Viruses, spyware, malware, etc., all have one thing in common: they all suck. They slow down your computer, corrupt your files, illegally steal your info, and more.
You have probably seen those ads online advertising a service that will scan your computer for free and magically clean your computer as well as make it 20 times faster. Well, those websites will scan your computer, which is true, however, the majority of them will charge a large fee to get rid of all of the errors found in the scan. In addition, a lot of them are fake and will actually install more malware and spyware onto your computer.
Basically, though, the services use a simple antivirus scanner/remover. There is far better software out there that is available to you for free. By following the tips in this article, you should be able to remove most types of virus, spyware, or malware from your computer.
Obviously, not all malware is created equal and some items are far harder to remove than others. In those types of instances, you best option is to perform a clean install, which is the only sure-fire way to ensure that all remnants of the infection are gone.
Method 1 – Scanning
There are thousands of different programs out there in the spyware/virus removal category, many of which are free. The thing to remember is that different virus removal programs will bring different results and none of them are 100% completely accurate.
For example, you can scan your computer with one virus removal program, remove the viruses and then turn around a scan your computer with a different program, which will catch even more viruses that the first program didn't pick up.
So the best thing to do when you have a nasty infection with multiple viruses, malware or spyware on your system is to run multiple programs. However, a lot of these newer viruses are smart and prevent you from running anti-virus or anti-malware tools inside Windows.
In order to get around this, you have to either scan the system before the operating system boots up or you have to get Windows into Safe Mode and start the scanning process there. To get started, read my post on how to reboot Windows 7/8/10 into Safe Mode.
Once you are in Safe Mode, you need to run several scanning programs one after the other until no more instances of infection are found. So which programs should you choose to run? Luckily, I’ve already written an article on the best free anti-spyware, anti-malware and anti-virus programs currently out there.
In my opinion, you should run SUPERAnti-Spyware first, then MalwareBytes Anti-Malware followed by Spybot and Ad-Adware. Of course, you’ll need an Internet connection for this, so make sure that you enable Safe Mode with Networking.
If you have a really smart virus, it will even disable your Internet connection by changing settings in Windows. In that case, read my post on troubleshooting Internet connections and it should fix your problem.
With thorough scanning, most cases of infection can be cleaned completely. It’s a tedious process and requires a bit of technical work, but it usually gets the job done.
Method 2 – Rescue Disks
In addition to the Safe Mode method, you should also scan your computer before Windows even has a chance to boot up. You can do this by using an offline virus scanner or pre-boot scanner.
The way this works is that you will have to use another computer to download an ISO image file from an anti-virus company like Microsoft or Kaspersky and then burn it onto a disc. You will then boot to this disc instead of your normal Windows install and run the anti-virus software from there.
Since Windows is not running, the infection can’t interfere and you have a much better chance of being able to remove it. This method is really the only way to get rid of a really nasty virus or malware infection via scanning.
There are a couple of rescue disks that I recommend using. The first one is from Microsoft and is called Windows Defender Offline. Check out my previous article on using Windows Defender Offline to scan your computer.
Again, just like with the scanning software, you should try multiple rescue disks to ensure that the virus or malware has been removed. The other ones I suggest using are:
Note that some of these allow you to download an EXE file and install the files onto a USB stick, which you can then boot up from instead of a CD/DVD. As mentioned, this is a bit more technical, but all the sites have guides on how to create the disks and then use them.
Method 3 – Clean Install
A clean install is not the most fun thing to do, however, it is the one guaranteed way to get rid of viruses, spyware, and malware. It's pretty straight-forward: when you do a clean install, you delete everything on your hard drive. Therefore, no more viruses.
Some of the time, viruses will not infect items like pictures, text documents, videos, or MP3 files. A good thing to do is to scan all your personal data and if there are no viruses found, copy that to an external drive. In this way, you can perform a clean install and not lose anything important. Obviously, you’ll have to reinstall all your programs, etc., but sometimes you have no other choice.
Performing a clean install is not at all as hard as it may seem, it's just time consuming because you have to wait for Windows to install. Also, with Windows 8 and Windows 10, the process is even easier because you don’t even need to have your installation CD/DVD anymore.
If you have trouble using the built-in reset feature in Windows and you don’t have your original Windows disc with you, check out my post on how to legally download Windows and install it on a flash drive.
As long as you have your original product key or in the case of Windows 10, as long as it’s the same computer you had Windows 10 installed on before, you can just boot up from the USB stick and reinstall Windows.
Finally, once your computer is clean and running well again, check out my post on how to protect yourself from viruses and malware in the future. The safest way to keep your computer free of viruses, however, is to create a virtual machine and do everything shady inside of that. If you have any questions, feel free to comment. Enjoy!
Looking for a way to burn an ISO image file to a CD or DVD on your Mac? Luckily, just as you can mount and burn ISO images files in Windows 8/10 without additional software, you can also do the same thing in OS X.
There are a couple of different ways you can burn an ISO image in OS X and it really depends on what version you have installed. For the last several years, you could use Disk Utility to mount the ISO image and then burn it to a disc.
However, with the latest release of OS X, 10.11 El Capitan, Apple has removed the burning functionality from Disk Utility. You can still burn ISO images in El Capitan, but you have to use Finder instead. The Finder method also works on older versions of OS X too.
Lastly, you can use Terminal and the hdiutil command to burn an ISO image to disc if you are comfortable using that tool. In this article, I’ll show you all three methods for burning ISO images in OS X.
Finder Method
The Finder method is now the most universal method for burning ISO images in OS X since it’s supported on pretty much all versions. It’s also extremely easy to do. First, open a new Finder window, navigate to the location of your ISO file and then single click on it to select it.
Now go ahead and click on File and click on Burn Disk Image at the bottom of the list.
If you don’t already have a disc in your drive, you’ll be asked to insert one. Then just click the Burn button to start the burn process.
Another quick way to burn the ISO image file is to just right-click on the file and choose Burn Disk Image. As long as you have a disc in the drive, the burn process will start immediately.
Disk Utility Method
If you are running OS X 10.10 or lower, you can also use the Disk Utility method to burn your ISO image. Open Disk Utility by clicking on the Spotlight icon (magnifying glass) at the top right of your screen and type in disk utility.
Now click on File and then Open Disk Image.
The ISO image will show up in the left-hand side along with the list of hard drives, etc. Click on the ISO file and then click on the Burn button at the top.
Pop your disc into the drive and click the Burn button to start the process. As mentioned earlier, this no longer works on OS X 10.11 El Capitan.
Terminal Method
Lastly, if you love using the Terminal, you can type a simple command to burn the ISO image file.
hdiutil burn ~/PathToYourISO/filename.iso
I would suggest copying the file to an easy location like your desktop and renaming the file to something short too. In my case, I copied the file to my desktop and renamed it to just ubuntu.iso. I navigated to the desktop by typing in CD Desktop and then typed in hdiutil burn ubuntu.iso.
If you have a disc in the drive before you run the command, the burn process will start automatically. Otherwise, it’ll ask you to insert a disc. Those are all the ways you can burn your ISO image on a Mac without third-party software! If you have any questions, feel free to comment. Enjoy!
Jan 14, 2016 10:56 am | Aseem Kishore | Computer Tips
Delete or Clear Jump List Recent Items in Windows 7, 8 & 10
Back in the days, I wrote an article on how to clear the recent items list in Windows. If you added the Recent Items option to the Start Menu, you or anyone else could see all the files you recently opened!
If you're a privacy freak who doesn't want someone else to see what kind of documents you’ve been opening, clearing this list is essential! However, starting with Windows 7, there was a new feature introduced called a Jump List. You can read my previous post to understand how Jump Lists work.
With Jump Lists, that functionality basically moved from the Start Menu to the taskbar in Windows 8 and Windows 10! For example, if you open several Word documents and then right-click on the Word icon in the taskbar, you'll see the following list:
It’s even worse for something like a web browser. When I right-clicked on the Chrome icon in my taskbar, I was surprised to see a list of my most visited sites and recently closed tabs!
If no one else uses your computer, that’s fine, but otherwise it’s like a quick peek into your personal stuff! Obviously, Microsoft created this feature for convenience purposes, so you could easily open a web page you visit very often or file that you had recently worked on.
Each program has to individually support this feature in order to see the list. If a program doesn’t support Jump Lists, you won’t see anything when you right-click on the icon.
Clearing Individual Jump List Items
Now when it comes to removing items in the Jump List, there are a couple of ways to go about it. Firstly, let’s start with removing individual items from the list. An easy way to get rid of one item is to just right-click on the item and choose Remove from this list.
Obviously, that’s just for clearing a small number of items. If you remove all of the items, you have to configure a setting in Windows. The procedure for doing this is different depending on what version of Windows you are using. I’ll show you how to do it in Windows 7 and Windows 10.
Turn Off Jump Lists in Windows 7
To prevent Windows from storing and displaying a list of recent items in the taskbar, you first need to right-click on the taskbar and choose Properties.
Now click on the Start Menu tab and then uncheck the Store and display recently opened items in the Start menu and the taskbar box.
Click OK and all the data stored for recently opened items will be deleted. Now when you right-click on any program in the taskbar, no personal data will show up. Note that this is a good way to wipe out all the stored data and start from scratch.
If you want, you can check the box again and it will begin to store recently opened items, but from a clean slate. Obviously, just leave it unchecked if you never want Windows to store your history.
Turn Off Jump Lists in Windows 10
In Windows 10, the procedure has changed. If you right-click on the taskbar and go to Properties, you’ll see there isn’t even a Start Menu tab anymore.
For Windows 10, you have to click on Start and then Settings first. Then click on Personalization.
Click on Start in the left-hand menu and then click on the Show recently opened items in Jump Lists on Start or the taskbar toggle button so that it says Off.
Manually Clear Jump Lists
All recent items in any Jump List are stored by Windows in a hidden location, which you can get to in Windows 7 or higher by browsing to the following folder location in Explorer:
Copy and paste that into Windows Explorer and press enter. Now you will see a list of files with very long and convoluted names. This is because all the Jump Lists are encoded. Each file represents a list of recent items for a particular programs’ Jump List.
It's impossible to tell which entries go with which Jump Lists unless you open the file in a text editor and browse through it. However, since all of the files are just recent items in a Jump List, you can delete all the files and it will clear all recent items on all Jump Lists.
Those are all the different ways you can clear the list of recent items from a Jump List in Windows. If you have any questions, feel free to comment. Enjoy!
Sometimes even after you’ve uninstalled a program, its entry will remain listed in the Add or Remove Programs or Programs and Features list under currently installed programs in the Control Panel.
This is usually caused by a badly written program that doesn’t properly uninstall itself. The entry is not removed from the registry and therefore remains in the list. If you try to uninstall it again, you’ll most likely just get an error message.
Newer versions of Windows will detect this problem and actually ask you if you want to remove the entry, which is nice. However, if you’re still running Windows 7 or Vista or XP, you’ll still run into this problem.
Remove Stuck Programs – Registry
Luckily, there is an easy way to manually remove these stuck entries from the list. It requires some registry editing, so be sure to make a backup of your registry first in case you mess something up.
To open the registry, click on Start and type in regedit. Now navigate to the following registry key and expand it.
You’ll see quite a few entries listed, some of which have friendly names and some that have a really long identifier.
You can easily identify the programs with the long identifier by just clicking on it and looking for DisplayName at the right. In the above example, you can see one of them is for a program called VMware Tools.
Find the program that is stuck in your program list and then right-click on it in the left-hand menu and choose Delete.
Now you might be wondering why all the programs you have listed under Programs and Features are not showing up under this registry key? The reason is because you might have 32-bit programs installed on a 64-bit version of Windows.
For all of these programs, you need to navigate to the following registry key where you will probably find a lot more entries:
Here, for example, you will find all the entries for Java, if you have that installed. You’ll also find a bunch of entries for Microsoft Office, if you have the 32-bit version installed. Again, just right-click on the entry and choose Delete to remove it.
Lastly, if the program was installed via a .MSI package, which might be the case in corporate environments, you also should check this registry key:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Installer\Products
You’ll need to restart your computer and then open up the list of programs in Control Panel to see the changes. It should hopefully be gone.
Microsoft Fix It Solution
If you don’t want to mess around with the registry yourself, Microsoft has a free Fix It tool you can download that specifically deals with this issue of programs that cannot be completely uninstalled.
The program will run on Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8.1. It does not work on Windows 10, but hopefully you should never have this issue on Windows 10.
Third-Party Tools
Finally, there is one other way to go about fixing this problem and that is using third-party tools. One of my favorite programs for cleaning up the registry is CCleaner because it’s super safe to use. It’s actually the only program I recommend for fixing problems in the Windows registry.
Hopefully, using one of the methods above, you will be able to clear out any entries that were refusing to go away! If you have any questions, feel free to comment. Enjoy!
How to Replace Notepad in Windows with Alternatives
I’ve previously written about some of the best alternatives to Notepad for Windows, but I didn’t mention anything about replacing Notepad altogether. Personally, I find Notepad to be really useful because you can paste heavily formatted text into it and copy out clean non-formatted text.
However, if you never do that and only use Notepad when Windows forces you to, i.e. opening a text document, maybe replacing Notepad with something else will make you more productive. Unfortunately, the procedure to truly replace Notepad is quite long and tedious. I don’t think the benefits outweigh the cost of following the procedure for most people.
An easier way to semi-replace Notepad is to download a Notepad alternative and then just set the new program as the default program for certain file types. Basically, you would go to the Set File Associations dialog and just change all the ones currently defaulted to Notepad. You could also change any other extension to open with your new Notepad alternative.
This is obviously a lot easier and a lot safer. That being said, I’m still going to walk you through the steps for actually replacing Notepad with a different program in case that’s really what you want to do.
Before we get into the procedure, you have to check the alternative program to make sure it works all by itself. Firstly, you have to download the non-installer version of the program. For example, if you decide to use Notepad2, first make sure to download the 32-bit or 64-bit program files, not the setup.
Unzip the files and you should have a folder with some files, one being the Application file (EXE). Go ahead and copy that one file to your desktop and see if you can run the program.
If the program runs without any errors from the desktop, you can use it to replace Notepad. A program like Notepad++ has a bunch of file and folder dependencies and when you copy the EXE file to the desktop, it raises a bunch of errors. So we won’t be able to use that to replace Notepad. Remember, don’t download the setup or installer program when you choose an alternative.
Replace Notepad in Windows
So the first thing you have to figure out is whether you have 32-bit or 64-bit Windows. You can do this by going to Explorer, This PC and then clicking on the C drive where Windows is installed. If you see two folders, Program Files and Program Files (x86), that means you have a 64-bit version of Windows.
You can also just click on Start, type in System, press Enter and then check to see what is listed under System Type.
In order to replace Notepad, we have to replace the Notepad executable file that is stored in a couple of different locations in Windows. If you have 32-bit Windows, it’s just two locations. For 64-bit Windows, it’s three locations.
C:\Windows
C:\Windows\System32\
C:\Windows\SysWOW64 - Only 64-bit Windows
Now we have to go through all of the above locations and delete the notepad.exe file. The procedure is the same for each file, so I’ll only show you once and then you’ll have to do it yourself for the other two.
Navigate to C:\Windows and scroll down till you see Notepad. Now right-click on Notepad and choose Properties.
Now click on the Security tab and then click on the Advanced button at the bottom.
At the top, click on the Change button next to the Owner. The owner for this file should be TrustedInstaller. If you are running Windows 7, click on the Owner tab and then click the Edit button.
In the box that appears, go ahead and type in the word administrators and then click on Check Names. It should format it properly with the computer name in front.
Click OK and you should see that the owner now says Administrators instead of TrustedInstaller. In Windows 7, you don’t have to type in anything. You should see Administrators listed at the bottom, so just select that and click OK.
Now you have to exit all of the security screens by clicking OK. Make sure you don’t click Cancel. You should have to click OK twice, once to exit the Advanced Security Settings screen and once to exit Properties screen for notepad.exe. You should be back to your Explorer window.
Go ahead and right-click on notepad.exe again and choose Properties. Click on the Security tab again, but this time click on the Edit button.
Click on Administrators in the list of groups and users and then check the box under Allow for Full Control in the permissions box at the bottom.
Now click OK to close the Permissions screen. You might get a popup saying you are changing permissions and this could reduce the security of your computer. Just click Yes to continue. Then click OK again to close the Notepad Properties dialog.
Again, you’ll be back to the Explorer window. Now you should be able to right-click on the notepad.exe file and delete it. Now take your replacement notepad application file and copy it to the C:\Windows folder.
Note that if you have a 64-bit version of Windows, you should copy the 64-bit version of the program. This is not a requirement and if the program doesn’t have a 64-bit version, you can use the 32-bit version and it’ll still work.
You’ll also get a dialog saying Folder Access Denied, but just click Continue and the file will be copied. Now go ahead and rename the file to notepad. Note that you do not have to type in notepad.exe because Windows hides application extensions by default.
When you rename the file to notepad, you’ll also see that the icon gets replaced with the regular Notepad icon. Don’t worry, the program is still your Notepad alternative, but Windows changes the icon because this is a system folder and Notepad is a system program.
Now you have to go do this one more time in C:\Windows\System32 if you have a 32-bit version of Windows or two more times (C:\Windows\System32 and C:\Windows\SysWOW64) in you have a 64-bit version of Windows.
The first time takes a bit of time, but the second and third time go by really fast. Once all the original files have been replaced, you can click on Start, type in notepad and then press Enter. Instead of the normal Windows Notepad loading, you should now see your replacement program.
You might get a warning saying that the publisher of this program could not be verified the first time you run it. This is because Windows checks the signature of the EXE file and knows it is not the original file. In this case, just uncheck the Always ask before opening this file box and click Run.
Now when you run it again, it should just open fine without any dialog.
That’s about it! Overall, it works well and you can choose from several different Notepad alternatives when performing these steps. If you have any questions, feel free to comment. Enjoy!
Even though most people still have CD and DVD burner drives in their computers, you’ve probably bought a movie that is in Blu-ray format. Due to the cost, you’ll only see Blu-ray drives installed on custom PCs or on higher-end machines from companies like Dell or HP.
If you like watching movies on your computer and you have a high-end monitor, then it might be worth the extra cost. However, most people spend money on more expensive HDTVs and therefore most Blu-ray discs you’ll buy today are for movies. Most Blu-ray players are stand-alone devices or they are bundled with gaming consoles.
If you want to start using Blu-ray discs to store large amounts of data physically, then your best option is to simply buy an external Blu-ray burner online. You can get a decent Blu-ray burner that can write at 14X speed for around $50 on Amazon. These cheaper ones will let you burn 25 GB and 50 GB discs. If you spend a little more (around $110), you can get an external Blu-ray burner that supports BD-XL discs, which go up to a whopping 128 GBs.
In this article, I’ll talk about the different Blu-ray formats and some of their technical specs. Blu-ray discs are a great way to quickly and cheaply backup large amounts of data that would otherwise require a really large cloud storage plan or large external hard drive.
After I bought an HD camcorder back in 2010, I suddenly had hundreds of gigabytes of data sitting on my computer. The first solution was to copy all that data to a 2 TB external hard drive. That worked great and I still do that, but one of my external hard drives failed and I lost a lot of video. Storing all that data in the cloud was too expensive and slow, so I started burning Blu-ray discs.
The great thing about discs is that they won’t fail on you if you take care of them. As long as they don’t get crushed, my data will be safely stored on those discs for a very long time. It’s just another way to keep your data backed up in case of hard drive crashes, which still happen more often than you would think.
Another great reason to buy them is for watching your movie collection on your HDTV. If you have a Xbox One or PS4 console, you can burn your movies onto a Blu-ray disc and play them directly. This is actually a lot easier than trying to stream your content from your computer or NAS to your HDTV, which requires a gigabit connection between all your devices.
BD-R, BD-RE and BD DL
When Blu-ray first came out, there were really only two types of discs: write and rewriteable. BD-R discs are write-only and BD-RE are rewriteable. The standard size for these discs are 25 GB and they only have one layer. These cost about $1 per disc.
After a while, the dual layer Blu-ray discs started to appear. Just like dual layer DVDs, these Blu-ray discs could hold double the amount of data as regular discs or 50 GB in this case. These discs are significantly more expensive at more than $2 per disc.
A BD-RE DL (50GB and rewriteable) disc is even more expensive coming in at around $3 per disc. So how long does it take to burn one of these Blu-ray discs? Well, it all depends on the speed of your burner and the size of the disc. Here is a chart from Wikipedia:
BD-XL TL, BD-XL QL, and BD-XL DS TL
Now let’s get to the newer stuff where the really big sizes start to come in. In 2010, BD-XL discs were announced and they come in two flavors: triple layer (TL) and quadruple layer (QL). A BD-XL TL disc can hold up to 100 GB of data and a BD-XL QL disc maxes out at 128 GB.
Along with the bigger size comes a bigger price! The BD-XL TL discs start around $10 per disc. It doesn’t seem like the QL discs ever gained any traction because I can’t even find a place that sells them. Seems like the 100 GB discs are the most popular when talking about BD-XL.
BD-XL DS (double-sided) TL is another specification that has been approved by the Blu-ray Disc Association, which will support up to 200 GB, but it will only be cost-effective for commercial uses like data centers, cloud computing, etc.
For consumers, the most you can get with Blu-ray is a BD-XL burner and a BD-XL TL disc, which can store up to 100 GB. That’s still a lot of data on one disc!
Ultra HD 4K BD-ROM
Lastly, the Blu-ray Disc Association announced at the end of 2015 that new 4K Blu-ray disc format will support Ultra HD 4K video up to 60 frames per second. If you haven’t heard about UHD yet, Google it.
Basically, 4K TVs are selling like crazy nowadays, but you might have come across a few that are saying to hold off until 4K UDH sets become available. That’s because these new 4K TVs will support high dynamic range, which allows them to show more colors, more details, and better highlights.
Unfortunately, these high dynamic range 4K sets aren’t coming until 2016 and will most likely be way more expensive than your $700 Vizio 4K set. However, according to the people who have seen it, 4K with high dynamic range makes a significant difference over 1080p, whereas a lot of people say that it’s hard to see the difference between a current 4K set and 1080p, especially on TVs less than 65 inches in size.
Of course, you’ll have to blow up a lot of money. In order to enjoy this awesome resolution, you’ll need a 4K TV with high dynamic range, a native 4K Blu-ray player coming in 2016 and the new 4K UDH Blu-ray discs, arriving on March 1st, 2016.
There are currently 4K Blu-ray players on the market, but they are not native 4K, meaning that they simply take a 1080p signal and upscale it to 4K. A native 4K player will set you back at least $400 to $600 in 2016, but will offer true 4K resolution (as long as you buy the new 4K Blu-ray UHD discs too).
Hopefully, this gives you a little more background into Blu-ray technology and where it is going. For most people, it’ll apply to their movies and TV sets, but also for those who own Blu-ray disc drives on their computers. If you have any questions, feel free to comment. Enjoy!
Jan 12, 2016 12:27 pm | Aseem Kishore | MS Office Tips
How to use Sparklines in Excel
Ever had a worksheet of data in Excel and quickly wanted to see the trend in the data? Maybe you have some test scores for your students or revenue from your company over the last 5 years and instead of creating a chart in Excel, which takes time and ends up eating up an entire worksheet, some small mini-charts in a single cell would be better.
Excel 2010, 2013 and 2016 have a cool feature called sparklines that basically let you create mini-charts inside a single Excel cell. You can add sparklines to any cell and keep it right next to your data. In this way, you can quickly visualize data on a row by row basis. It’s just another great way to analyze data in Excel.
Before we get started, let’s take a look at a quick example of what I mean. In the data below, I have revenue from ten stores over the last six quarters. Using sparklines, I can quickly see which stores are increasing revenue and which stores are performing badly.
Obviously, you have to be careful when looking at data using sparklines because it can be misleading depending on what numbers you are analyzing. For example, if you look at Store 1, you see that revenue went from $56K to about $98 and the trend line is going straight up.
However, if you look at Store 8, the trend line is very similar, but the revenue only went from $38K to $44K. So sparklines don’t let you see the data in absolute terms. The graphs that are created are just relative to the data in that row, which is very important to understand.
For comparison purposes, I went ahead and created a normal Excel chart with the same data and here you can clearly see how each store performs in relation to the others.
In this chart, Store 8 is pretty much a flat line as compared to Store 1, which is still a trending up line. So you can see how the same data can be interpreted in different ways depending on how you choose to display it. Regular charts help you see trends between many rows or data and sparklines let you see trends within one row of data.
I should note that there is also a way to adjust the options so that the sparklines can be compared to each other also. I’ll mention how to do this down below.
Create a Sparkline
So, how do we go about creating a sparkline? In Excel, it’s really easy to do. First, click in the cell next to your data points, then click on Insert and then choose between Line, Column, and Win/Loss under Sparklines.
Pick from any of the three options depending on how you want the data displayed. You can always change the style later on, so don’t worry if you’re not sure which one will work best for your data. The Win/Loss type will only really make sense for data that has positive and negative values. A window should pop up asking you to choose the data range.
Click on the little button at the right and then select one row of data. Once you have selected the range, go ahead and click on the button again.
Now click OK and your sparkline or tiny chart should appear in that one cell. To apply the sparkline to all the other rows, just grab the bottom right edge and drag it down just like you would a cell with a formula in it.
Customizing Sparklines
Now that we have our sparklines, let’s customize them! Firstly, you can always increase the size of the cells so that the graphs are bigger. By default, they are pretty tiny and can be hard to see properly. Now go ahead and click in any cell with a sparkline and then click on the Design tab under Sparkline Tools.
Starting from the left, you can edit the data if you like to include more columns or less. Under Type, you can change the type of mini chart you want. Again, the Win/Loss is meant for data with positive and negative numbers. Under Show, you can add markers to the graphs like High Point, Low Point, Negative Points, First & LastPoint and Markers (marker for every data point).
Under Style, you can change the styling for the graph. Basically, this just changes the colors of the line or columns and lets you choose the colors for the markers. To the right of that, you can adjust the colors for the sparkline and the markers individually.
The only other important aspect of sparklines is the Axis options. If you click on that button, you’ll see some options called Vertical Axis Minimum Value Options and Vertical Axis Maximum Value Options.
If you want to make the sparklines relative to all the other rows instead of just its own row, choose Same for All Sparklines under both headings. Now when you look at the data, you’ll see that you can compare the charts in terms of absolute values. I also found that viewing the charts in column form makes it easier to see the data when comparing all sparklines.
As you can see now, the columns in Store 1 are much higher than the columns for Store 8, which had a slight upward trend, but with a much smaller revenue value. The light blue columns are low and high points because I checked those options.
That’s about all there is to know about sparklines. If you want to make a fancy looking Excel spreadsheet for your boss, this is the way to do it. If you have any questions, feel free to post a comment. Enjoy!
It’s happened to all of us at some point or another: you go to log onto your computer and you type in the password and you get a Password Incorrect message. You try again and it doesn’t work. Then you type it in really slowly to make sure you didn’t mess up any character and it still doesn’t work!
You’ve forgotten your password! It’s never fun forgetting a password, especially if you have a lot of important data on your computer. Luckily, there are tools and methods that allow you to get access to your data without ever needing to know what the original password was.
In this article, I’m going to talk about the different ways I have learned to regain access to a local account in Windows. Note that there is really no easy solution to this problem; you will have to open command prompts, type strange things and pray a lot.
If you are using a Microsoft account, it’s actually a lot easier to reset your password! Just visit the Windows Live password reset page and follow the instructions.
Windows 7 & Windows 8.1 Reset Password
There are actually two ways you can go about resetting a password for a user account in Windows 7 and Windows 8.1. Both methods work on both operating systems, which is really convenient. The first method uses the Windows 7 or 8.1 installation DVD and the second method involves using a third-party tool. If you don’t have your install CD/DVD, then use the second method.
Method 1 – Windows DVD
Go ahead and grab your installation disc for Windows 7 or 8.1 and pop it into your CD/DVD drive. Restart your computer and boot up from the disc. Note that you might have to change the boot order in your BIOS before the system will boot from the disc.
For Windows 7, the first screen will make you pick your language, keyboard, etc. Just leave those as default and click Next. For Windows 8, it will be similar. On the next screen, you’ll see a Repair your computer link at the bottom. Click on that link.
On the next screen for Windows 7, System Recovery options should find your Windows 7 install. Click on the Use recovery tools radio button and then click Next.
Finally, click on Command Prompt to open the command prompt. For Windows 8, after you click on Repair your computer, you’ll need to click on Troubleshoot.
Next, click on Advanced Options at the bottom.
Finally, click on Command Prompt at the far right.
Now you should be at the command prompt whether you were using Windows 7 or Windows 8.1. Now we have to type in two simple commands.
Don’t worry about what the commands do, just hope they work. If you get an error message like cannot find the path, etc., then use a different drive letter than C. For example, type in the same commands, but replace C:\ anywhere with D:\. I had this problem on Windows 8.1 and using D:\ fixed it. Close the command prompt windows and choose Continue if using Windows 8.1.
Now you can go ahead and reboot your computer and don’t boot to the DVD. Actually, after you run the commands, you can take out the disc and then reboot. When you get to the Windows login screen, go ahead and press the SHIFT key 5 times.
A command prompt box should pop up on top of the login screen in Windows 7 and 8.1. Here you have to type in one final command to reset the password for the user account:
net user "User Name" newpassword
Note that you don’t need to use the quotes if the username is just one word like John. Since my username is two words, I had to use the quotes. The password can be anything you like. Once you have done this, close the command prompt window and type in your new password to log into your account! It works!
Method 2 – Third-Party Tool
If you don’t have a Windows installation DVD, you can download a free tool called Offline Windows Password & Registry Editor. Scroll down to the section that says Download and choose either the ISO image or the USB install. If you can boot your computer from a USB stick, that would be easier since you have to burn the ISO image to a CD/DVD if you download that.
Again, you’ll have to change the boot order on your computer in order to boot from CD/DVD or USB drive. When you boot up to this tool, you’ll see the following screen. This method is definitely a little more technical-looking, but it’s really not hard. Mostly, you just have to press Enter.
On this screen, just press Enter. You’ll see a bunch of stuff scroll across the screen and then it’ll end with a prompt for Step 1, which is to choose the installation. It should find this for you automatically and will have Select:[1] at the bottom. Just press Enter here also.
For Step 2, it will ask you to choose which part of the registry you want to load. In our case, it’s the Password reset [sam] option, which is 1 and already selected. So again, just press Enter.
For Step 3, you have to choose which hive to work on. Again, the option we need, Edit user data and passwords, is 1, so just press Enter again. Like I said, it looks scary, but mostly it’s pressing Enter.
Finally, at step 4, we actually have to type in something. Here, we need to select the username that we want to clear the password for. Instead of typing the username itself, type in the RID value that is listed to the left of the desired username.
In my case, the RID associated with my user name (Aseem Kishore) was 03e8. So I typed 03e8 and pressed Enter.
Now, you’ll be asked what you want to do with that user. The first option is Clear (blank) user password, so type in 1 and then press Enter. This time around make sure you actually type in the number 1 instead of just pressing Enter. It should be very fast and you’ll see some stuff written that won’t make any sense. Don’t worry about all of that, just look for Password Cleared written somewhere. If you don’t see if, don’t worry, just keep going.
We have one last thing to do before we are done. At the prompt, go ahead and type in q to quit and then type in q again to quit one more time. After the second time you type in q, you’ll see that it says Step 4 – Writing back changes. Here you have to type y to write the changes.
You should make sure that it says EDIT COMPLETE. This means that everything was written correctly. When it asks you if you want to do another run, type in n for no. Now you can restart your computer by pressing CTRL + ALT + DELETE. You may need to remove the CD/DVD or USB stick in order to boot to Windows normally.
That’s about it. If everything worked OK, you should be able to login into Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 without a password!
Windows 10 Reset Password
The procedure for Windows 10 is very similar to that of Windows 8, but requires slightly different commands. To get started, follow the instructions I have above for Method 1 under Windows 7 and 8.1 until you get to the command prompt. Follow the directions for Windows 8.1 as those are the same for Windows 10.
Once you get to the command prompt, type in the following commands:
Close the command prompt and then click on the Continue button to load Windows normally. Go ahead and take out the CD/DVD or USB drive before you reboot. At the login screen, you have to click on the ease of access icon at the bottom. This will pop up a command prompt window.
Now at the command prompt window, we use the same command like we used for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1.
net user username newpassword
Again, you’ll need to use quotes around the username if it is more than one word. For example, if the user name is Aseem Kishore, you would type in:
net user "Aseem Kishore" newpassword
Now close the command prompt window and simply type in your new password and you will be logged into Windows 10! It’s amazing that this trick works, but I tested it out and it worked like a charm.
Hopefully, this will get you back into your Windows 7, Windows 8.1 or Windows 10 computer. Note that if you don’t have an installation DVD, you can download them from Microsoft. Check out my previous post on downloading Windows 7, 8 and 10 legally. If you have any questions, post a comment. Enjoy!
So most likely, if you bought your computer from Amazon or Best Buy or some other online website/store, the version of Windows that is included with the computer is going to be the basic version: Starter or Home or Home Premium. In the case of Windows 10, it’s just Windows 10 and not the Professional version.
Why would you want to upgrade to a higher edition? Well, the Professional or Ultimate versions of Windows basically have more features that power users might use like the ability to join a domain, Bitlocker encryption, remote desktop, Hyper-V virtualization and more. So if you have decided to make the move from Starter to Home Premium, Home to Professional, or Professional to Ultimate, how do you go about doing it?
In this article, I’ll show you how to upgrade your Windows edition in Windows 7, 8.1 and 10. Note that you can currently upgrade a 32-bit version to another 32-bit version and same for 64-bit, but you cannot upgrade from a 32-bit OS to 64-bit.
Upgrade Windows 10 to Higher Edition
For Windows 10, there are basically just three editions: Home, Professional and Enterprise. When you upgrade from Home to Professional, you can downgrade or revert back within 30 days unless you run Disk Cleanup and remove previous Windows installations. You only have 30 days because that’s how long Windows keeps the previous version of Windows before deleting it.
Also, for Windows 10, you can’t upgrade directly from Pro to Enterprise. You have to buy it directly from Microsoft and usually with a volume license. If you have Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 Enterprise, you can upgrade that to Windows 10 Enterprise.
To upgrade Windows 10, click on Start and then Settings.
Now click on System and then click on About. At the bottom, you will see a Change product key or upgrade your edition of Windows link.
This will take you to the Activation screen where you will see a Go to Store link at the bottom.
This will load the Windows Store app and allow you to purchase the upgrade for $99.99.
Once you buy it, Windows will start the process for upgrading Windows 10 Home to Pro. It takes just a few minutes and you’ll just have to restart your computer once after it has finished.
Upgrade Windows 8.1 to Higher Edition
As of October 2015, Microsoft no longer sells upgrade packs to Windows 8 or 8.1 Home to Windows 8 or 8.1 Pro. Basically, no one really uses Windows 8 anymore and therefore they are trying to get everyone upgraded to Windows 10.
If you try to go to Control Panel, Windows Update, click on Add features to Windows 8.1, and then click on I want to buy a product key online, you’ll get a message saying that no products were found in your region.
The only place you can get a Windows 8.1 Pro upgrade is from a third-party seller like Amazon for a whopping $137! That really doesn’t make a lot of sense considering you can upgrade Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 for free until July 29th, 2016. At that point, the Home edition will be $99 and Pro will be $199.
Note that Amazon only sells a keycard, which will contain the product key for Windows 8.1 Pro. To use it, you’ll follow the steps above, but choose I already have a product key to enter the new key.
Upgrade Windows 7 using Windows Anytime Upgrade
For Windows 7, once you upgrade to a higher edition, you really can’t revert back without some serious registry hacking, etc. This really shouldn’t be a big issue, but it's good to know. Also, for Windows 7, you can upgrade from Home Premium to Ultimate without having to upgrade to Professional first. You can basically skip editions.
Click on Start, then type in anytime upgrade into the search box and click on Windows Anytime Upgrade to get started. Note that Windows Ultimate will not have this feature since it’s at the highest edition already.
Now just follow the instructions to upgrade to a new edition of Windows 7. First, click on Go online to choose the edition of Windows 7 that’s best for you.
In the same dialog, you'll get a list of the different versions along with a nice table of features for each. This is also a great way to compare the different versions of Windows 7 and actually see what the differences are.
You can also click on the tabs across the top to see the features of each version separately. Once you buy a new version and have an upgrade key, click on Enter an upgrade key.
That’s pretty much it! After you enter your key, Microsoft will confirm it and all the new features of the higher edition will be available immediately! No need to download anything or install any extra software. Enjoy!
How Many Computers Can You Install Windows 7, 8, 10 On?
One common question that I get all the time is How many computers can I install Windows on? If you read around, you’ll get all sorts of different answers. However, for legal purposes, it’s best to stick with what Microsoft states in their end-user license agreements.
There are always ways you can get around the limits, but that’s not the point of this article. In this article, I will list out the official installation options for Microsoft for Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10. Skip down to the section you are interested in.
Windows 10
With Windows 10, things are very different than previous versions of Windows. As of now and until July 29th, 2016, you can upgrade any Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 PC to Windows 10 for free. After that, no one is really sure what’s going to happen.
Apparently, you’ll have to pay for the upgrade, but after letting people upgrade for free for a year, it’s going to be a tough sell to start making people pay for it. After the July 2016 date, the price for the Home edition will be $119 and the Pro edition will be $199.
So if you want to install Windows 10, it’s best to do it before that date. It’s also worth noting that when you do the free upgrade, you’ll stay at the edition that is closest to what you had.
Above is a table that explains which version of Windows 10 you will have depending on which version of Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 you currently have. In order to upgrade from Windows 10 Home to Pro, you still would need to pay $99, which is what Microsoft is currently charging.
Another thing to note is that if you upgrade Windows 7 or Windows 8 to Windows 10 or if you have an OEM version of Windows 10, after July 29, you will not be able to move that copy of Windows 10 to another computer. Right now, you could reinstall Windows 7 or 8.1 on another computer and then perform the free upgrade to 10. If you have a retail version of Windows 10, you will be able to move it to another computer even after July 29th.
If your Windows 10 license is based on a Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 license (even a retail license) and you have to replace the motherboard on your computer, Windows 10 will no longer be activated. It only works with the current hardware on that computer. This can be problematic because if you have gotten the free upgrade to Windows 10 and then you replace a bunch of parts on your computer after July 29, 2016, you will end up with a non-genuine version of Windows.
You’ll then be asked to pay for the upgrade! There are only two solutions at this point that I know of: either don’t replace any major parts on your computer or if you have to because of a bad motherboard, etc, then call Microsoft, explain your situation and they will give you a new code. Microsoft’s Vice President of Engineering has publicly posted on Twitter that you’ll need to contact support in these types of situations.
In terms of virtualization, Windows 7 was great because you could install one copy on your computer and use the same key to install a virtual copy of Windows, which I explain below. However, with Windows 10, Microsoft has reverted back to the old way. In the new license agreement, a virtual copy of Windows 10 needs its own license key.
(iv) Use in a virtualized environment. This license allows you to install only one instance of the software for use on one device, whether that device is physical or virtual. If you want to use the software on more than one virtual device, you must obtain a separate license for each instance.
Windows 7 and 8.1
For Windows 7. it depends on what version on Windows 7 you have. You can either have a pre-installed copy that came with your computer (OEM), a retail version bought from a store, or a Family Pack bought from Microsoft.
The number of computers you can install Windows 7 on is the same regardless of the edition of Windows you have: Ultimate, Home Premium, Starter, Professional, etc.
Here's the lowdown on the whole licensing thing and the official text from the End User License Agreement for Windows 7:
INSTALLATION AND USE RIGHTS.
a. One Copy per Computer. You may install one copy of the software on one computer. That computer is the "licensed computer."
b. Licensed Computer. You may use the software on up to two processors on the licensed computer at one time. Unless otherwise provided in these license terms, you may not use the software on any other computer.
c. Number of Users. Unless otherwise provided in these license terms, only one user may use the software at a time.
d. Alternative Versions. The software may include more than one version, such as 32-bit and 64-bit. You may install and use only one version at one time.
So that pretty much states how many computers you can install Windows 7 on! ONE! Now if you have the Family Pack, you can clean install or upgrade up to 3 PCs. Note that for Windows 7 retail versions, you can also uninstall Windows 7 from one PC and install it on another, though you may have to give Microsoft a call when activating it.
The one caveat that is pretty welcome is the fact that you can install one more copy of Windows 7 on the same licensed machine in a virtual machine. However, it has to be on the same computer. Here is the official text:
d. Use with Virtualization Technologies. Instead of using the software directly on the licensed computer, you may install and use the software within only one virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system on the licensed computer. When used in a virtualized environment, content protected by digital rights management technology, BitLocker or any full volume disk drive encryption technology may not be as secure as protected content not in a virtualized environment. You should comply with all domestic and international laws that apply to such protected content.
So that means you can install VirtualBox or Hyper-V and pop in your Windows 7 DVD and install another copy there for free! This is the only part of the license agreement that is different than previous versions of Windows.
For Windows 8.1, the rules are pretty much the same. If you have an OEM version of Windows 8.1 or a version that was upgraded from Windows 7, you can only use that version on that one computer. If you need to move it to another computer, you’ll need to call Microsoft and explain the situation.
If you have a retail version of 8.1, you first have to deactivate the license on the computer and then use the product key on the new computer to activate. The product key can only be used to activate one PC at a time.
For virtualization, Windows 8.1 has the same license terms as Windows 10, which means you cannot use the same product key in a virtual environment. Apparently, only Windows 7 allowed you to install another copy in using virtualization software without getting another license.
Hopefully, this article help explains how you can install different versions of Windows on your computers. It’s complicated and I didn’t explain every detail and caveat, so feel free to post a comment if you have questions. Enjoy!
Troubleshoot Cannot Connect to Internet in Windows
Having problems connecting to the Internet on your Windows machine? Windows does a pretty good job of determining if there is a problem in Windows that is preventing the computer from accessing the Internet and then fixing it, however, not all Internet problems are related to the computer.
Before your computer can access the Internet, it needs to pass through the cable modem or router provided by your ISP. A misconfigured or malfunctioning router will prevent all your devices from connecting to the Internet.
In this post, I’m going to talk about all the different ways you can try to fix Internet connection problems. I’ve broken into down into three categories: solutions related to the OS, solutions related to the computer and solutions related to network/router/ISP.
Before you begin, try to determine what category your problem falls into. For example, if you are not able to connect using Internet Explorer, but Firefox or Chrome work, then that would be an OS related issue. If nothing on your computer connects to the Internet, but another computer on the same network can connect, that would be a computer related issue. Finally, if none of your devices can connect, it’s definitely a router/modem or ISP issue.
OS Related Problems
Toggle Automatically Detect Settings option
If you are having problems with only IE, check the Automatically Detect Settings option in LAN settings. You can get there by going to Tools (or clicking on the gear icon), Internet Options, Connections, LAN Settings.
Make sure that Use a proxy server for your LAN is unchecked and that Automatically detect settings is checked.
Disable Enhance Protected Mode
Enhance Protected Mode is a feature in IE 10 and IE 11 that makes your browsing more secure by enabling additional security features. It is usually not enabled by default unless in a corporate environment. It can prevent certain add-ons from working if they are not compatible.
If you are having trouble connecting to the Internet using IE 10 or 11, go to Internet Options, click on the Advanced tab and make sure Enable Enhanced Protected Mode is unchecked.
Computer Related Problems
If nothing on your computer can connect to the Internet, but other computers work fine, then you know there is something wrong with that one particular computer. Let’s go through some possible solutions.
Check All Hardware
The first thing to do is to check the obvious stuff. If you are using a hard-wired connection, make sure the cable is plugged in fully into your router and computer. Also, try a different cable in case there is a problem with the cable.
Secondly, if you are connecting via WiFi, make sure that it is turned on if you are using a laptop. Some laptops have physical switches that let you turn off the wireless functionality. On some laptops, you have to press a key combination like Fn + F5 to enable/disable the wireless card.
Turn Off Firewall/Anti-Virus Programs
This is another really common cause for Internet connection problems. Lots of people buy these Internet protection suites that include anti-virus, anti-malware, firewall, web security, and other software. Sometimes the software goes overboard and it ends up messing up your connection to the Internet.
You can usually try turning off just the firewall instead of the entire software suite. However, I would suggest disabling everything at least once to make sure it’s not the security software causing the Internet problem.
Check TCP/IP Settings
Next, we want to make sure that the network card is getting an IP address from a DHCP server and does not have a static IP address assigned. To do this, click on Start and type in ncpa.cpl and press Enter. This will bring up the list of network adapters in Control Panel.
Right-click on the one that is currently connected and choose Properties. Note that if you have multiple adapters connected like Ethernet and Wi-Fi, you should disconnect one as having both connected at the same time shouldn’t necessarily cause any problems, but sometimes it might.
Click on Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) and then click on Properties. In the next dialog, make sure that the Obtain an IP address automatically and Obtain DNS server address automatically radio buttons are selected.
Enable/Disable/Uninstall Network Card
The next step you can take is to try disabling the network card and then enabling it again. Sometimes that will help the computer get an IP address if it didn’t already have one. You can do this by clicking on start and typing ncpa.cpl again. Right-click on the network card and choose Disable. Once disabled, just right-click again and choose Enable.
If this doesn’t work, you can try uninstalling your network card completely. When you do this, you have to restart your computer and Windows will reinstall the network card automatically.
Click on Start, type in Device Manager and then expand Network adapters. Right-click on the network card you’re using for network and Internet access and then click on Uninstall.
Update Drivers
If you are running a newer version of Windows on an older machine, then you might have to upgrade your drivers. For example, if you upgraded Windows 7 to Windows 10, you might have to download the latest Windows 10 drivers for your network card.
Check out my previous post explaining how drivers work in Windows and how you can update your drivers automatically. For your network card, it might be easier to just visit the website for your computer manufacturer and download the latest driver for your network card from there.
As you can see from the screenshot above, my Dell computer is not tested for Windows 10. That means if I upgrade, some hardware may not work with that operating system. Be sure to check before you upgrade. Even if you upgraded your OS and the latest driver isn’t available for your version of Windows, it’s still worth downloading the latest version of the driver and seeing if it fixes the problem.
Try Network Troubleshooter
If nothing has worked as of yet, try to use the network troubleshooter in Windows. You can do this by going to the Network and Sharing Center in Control Panel. At the bottom you will see Troubleshoot problems.
Now click on Internet Connections and run through the wizard. Windows will try to detect the reason for the connection problem and fix it. It has worked for me on several occasions, so it’s worth a shot.
Reset TCP/IP
If you’re still without Internet, you might have to reset the TCP/IP stack. You could run the commands yourself via command prompt, but Microsoft has a small utility you can download that does it for you. Check out this KB article from Microsoft on how to reset the TCP/IP stack and click the download button for your version of Windows.
If you are running Windows 10, you can try to use the one for Windows 8.1 and it should work.
Router/ISP Related Problems
If none of the devices on your network can connect to the Internet, it’s probably a modem/router or ISP issue. Here is what you can do.
Restart Router/Modem
The simplest solution and the one that works the most often is restarting your modem or router or both. If you have a combined modem/router from your ISP, just restart that device. If you have a separate modem from your ISP and your own router, restart both of them.
In the latter case, you should actually turn both of them off and then turn the ISP modem back on first. Wait until all the lights are green or active and then turn on your wireless router. If you have any switches, etc. connected behind the router, turn those on last.
The easiest way to restart your router is to find the power button on the back of the router. Just about all routers have a power button. If not, just unplug the power cable from the router, wait 30 seconds and then plug it back in.
Reset Router
If restarting your router doesn’t work, you may have to reset your router. This is a last resort step because it will erase all the wireless settings for your router. If you want your devices to connect back without having to re-enter the WiFi password, you’ll have to setup the wireless settings exactly as they were before you reset the router.
The reset button is usually a tiny hole in the back on your router that you have to press for a certain amount of time ranging from 10 seconds to 30 seconds using a pin or paper clip.
If you just have one device not connecting to the Internet, it could be a problem with the wireless security settings. If you have a device that does not support stricter encryption standards like WPA2, you might have to lower the security settings so that the device can connect.
Contact ISP
Sometimes, your ISP may be having issues in your area and it could be causing Internet connection issues. Other times, your ISP may block your Internet connection if it detects too much spam originating from your IP address or if you get caught downloading a lot of illegal stuff.
If one of your computers has become infected with a nasty virus or malware and you don’t know about it, it could be using your computer and your Internet connection for bot-net attacks, etc. Contact your ISP and see if they have any complaints on file with you or if there is some outage in your area.
Your ISP will also be able to connect to your router directly and run tests to make sure everything is configured properly. Hopefully, one of the above solutions will fix your problem. If not, post a comment and I’ll try to help. Enjoy!
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