How to Hide Favorites, Frequent Folders and Recent Files in Windows 10

In Windows 10, when you open File Explorer, by default it shows 'Favorites', 'Frequent Folders', and 'Recent Files'. All over Windows, you'll see menus with the most recently used items for a given application, documents, or some videos you recently watched. Frequent folder showing you important folders in your account such as downloads, documents, pictures, music and folders you've pinned or accessed recently. 

How to Hide Favorites, Frequent Folders and Recent Files in Windows 10


If you don't want to see them in File Explorer, you can easily hide them, here is how.


How to Hide Favorites, Frequent Folders, and Recent Files on Windows 10

Open File Explorer by click on Start > File Explorer ( Win + E ) and click View > Options. In the Folder Options dialog windows, under General tab, choose 'This PC' and uncheck the following boxes.
  • Show recently used files in Quick access.
  • Show frequently used folders in Quick access.

Recent Files in Windows 10



Now click on apply and tap on 'OK' to save the changes. 

Note : To delete recent files shortcut, press Win + R and open run command, type recent and select all items by pressing Ctrl + A, hit enter. 

To turn off recent items and frequent places in Windows 7 and 8.1 follow the steps given below.

In Windows 7, right click or press and hold on a empty area on the taskbar and click properties. This will open Taskbar and Start Menu Properties, click on Start menu and uncheck the box displaying "Store and display recently opened program in the Start menu" and Store and display recently opened items in the Start menu and the taskbar". 


Recent Items and Frequent Place in Windows 7

In Windows 8.1, right click or press and hold on a empty area on the taskbar and click "Properties". In the Jump List, uncheck the box displaying "Store recently opened program" and "Store and display recently opened items in Jump Lists". 


Recent Items and Frequent Place in Windows 8.1

121 Most Useful Websites

There are lot of amazing resources on the Internet toady but most people will live their entire lives without ever knowing about 98% of them. There are many website to help us to productive but the problem is that you probably never heard of most of them. Here are some of the most useful websites on the Internet that solve at least one problem really well.

121 Most Useful Websites


1. Mathway.com : Solves any kind of math problem with explanation.

2. Midomi.com : Play or sing a song to know more about it. 


3. 10minutemail.com : Disposable e-mail address which destroy after 10 minute. 


4. Chesscademy.com : Learn chess on the Internet.


5. TwoFoods.com : Compares two types of food to know calories, carbs, fat and proteins per 100 gm.


6. Camelcamelcamel.com : Track price drops of items on Amazon.


7. Netflixroulette.net : Find something random to watch on Netflix.

8. Pintsinthesun.co.uk : Find somewhere to drink a pint in the sun.

9. Mint.com : Budget your money.

10. Roadtrippers.com : Plan your route with the best lodging and attractions.

11. Oldversion.com : Get old version of any software.

12. Keybr.com : Speed up and practice your touch typing.

13. Avoidhumans.com : Find places to go in public that are not crowded.

14. Shouldiremoveit.com : Find out which application you should remove from your PC.

15. Squirt.io : Speed read the web one word at a time.

16. Ninite.com : Download all the free software you want at the same time.

17. Fpage.co : NSFW language, daily links to enlighten and educate you. 


18. Dictation.io : Online voice recognition in the browser itself.

19. Zerodollarmovies.com : Find full length movies on YouTube.

20. Screenr.com : Record your desktop and send them straight to YouTube.

21. Goo.gl : Shorten long URLs and convert URLs into QR codes.

22. qClock : Find the local time of a city using Google Maps.

23. Copypastecharacter.com : Copy special characters that aren't present on your keyboard.

24. Unfurlr.com : Find the original URLs that's hidden behind a short URL.

25. Codeacademy.com : Best place to learn coding online.

26. Superlogout.com : Open the Website to logged out from all accounts instantly.

27. Printfriendly.com : Print any web page in a print friendly format.

28. Smallpdf.com : For all your PDF needs you can imagine.

29. Popcorntime.io : Watch free movies and tv shows instantly.

30. File.io : Snapchat for file sharing.

31. Deadmansswitch.net : Send emails when you're dead.

32. Supercook.com : Search recipes by ingredients.

33. Privnote.com : Write notes to someone that will destroy itself one he reads it.

34. Coffitivity.com : Feeling alone at home, get free murmur sounds.

35. Gifyoutube.com : Convert YouTube videos to gif.


36. Fakenamegenerator.com : Create a fake identity.

37. Accountkiller.com : Delete your account from many popular websites.

38. Fliptext.org : Writes text upside down.

39. Zamzam.com : Converts any file formats without having to download anything.

40. Fiverr.com : People do any kind of minor tasks for you for $5.

41. Forvo.com : Learn how to pronounce any word.

42. Shrib.com : Create and save notes in your browser.

43. Pipl.com : Search engine for finding people.

44. Lovelycharts.com : Create flowcharts, network diagrams, sitemaps etc.

45. Iconfinder.com : Find icons of all sizes.

46. Office.com : Download templates, clip-art and images for your Office documents.

47. Followupthen.com : The easiest way to setup email reminders.

48. Jotti.org : Scan any suspicious file or email attachment for viruses.

49. Duolingo.com : Learn new language for free in an interesting way.

50. Ohdontforget.com : Schedule yourself a reminder on your Phone.

51. Futureme.org : Write yourself a future email.

52. Freecycle.org : Find free things in your town which people are willing to give away.

53. Couchsurfing.com : Stay with locals for Free.

54. Simplynoise.com : Just plain sounds to help you sleep.

55. Vodle.com : Record your message as you type it.

56. Ptable.com : Periodic table made easy.

57. Login2.me : Free login id and password for every website.

58. Mailvu.com : Send video emails.

59. Thistothat.com : What you should use when gluing various things together.

60. Scribblemaps.com : Draw on maps and share with friends.

61. Keepmeout.com : Keeps you from visiting websites for a certain amount of time.

62. Manualslib.com : A huge database with mannuals for all sorts of things.

63. Wakerupper.com : Set up a reminder call.

64. Rainymood.com : Generates the sound of rain to make you feel more comfortable.

65. Similarsites.com : Find similar websites.

66. Essaytyper.com : Write an essay by entering title only and hit enter.

67. Random.org : Produces random numbers.

68. Criticalpast.com : What happened in history on a selected date.

69. Faxzero.com : Send 5 free faxes a day in US and Canada.

70. Stickk.com : Helps you stick to the goals you set.

71. Instructables.com : How to build something.

72. Fitday.com : Keep track of your weight loss.

73. Wetransfer.com : Send files upto 10 GB per emial to someone.


74. Tweetbeep.com : Keep track of Twitter conversations that mention pre-determined keywords.

75. Ifttt.com : Create a connections between all your online accounts.

76. Otixo.com : Easily manage your online files.

77. ctrlq.org/html-mail : Send rich-text, anonymous emails to anyone.

78. Mixlr.com : Broadcast a live audio message over the Internet.

79. Pancake.io : Create a free and simple website using your Dropbox account.

80. Talltweets.com : Send tweets longer than 140 characters.

81. Deadurl.com : You'll need if your bookmarked web pages are ever deleted by accident.

82. Stupeflix.com : Create a movie out from your images, video and audio clips.

83. Sxc.hu : A huge stock of images and free to download.


84. Disposablewebpage.com : Create a temporary web page that self-destructs.

85. Tinychat.com : Setup a private chat room in seconds.

86. Mikogo.com : Remote desktop tool for your online meeting and web conferencing needs.

87. Marker.to : Highlight the importants parts of a web page for easy sharing.

88. Intelius.com : Find a person's phone, email and other contact information.

89. Eyejot.com : Use your webcam to create and send instant video emails for free.

90. Rhymer.com : Find rhyme for any word.

91. Mit.edu : Build apps without any coding knowledge.

92. Wikipedia Nearby : Wikipedia articles based on your location, good for travelers.

93. Projectnaptha.com : Delete text from images.

94. Haveibeenpwned.com : Find out whether your email is leaked in past hack attacks.

95. Magastack.com : Read magazines for free.

96. Joinhoney.com : Automatically applies best coupons when you check out of any shopping website.

97. Pushbullet.com : Phone notification on your desktop.

98. Kiddle.com : Safe search engine for kids only by Google.

99. Duckduckgo.com : A search engine that do not track you.

100. Live Radio : Listen to worldwide shortwave radio broadcast.

101. Memrise.com : Learn to memorize things.

102. Gutenberg.org : Download from over 45,000 free ebooks.

103. Offliberty.com : Download videos, podcast, music from almost any URL for offline use.

104. Torelay.com : Access website using Tor without using Tor on your computer.

105. Tagmydoc.com : Add QR codes to your documents and presentations.

106. Youtube.com/disco : Watch YouTube channels in TV mode.

107. Timerime.com : Create timelines with audio, video and images.

108. Snopes.com : Find that email received is real or just another scam.

109. Formspring.me : You can ask or answer personal questions.

111. Sumopaint.com : An excellent layer based online image editor.

112. Zoom.it : View very high resolution images in your browser without scrolling.

113. Unsplash.com : Download images absolutely free.

114. baatkar.com : How to tech guides and software tutorials.

115. Google.com/history : see your past searches.

116. Imo.im : Chat with your buddies on Skype, Facebook, Google talk, etc from one place.

117. Gtmetrix.com : Perfect tool for measuring your site performance online.

118. Typewith.me : Work on the same document with multiple people.

119. Hundredzeros.com : Download free kindle books.

120. Join.me : Share your screen with anyone over the web.

121. Google.com/webfonts : Good collection of open source fonts.


Do you have other favorite sites that you find incredibly useful, let us know in comment box.

How to Migrate from Evernote to Apple Notes

A new feature in the most recent update to OS X EL Capitan is the ability to migrating content from Evernote to Apple Notes. Here what you'll need to get started:
1. A Mac running OS X 10.11.4
2. Evernote for Mac
3. Notes on your Mac, just make sure you're signed in with your iCloud account. 


How to Migrate from Evernote to Apple Notes



How to Migrate From Evernote to Apple Notes

  • Install Evernote for Mac from the Mac App Store and log in to Evernote. 
  • To migrate everything all at once, click "Edit" at the top of your screen and tap "Select All". 
  • Click "File" at the top of your screen and tap the "Export Notes"
  • On next screen type in a file name, choose file location and select Evernote XML format for the format. 
  • Once you hit "Save" and see the "Export Complete" dialog, click 'OK'.
  • Now launch Notes and click 'File' at the top of your screen and tap 'Import Notes', select the file you saved from Evernote.  

Note : If you want only notebooks, you can right click a notebook in Evernote, select "Export" and the further process is same as described above.

How to Extract Media Files from Word, Excel and PowerPoint

If someone sent you a Word (.docx), Excel (.xlsx), or PowerPoint (.pptx) file with images or other files embedded, you can extract them without having to save each one separately. The Microsoft Office XML based file formats - docx, xlsx and pptx are actually compressed archives that you can open like any normal .zip file with Windows. 
How to Extract Media Files from Word, Excel and PowerPoint

You'll need Word 2007 or later or another .docx compatible program, if it's a .doc file open it in Word and save as a .docx file. 

How to Extract the Contents of Office file (.docx, .xlsx or .pptx)

Make a duplicate of the file and press "F2" to rename the extension from .docx, .xlsx or .pptx to .zip, leave the main part of the filename alone and press "Enter". A dialog box displays warning you about changing the file name extension and click "Yes". 

To extract the contents of the file, right-click on the file and select "Extract All" from the popup menu. If you want to change the destination folder click on browse, otherwise click on "Extract".  
How to Access the Extracted Media files 

Open the extracted folder and find the folder named "Word" for Word document, "xl" for Excel document or "ppt" for a PowerPoint document. 

To access the extracted images in Word document, click Word > Media.

If you don’t have Microsoft Office installed on your PC, and you need to extract text out of a Word (or Excel or PowerPoint) file, you can access the extracted text in the “document.xml” file in the “word” folder.You can open this file in a text editor, such as Notepad or WordPad, but it’s easier to read in a special XML editor, such as the free program, XML Notepad.


To extracted embedded OLE objects or attached files, right-click on one of the embedded files and choose "Open PDF object".  This opens the PDF file in the default PDF reader program on your PC. From there, you can save the PDF file to your hard drive.
Note : To extract media files from an Microsoft Office 2003 or earlier, download and install Office Image Extraction Wizard to your PC. Now select document and output folder, click next and start.

21 Tricks in Google Chrome, You don't know

Google's Chrome browser is full of shortcuts, hidden features, and tweaks that can save your time and improve your workflow. 

21 Tricks in Google Chrome, You don't know

Here's a collection of 21 most useful tips and tricks for Google Chrome that will help you work faster and do more with your favorite web browser and You don't have to install any extension. 

#1. Enable Guest Browsing 

Someone wants to borrow your laptop, but you're not keen on him or her messing around with your Facebook account or seeing the URLs that come up as suggestions in the omnibox (URLs address). To enable Guest browsing, go to Settings > People > Enable Guest browsing. To switch to the guest account, click on your username (top right) then choose switch person and browse as Guest.

#2. Chrome Omnibox a Hidden Calculator 

You can perform quick calculations and even unit conversion right from the address bar (Omnibox), no Google search required. Type out a simple bit of math like "26 inches to feet" and hit Enter, to see answer. Temperature, distances and weights should all work natively just as they do from Google searches. 

#3. Save web pages as PDFs 


Open any web page, press Ctrl + P on Windows (or Cmd + P on Mac) and choose "Save as PDF" from the list of available printers to download the page as a PDF file. 

#4. Get Word definitions 

You can double click on a word inside Chrome, right mouse click and select "Search google for" to get a definition in a pop-up window.

#5. Assign Custom Keyboard shortcuts 

Google Chrome supports a variety of keyboard shortcuts but you can also assign your own custom shortcuts to launch various extension and Chrome apps. Type chrome://extensions in the browser's address bar to open the Extension page, scroll down to the bottom and click the link that says Keyboard Shortcuts. 


#6. Quick fix for slow Chrome

Go to More toos > Task Manager, it shows you a list of all the open tabs and the background processes running in the browser at the moment, along with the amount of system resources they're using up. Sort the list by Memory, select the websites and extensions that are consuming more memory and click End Process. 

#7. Switch to Google Cache 

When you're on a page, click the address bar, type cache: before the URL and hit Enter. You'll be redirect straight to the Google Cache, if there's one. 

#8. Remove embarrassing URLs 

When you type in the Chrome's address bar, the browser will suggest matching URLs from your web history. If there's any particular URL that you would not like to appear in the list of suggestions, you can easily remove it by clearing the history or from the address bar itself. Highlight any auto-complete URL in the drop-down list and press Shift+Delete to remove it permanently.

#9. Change Search Engine in the Omnibar 

Type amazon in the address bar and press tab, which will change the address bar to search amazon.com and type any keyword to seach in amazon website

#10. Open mobile website on slow Internet 

If you're on a slow Internet connection, you can pretend to be a mobile device and most websites will serve you mobile friendly versions that are often light in size. Open chrome developer tools, switch to Emulation tab and choose either Android or iOS as the User Agent. Make sure Screen and Device emulation is off.

#11. Use Chrome as a Media Player 

You can drag and drop files, videos, images, text files and PDF documents from your desktop into the Chrome tab and view them without opening a dedicated viewer application. 

#12. Text editor inside Chrome 

Open a new tab and paste  data:text/html,<html contenteditable> into the address bar. Click anywhere inside the tab and start typing. 

For larger font with more padding, use this code 

data:text/html, <body contenteditable style="font: 2rem/1.5 monospace;max-width:60rem;margin:0 auto;padding:4rem;">


#13. Send emails from the address bar 

Go to browser's address bar and type the mail to command like mailto:recipient@domain.com. This will open the Gmail compose window and auto-fill the address in the To field.

#14. Reveal all your Hidden Passwords 

Go to Developer tools, visually select the password field on the page and change the input type from password to text. You can also find your saved password under chrome://settings/passwords. 

#15. Fake your current location 

Go to tools > Developer Tools and press the Esc key to open the console, here switch to the Emulation tab and enter any value for latitude and longitude. 

#16. Install unapproved Chrome extensions 

Open the extension page of Chrome, turn on the Developer mode and drag-drop the extension (.crx file) into your Chrome. 

#17. Autofill Address 

Go to Settings > Options > Personal stuff > click on the check box "Enable autofill to fill out web forms in a single click > Click on Manager autofill settings > Click on 'Add new address' and enter the information. 

#18. Google Cloud Print 

Go to Settings > Options > Under the Hood > click on sign into “Google Cloud Print”.

Once you setup your printer using Google cloud print, you can print to it from anywhere. i.e You can print to it from your mobile, other PC at work, or any other system that is connected to the internet.


#19. Google Chrome browser shortcuts

Alt+F – Open chrome settings menu
Ctrl+J – Go to downloads window

Ctrl+H – Go to history window 
Ctrl+Tab – Navigate Tabs
Alt+Home – Go to home page
Ctrl+U – View source code of the current page
Ctrl+K – To search quickly in the address bar
Ctrl+L – Highlights the URL in the address bar (use this to copy/paste the URL quickly)
Ctrl+N – Open a new Chrome browser window
Ctrl+Shift+N – Open a new incognito window (for private browsing)
Ctrl+Shift+B – Toggle bookmark display
Ctrl+W – Close the current Tab
Alt+Left Arrow – Go to the previous page from your history
Alt+Right Arrow – Go to the next page from your history
Space bar – Scroll down the current web page
 

#20. Generate new password on sign up pages 

Type "about:flags" into the browser's address bar, find the option "Enable password generation" select enable and restart the Chrome. 

#21. Activate Flash on demand
 

If you want to improve stability of the browser, go to the browser’s Advanced Settings (chrome://settings/content) and choose the “Click to Play” option under Plugins. This disables Flash Player. Should you need to run the plug-in you can activated it on demand.

5 Ways to Speed Up Windows 7, 8, or 10 Folder Loading Time

Are you tired of the slow loading time, every time you open a folder in Windows 7, 8 or 10. The loading time is usually slow, if you have a folder with large collection of music, video, documents or photos. Windows 7, 8, or 10 folders are optimized default for pictures and tries to generate thumbnails for all the files in folder, even if the folder doesn't contain any pictures. 

5 Ways to Speed Up Windows Folder Loading Time


How to Speed Up Windows Folder Loading Time

#1. Disable Thumbnail Preview : Generating preview of your files takes processing cycles and slow down your Windows Explorer. To disable this feature, open my computer or this PC > tap on "Organize" from the menu bar > Folder and Search Options > View and enable the "Always show icons, never thumbnails" checkbox. 


Disable Thumbnails in Windows

#2. Optimize Folders : Right click on any folder and choose its properties > Customize tab > check General items from the drop down menu and apply the setting to sub folders as well. Now tap on apply and click Ok to save changes. 


Optimize Folder in Windows

#3. Rebuild the Index : The indexing of files and folder can get huge over time with the addition and deletion of data. To speed up folder loading time, you can build index manually. 

Click on Start menu and type index, select Indexing Option > Advanced and enter the administrator password, if prompted to do so. In the Advanced Options dialog box, click the Index setting tab and the click Rebuild. Indexing may take long time to complete, some views and search results may be incomplete till then. 


Manually Build Windows Index

#4. Add or Remove Columns : Open folder > click view from the menu bar > details. After this you can add new columns, click view from the menu bar and tap on choose details..at the bottom, you find add columns. Enable the checkboxes for the columns you want and disable the columns you dont' want. 

#5. Use third party Windows Explorer : Clover is an extension of the Windows explorer, to add multi-tab functionality similar to Google Chrome browser. The tabs lets you view multiple folders using a single window, which can be great for freeing up clutter and improving efficiency. 


Tabbed Browser in Windows

Note : You can also use QTTabBar, BetterExplorer, and Tab Explorerto add tabbed browsing to Windows Explorer.

How to Print Files from Mobile Phone or Tablets

Smartphones and Tablets are just like computers, you can browse the web, send emails, watch YouTube videos and many things. You can also print documents, emails, photos, PDF files with the help of mobile phone and tablets. Some printers let you print from your mobile phone or tablets over a Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, or USB connections. 


How to Print Files from Mobile Phone or Tablets


Use Google Cloud Print With Mobile Phone or Tablet 

Google Cloud Print works with most printers, but for best experience a Cloud ready printer is recommended. These types of printers can directly connect to the Internet and don't need a computer for it to work. Google Cloud Print currently supports printing only through iPhones and Android mobile phones or tablets. Here's a Chrome extension that will let you print documents even from your desktop without requiring a Phone.

Open Google Chrome on your computer, click the Menu button > Settings > Advanced Settings > Scroll down to the Google Cloud Print and click "Add Printers". A confirmation message appears on the next screen and click "Add Printer" to confirm.

Google Cloud Print

Note : Make sure that your PC is connected to the Internet, you're logged in to your Google account in Google Chrome and your Printer is ON. 
  • Install and launch Cloud Print on your mobile device or tablet and login to your same Google account registered on Google Cloud Print. 
  • Click the printer icon to select a file to print and choose a printer registered on Google Cloud Print. You can select a file from Google Drive, Dropbox, Gallery and other file manager apps on your device. 
  • The print preview page will appear, you're able to set the orientation of the documents, media size, DPI and the number of copies. 
  • Now click the paper plane icon at the top row to send the data to Google Cloud Print and print your document.

Note : To print a Web page, click Menu > Share > select Cloud Print and print Gmail message by open Gmail message in browser, tap the arrow to reveal additional buttons, and select print. 

How to Rotate a Video 90 Degree on Android, iOS and Windows

When you captured a video with your smartphone or camcorder and try to play it in your computer or laptop, you find that it's rotated 90 degrees. If you find your video sideways or upside down then you know how frustrating it can be to watch it later. Luckily, rotating your video is a snap, and there are many free ways to do it. 

How to Rotate a Video 90 Degree on Android, iOS and Windows

How to Rotate a Video 90 degree on Windows or Mac 

#1. Windows Live Move Maker : Click on Start button and search for Movie Maker, if you don't find Movie Maker in Windows, download it from Microsoft Website. 

Windows Live Move Maker

Open the app, click on the "Add Videos and Photo" icon and locate the video that you want to rotate, double click the file. Now locate the rotate video icons in the Editing section and click the "Rotate left" or "Rotate right" button to rotate the video in 90 degree increments. Save the changes you've made by clicking the "Save Movie" button in the Home tab and choose the desired format. 

#2. VLC :  Open your video in VLC and open the Tools menu > select "Effects and Filters' or press Ctrl + E. Click on the "Video Effects" tab, and then check "Transform" to rotate the video 90 degree. 

VLC video rotation

This change isn't permanent, to save the video in its new orientation, you've to open Tools > Preferences and at the bottom of the preferences windows, enable "All" settings. Now find the heading call "Sout stream" (under Stream Output) then click on "Transcode" and choose "Rotate video filter" from the selections to the right and finally click "Save".


How to Rotate a video in VLC

Click open VLC's Media menu > Convert/Save, click Add and choose the file we just rotated. Click on the "Convert/Save" button at the bottom of this dialog and then "Convert" (Alt+O). Select a destination and file name to which you want to save your new file. Go ahead and click "Start" and the file will be converted and saved.

#3. Download iMovie which is available at Mac App Store and open iMovie, click the file menu, select import and select video. Open the Crop Menu by selecting your video and press "C" on your keyboard or by clicking the crop button in the middle toolbar. You'll see the Rotate buttons appear at the top of the viewer and click the Left or Right rotation buttons to rotate the image in 90 degree increments, click done. 


iMovie video rotate


Note : Use the "Fit" option to ensure that you don't lose any of the edges of your video when it's rotated.


How to Rotate a Video 90 degree on Android or iPhone

There are a variety of free and paid apps available for both iOS, Android Phones and tablets. Some popular apps include, Video Rotate Free, Video Rotate and Flip for iOS and mVideoCut, Video Toolbox for Android. 

Once you've installed the app, open it and select your video file. You can start rotating it, your options will depend on the app you're using, but almost all allow for basic 90 degree increments.

Bonus Tips : You can also use, online video rotating site like RotateMyVideo.net. Click the "Pick Video" button in the middle of the page and select the video on your computer or mobile device. The video is uploading and can take a few seconds or even a few minutes, depending of your connection and size of your video. Click the buttons in the Rotation section (Left or Right arrows) until the video is fixed. Click the "Download" link to download the rotated video.

How to Create Recovery Drive or System Repair Disc in Windows 8 or 10

Windows 8 or 10 allows you to create recovery drive (USB) or system repair disc (CD or DVD) that can be used to troubleshoot problems like startup repair, file system problems, system restore and resetting your PC. Each type of recovery media gives you access to Windows advanced startup options. 


Note : you cannot use Refresh or Reset Your PC features if Windows is installed on a drive with GPT (not MBR) partition table until you force "UEFI only" boot setting in BIOS/EFI. Windows 8 and 10 will not detect GPT partition alignment correctly if BIOS booting is enabled.


How to Create a Recovery Drive (USB flash drive)

To create a bootable USB recovery drive, you need USB flash drive with space at least 256 MB for Windows 8, 4 GB for Windows 10 32bit and 8 GB for Windows 10 64bit.
To open the recovery drive creation tool, press the Windows key and type "create a recovery drive". Click the Setting category and launch the create a recovery drive application.

Create a Recovery Drive in Windows

The Recovery Media Creator opens on your desktop. If your computer came with a recovery partition, you can copy it to the recovery drive, check the box says "copy the recovery partition from the PC to the recovery drive in Windows 8 or Backup system files to the recovery drive in Windows 10", otherwise click next. This will increase Recovery Drive space requirements from the default 256 megabytes to about 4 gigabytes in Windows 8.

Create a Recovery Drive Options in Windows
You'll be prompted to select a connected USB drive and click the create button to copy files into USB drive. 

USB Flash Drive for Recovery Drive

Windows will warn you that all contents of the selected drive will be deleted. To continue, click create. The drive formatting and file copying process might takes several minutes, depending on the speed of your USB drive, after the drive is ready, click finish. 

How to Create System Repair Disc (CD or DVD)

Open the disc creation tool by pressing Windows key and type recdisc, hit enter. The disc creator will open on the desktop, select the disc burner drive with a writable CD or DVD in it and click the create disc button to create recovery disc. 

Create a System Repair Disc in Windows

Creating the System Repair Disc might take several minutes and after the process is complete, label the disc as instructed.

6 Ways to Boot into Safe Mode in Windows 8 or 10

Safe Mode is one of the most important features of Windows operating system that is present in all recent versions. Safe Mode starts Windows with only a limited sets of files and drivers so you can figure out what's wrong with your PC. 
 
6 Ways to Boot into Safe Mode in Windows 8 or 10

In Windows 7, accessing Safe Mode options was very straight forward. You just need to press F8 key or Shift + F8 after powering the computer. However, the procedure to boot Windows into Safe Mode is little complicated in Windows 8 and Windows 10. Here are 5 different ways to enable Safe Mode in Window 8 or Windows 10.

How to Boot Into Safe Mode in Windows 8 or 10

#1. Use the System Configuration Tool : This is the easiest method to enable Safe Mode in Windows with the help of System Configuration tool. Click on search and find Run desktop app or press Win + R key combination and type msconfig in the run box, hit enter. 

System Configuration Windows

Go to Boot tab, check the box that says "Safe boot". You can also choose the type of Safe Mode you want to boot into:
  • Minimal is normal safe mode.
  • Alternate Shell is safe mode with command prompt
  • Network is safe mode with networking.
Once you've chosen your option click the OK button and restart your machine. Your PC will be booted into Safe Mode automatically.

Note : To exit from Safe Mode, open msconfig again and uncheck the Safe Boot option, then tap OK button.

#2. Use Shift + Restart : Hold Shift and press the Power button at the Windows login screen or in the Settings. Windows will ask you to choose an option, Press Troubleshoot > Advanced Options > Startup Settings and press "Restart".


Windows Startup Settings

Once your PC restarted, it displays options like enable debugging, enable boot logging, enable low resolution video, enable Safe Mode, enable safe mode with Command Prompt, disable driver signature enforcement, disable early launch anti-malware protection and disable automatic restart after failure. You need to press number key or function key from F1 to F9, to choose options.

#3. Boot from System Recovery DVD  : Insert the System recovery DVD into DVD ROM and press any key to boot from it. Choose your keyboard layout and click on Troubleshoot. The other steps are identical shown in method 2. 

#4. Boot from a System Recovery Memory Stick : You can use the Recovery Media Creator to create a system recovery drive on a USB flash drive. Boot from the USB flash drive and follow the same instructions as in Method 3.

#5. Use F8 or Shift + F8 : When you turn on a Windows 8 or 10 PC, there's no enough time to detect keystrokes like F2 or F8, much less time to read a message such as "Press F2 for Setup". If you have modern PC with a UEFI BIOS and a fast SSD drive, there's no way, you can interrupt the boot procedure with F8 key or Shift + F8.  On older PCs, with a classic BIOS and no SSD drive, pressing these keys might still work though.


#6. Add Safe Mode to Boot Menu : Open the Command Prompt and type the any of the command given below, hit enter.

bcdedit /copy {current} /d "Windows 10 Safe Mode"


Command Prompt

Tap on Start, type msconfig and then select System Configuration. Now click on the Boot tab, you'll see the default OS, and the new entries you created. 


System Configuration Boot Options Windows

Click the new entry you created for Windows 10 Safe Mode (or whatever you named it). Enable the “Safe boot” check box and make sure that the Minimal option is selected underneath it. Enable the “Make all boot settings permanent” option if it isn’t already. You can also delay the boot time by entering the timeout values from 0 to 9999 seconds. To see the Boot Menu until you pick an OS, set the value to -1. 

You'll be asked to confirm the changes with a Scary warning about everything you've done being permanent. Go ahead and click Yes and restart your computer.