedly did was screw up many a display with no possibility of a workaround.

Back to the issue in hand

Apparently, Microsoft started to replace some units fairly quickly (for a tech company anyway). Now, according to new reports, Microsoft has decided to speed up the process.

Of course, you will have to reach out to support to get the ball rolling but we’ll assume that if you were affected by this update, you have already done that. So, reach out to support (again) and get the ball rolling on a new surface.

But you may need to be quick. As I was researching this article, I came across one website that pointed out something I hadn’t cottoned on to. Since Microsoft no longer makes the Surface Pro 4, all the replacements must be coming from existing stock. How many Surface Pro 4s have they got, I wonder?

Surface Pro 4

What’s being said by whom?

One place I recommend you check out is the Microsoft Answers page that has the original complaint and then all the usual stuff afterwards. It’s very entertaining. Especially the bits where the people who work for Microsoft chime in with ‘help’. Well, entertaining if you don’t have a Microsoft Surface Pro 4. Annoying as heck for people who do.

Apart from throwing their moderators to the wolves, Microsoft is as talkative as ever (when things go wrong). For major screw-ups, Microsoft’s usual tactic is to tell all and sundry that it is ‘investigating’ the issue, which is exactly what it has done here.

What caused the problem?

Who knows? It appears that Microsoft still has no idea what caused the problem in the first place. This is not only highly embarrassing but also begs the question about the use of the insider program again. If I remember rightly, both the fast and slow rings were skipped for the Windows 10 1809 update, and that ended pretty badly, although no machines have needed to be replaced as far as I am aware.

It’s only fair to assume that the firmware update for the Microsoft Surface Pro 4 must have skipped the insider program altogether as well, otherwise how did this major (and extremely costly) error not get picked up?

Wrapping it all up

What Microsoft has not addressed yet is the fact that for around five months, its customers have been led the old merry runaround. I would hate to suggest that it was presumably to give Microsoft’s legal department a chance to see if they could get out of replacing devices that were no longer under warranty, or better yet, get out of doing anything at all. That would be a terrible thing to suggest. Anyway, it would appear the big bosses just got the bad news and it is time to cough up.

Was your Microsoft Surface Pro 4 affected by this latest debacle? If so, let us know how you get on with fixing the problem or getting a replacement. We’d love to here from you.

RECENT NEWS ARTICLES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT:

Microsoft open sources Trill, an internal tool for processing “a trillion events per day”

Posted on by Kareem Anderson

Update: We mentioned that Trill will be available in the coming months, but it appears that it is already available on GitHub and developers can grab it here. 

Another day, another open source project gets a blessing from Microsoft. Today, December 17, 2018, Microsoft is open sourcing an internal project it’s dubbed Trill, so that more developers have access to a new temporal query language as well as “a trillion events per day” worth of aggregated data.

For those unfamiliar with Trill, it started as a Microsoft Research project back in 2012 and has since been featured in published research papers. Moving from the research phase to actual implementation, Microsoft has used Trill internally for Azure Data products and other mission-critical streaming initiatives throughout the company including Bing Ads and Halo.

Microsoft details Trill as,

Trill was the first streaming engine to incorporate techniques and algorithms that process events in small batches of data based on the latency tolerated by the user. It was also the first engine to organize those batches in columnar format, enabling queries to execute much more efficiently than before. To users, working with Trill is the same as working with any .NET library, so there is no need to leave the .NET environment. Users can embed Trill within a variety of distributed processing infrastructures such as Orleans and a streaming version of Microsoft’s SCOPE data processing infrastructure.

As of today, open source developers get access to the following Trill enabled data and toolsets:

  • As a single-node engine library, any .NET application, service, or platform can easily use Trill and start processing queries.
  • A temporal query language allows users to express complex queries over real-time and/or offline data sets.
  • Trill’s high performance across its intended usage scenarios means users get results with incredible speed and low latency. For example, filters operate at memory bandwidth speeds up to several billions of events per second, while grouped aggregates operate at 10 to 100 million events per second.

As far as the benefit to Microsoft from open sourcing Trill, the company seems to want Trill as the foundation layer for temporal processing for all businesses and developers. Microsoft also sees community involvement as the future of IStreamable abstraction for customers as well as IEnumerable and IObservable being made available to more people.

All Xbox One X / S bundles are now $100 off for a limited time

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Microsoft previously offered a $100 discount on select Xbox One bundles for Black Friday, and the company will be doing the same during the holidays. The limited-time offer starts today in the US and will last through December 25, while supplies last.

The list of discounted bundles is available on Xbox.com, but we’ve highlighted some of the most interesting below. If you’re not a fan of the standard black colour for the Xbox One X, and you can snag the Robot White Special Edition or the Gold Rush Special Edition for just $399:

  • Xbox One X Gold Rush Special Edition Battlefield V Bundle (also includes Battlefield 1 and Battlefield 1943) – $399
  • Xbox One X Robot White Special Edition Fallout 76 Bundle – $399
  • Xbox One X Forza Horizon 4 Bundle (also includes Forza Motorsport 7 – $399
  • Xbox One S Minecraft Creators Bundle (1TB) – $199
  • Xbox One S Forza Horizon 4 Bundle (1TB) – $199
  • Xbox One S Battlefield V Bundle (1TB) – $199

Any Xbox console would definitely make a great holiday gift, and we hope these lowered prices will go standard in 2019. In case you missed it, Microsoft is planning to launch two new Xbox One consoles next year, a disc-less model that could start shipping in 2019, as well as an updated Xbox One S later in the year to cut manufacturing costs. Even though Microsoft is planning two next-gen “Scarlett” consoles in 2020, the Xbox One family will be supported for many years to come, and all Xbox One games you buy today are expected to be backward compatible on the next generation.

Windows 10 news recap: Surface Pro 4’s affected by firmware issue are being replaced, testing of splitting Search and Cortana now taking place, and more

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Welcome back to our Windows 10 news recap, where we go over the top stories of the past week in the world of Microsoft’s flagship operating system.

Microsoft addresses faulty Surface Pro 4 firmware issue with device replacements

Surface Pro 4 devices that have suffered the fate of a firmware issue are being replaced by Microsoft. Specifically, the issue is caused by a firmware update that took place in July.

My Surface Pro 4

Windows 10’s People Bar set for the chopping block

The People Bar in Windows 10 is reportedly being deprecated soon. It’s a relatively new feature that aimed to surface those you communicate with most to make it easier to get in touch with them, but it appears Microsoft no longer has the same feeling for the People Bar as it did when it first touted the feature.

Microsoft starts testing splitting Search and Cortana in two

It looks like Microsoft may be in the Christmas-giving spirit, as it begins testing the break-up of Windows 10 Search and Cortana.

Mozilla Firefox gains native Windows 10 sharing in latest update

Firefox has released a new update that adds direct integration with Windows 10’s sharing functionality, making it easier to share across apps and with those you communicate with regularly.

Firefox on Windows 10

That’s it for this week – we’ll be back next week with more Windows 10 news!

Surface Diagnostic Toolkit Download: Quick and Easy Repair

Posted on by Radu Tyrsina

Computer problems are usually not that complicated to fix. The real problem is that most people are not keen to try and fix them, preferring to call IT or take the problematic machine to the local shop.

With the recent release of the Surface Diagnostic Toolkit (SDT), there is now a third option if you have a Surface device. Let’s have a look at how it works.

What is the Surface diagnostic toolkit?

The Surface Diagnostic Toolkit is a free Microsoft tool designed to help diagnose and resolve common issues with Microsoft Surface devices. It is compatible with Surface devices running Windows 10 and later versions.

The Surface Diagnostic Toolkit can identify and troubleshoot many issues, including battery and power problems, audio and video, network connectivity, and software and hardware issues.

In addition, the toolkit runs a series of tests to diagnose problems and provides recommended solutions or repair options.

The Surface Diagnostic Toolkit is easy to use and can be downloaded and installed directly from the Microsoft website. It is a valuable tool for Surface users experiencing issues and wanting to troubleshoot and fix problems without technical support.

How do I download Surface Diagnostic Toolkit?

  1. Go to the Microsoft website.
  2. Click the Download button.
    surface diagnostic toolkit download
  3. Select the tool version that matches your device’s operating system, then click the Next button.
    Fortect Top articles for Editing - 4510 articles Fortect Top articles for Editing - 4510 articles 100% 10 B1954 surface diagnostic toolkit download surface diagnostic toolkit download Turn on screen reader support To enable screen reader support, press Ctrl+Alt+Z To learn about keyboard shortcuts, press Ctrl+slashBolaji Ola-Hassan has joined the document.
  4. Once the download is complete, double-click the downloaded file to launch the installer.
  5. Follow the on-screen instructions to install the Surface Diagnostic Toolkit on your device.

Once the tool is installed, launch it from your Start menu or search for “Surface Diagnostic Toolkit” in the Windows search bar.

How do I run repair on my Surface Pro?

  1. Download and install the Surface Diagnostic Toolkit as described in my previous section.
  2. Launch the Surface Diagnostic Toolkit from your Start menu or search for Surface Diagnostic Toolkit in the Windows search bar.
  3. On the main menu, select Run All, or any specific repair.
  4. Follow the prompts and instructions to run the diagnostic tests on your device.
  5. Once the diagnostic tests are complete, the tool will summarize any issues detected.
  6. If the tool detects an issue that can be repaired, click on Repair and Continue to begin the repair process.
  7. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the repair process.
  8. After the repair, click on Restart your computer.

The Surface Diagnostic Toolkit is a powerful tool that can help diagnose and resolve many common issues with Surface devices. 

However, it may not be able to resolve all issues, and in some cases, you may need to contact MS support for further assistance.

SDT has been around a while and is one of those rare good and practical ideas. Please tell us your experience using this tool and what you find most interesting.

Windows 10 ARM emulator: What it is and what it does

Posted on by Aleksandar Ognjanovic

Since the Fall Creators Update, users who have ARM64 (or ARM32) machines are able to run Windows 10 without any issues. Two supported editions are Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 S. This brings a lot of advantages and diversifies a bit stalled development of the platform.

How does Windows 10 ARM emulator work?

Now, do not mistake this for the Windows 10 Mobile, as the Qualcomm-powered CPUs are finding their place on more and more non-smartphone devices. This breakthrough allows users to utilize low power consumption and mobile data features on the ARM architecture.

Since all UWP applications for standard x86 and x64 processors flawlessly emulate on ARM, you get the full Windows 10 experience with all the goodies an ARM CPU brings to the table.

But how does Windows 10 ARM emulates x86 and x64 applications? Or can it do it in the first place? It can do it and in a seamless manner, for that matter.

The only exception being x64 Win32 applications which are not supported. The applications don’t need to be recompiled or modified thanks to emulation of WOW64 layer.

x86 win32 emulation

It works by compiling blocks of x86 instructions into ARM64 instructions with optimizations to improve performance. Accordingly, these instructions are translated and cached, so the application modules are optimized to work in a seamless manner.

Primarily, if the app you want to use has an ARM version, that’s the version you’ll get. On the other hand, if that’s not the case, the system will provide you with the version for x86 architecture.

What are your thoughts on Windows 10 on ARM-powered devices? Tell us in the comments section below.

RELATED STORIES YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT: