Hey washup Everyone here and today I want to show you my favorite top 20 tips and tricks in Windows 10.
If you're not on Windows 10 let's say you're on Windows 7 or Windows 8 you should really upgrade and you can even upgrade for free.
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Top 20 Windows Tips and Tricks
Upgrade windows 10
Now there are lots of undiscoverable tips and tricks and I'm going to show them to you today so let's jump on the PC and let's get started.
Game bar to record screen
Windows tips and tricks No.1➞ I want to show you how you can use an app that comes free and pre installed with Windows 10 to record your screen, and it's called the Xbox game bar.
Xbox is in the name but you can record things outside of games as well to launch the game bar;
- Go down to your taskbar and within this search field.
- Type in game bar or Windows keys+G
You should see a deathmatch up here for the Xbox game bar and let's click on this, you can also launch the game bar by pressing the Windows Logo key on your keyboard, together with the G key g as in game.
When we click on this launch is a game bar and you see the interface here in the top left hand corner there's a window for capture this is what we're going to use to capture our screen.
I'm going to open up my browser window and once again hit windows G to bring up the game bar, and I can click on this button to kick off my recording the recording is now active and I can scroll around my page, I can narrate whatever I want to do once I'm done I'm going to click on the stop button.
If you want to adjust settings for the game bar simply go right back down to your taskbar and in the search field;
Type in game bar settings If we click on that this will allow you to adjust all sorts of things related to the game bar, for instance, you can set the shortcut key. You can also set a shortcut key to start recording by default is the Windows Logo key the Alt key and the G key under captures on the left hand side.
You can also adjust the quality of your recordings, for instance, you could set the audio quality you could set the frame rate and you could set the quality of the video.
Now is the Xbox game bar the best screen recorder, well it's not the best but it comes free and pre installed with Windows and it does a decent job when you're in a pinch. This is a great screen recorder to use.
Video editor to edit video
Windows tips and tricks No.2➞ Did you know windows 10 includes its very own free video editor, how do we launch it well once again;
- Go down to the taskbar, and within the search field
- Type in video editor there is a free video editor with Windows 10
- Click on this launches the Photos app
The video editor is built into the Photos app within the Photos app we can click on new video project, and this will launch us into a fairly feature rich video editor let me name the video something I've typed in a title.
Now I'm going to click on OK, now it's a fairly basic but also. Well, hello, pretty versatile video editor here you could add all of your different files, whether it's video files or photos to the Project Library.
You can drag different files down onto your storyboard to start pulling together your video, you could add things like title cards you can add emotions, you can add different filters and here you can preview your final output, along with that you could add background music custom audio and then you could export your video and you could upload this to places like say Vimeo YouTube, Twitter or Facebook.
All in all it's a pretty good video editor that's easy to understand and you can make some pretty nice videos this is the successor to movie maker and it holds that title pretty well.
Emoji
Windows tips and tricks No.3➞ I want to show you how you can use emojis very easily on Windows 10 to bring up the emoji picker all you need to do is press the Windows Logo key, together with this semi colon key at the same time, and that will bring up this this is the emoji picker.
Now I have all my recent emojis and I can go through and, however I want to communicate my feelings and my emotions, I can choose an emoji that represents that.
Here you see a very wide variety. All I need to do is click on the emoji and that'll insert it into my document it'll insert it into a comment on YouTube. If you want to test this out right now within the comments for this post, feel free to leave an emoji I think that'd be kind of cool to see what emoji. You pick out.
Delay & schedule Windows Updates
Tips and tricks of Windows No.4 ➞ This solves for one of the necessary evils. Now we all know that it's important to keep your computer up to date but it feels like oftentimes the computer updates at the wrong time.
I'll be finalizing a video for YouTube and right when I'm ready to start uploading or rendering my video, I get the message saying that Windows needs to update.
I know you need to update but please not right now to adjust when your computer updates;
- Go down to the taskbar and in the search field
- Type in a Windows Update, as the best match and this pulls up the Windows Update settings '
- Click into this within Windows Update settings
- you can pause updates for seven days
So if you're finishing something very important just push off those updates.
You can also change your active hours and the updates will not occur during the active hours and instead that will occur when you're not actively using your computer so for me it would occur overnight.
Copy & paste multiple items
Windows tips and tricks No.5➞. Did you know that you can copy and paste multiple items. Now, these are probably the most used shortcut keys ever on a Windows computer Ctrl C to copy and then Ctrl V to paste. Everyone knows it, everyone uses it.
However, there's an even better way you can use it and you can copy multiple items and then paste, multiple items, and instead of pressing CTRL V to paste instead you're going to press the Windows Logo key, together with the V key at the same time.
I'm going to press windows V and that opens on my clipboard, I can go through my clipboard now and I can paste texts that I might have copied I could paste images that I might have copied.
In fact, I can even pin items if let's say I want to copy it and use it again in the future but it won't be the last item or recent item that I added and then you can even clear the list. If this is your first time ever, using the Windows Logo key and V it'll First off, ask you to enable it, but once it's enabled you now have a clipboard that will contain multiple items.
Snip & Sketch to take screenshot
Tips and tricks of Windows No.6➞ You can very easily take a screen capture on your computer using an app that comes pre installed with Windows 10. It's called this snip and sketch tool.
Now there are two different ways you can launch it you could go down to your taskbar and you could type in snip and sketch, and that'll show up in the best match. Alternatively you can press the Windows Logo key shift and s at the same time, and that will also launch the snip and sketch tool.
Now I've launched the tool you could take a rectangular snip free form you can take a snip of a window, or you can even do just a full screen snip here I'm going to take a snip of this window, and let's take a look and see what this looks like. Once I open it up and brings it into the snip and sketch tool and I could annotate it highlighted, I can mark it up or crop it and then I could export it as any file type.
If I want to add say arrows or a text on top of it I can copy and paste it into Microsoft Paint and then make additional edits, so very nice tool, especially if you want to take screen captures on your computer.
Calculator
Windows tips and tricks No.7 ➞ The calculator app now, before you laugh and say really the calculator app, it has a lot of advanced and feature rich functionality packed in to launch the calculator app let's go back to the search field and type in calculator and click on the best match.
This opens up the calculator app and on the surface I agree it does look simple but let me show you what all you can do with it. First off, you can now set the calculator window to always stay on top.
When you click on this button. This will now require the app to be on top. So if I pull another window and back there you see the calculator stays at the top most layer. This is helpful if you want to run some quick calculations with a browser window open or maybe a PowerPoint open or a Word doc, you can now keep your calculator on top.
Next over on the left hand side and let's click on the navigation within navigation you can launch, all sorts of different calculators, whether it's a standard scientific graphing and so forth.
And my favorite new functionality, you can run all sorts of conversions within the calculator app, whether it's currency volume length weight and mass, and so on. Let's click into speed to see how this works.
When I click into speed here I can convert between kilometers per hour and miles per hour if I click on this drop down, I could select what type of conversion I want to do.
Let's do a quick example here in the city of Seattle the speed limit on the highway is only 60 miles per hour for people who don't work with, miles, you'll see that it's 96.5, kilometers per hour.
And yes, that is a pretty slow speed and in the city of Seattle, when the speed limits 60 miles per hour, that truly is the max speed limit, and no one goes above that speed also just for fun we could see that as 1.33 horses. I guess that's somewhat fast.
Dark mode
Tips and tricks of Windows No.8 ➞ Windows is pretty bright and especially when it's late at night, it might be nice to relax your eyes a little bit. So how do we turn it darker
- Go down to the taskbar and within the search field
- Type in dark mode you'll see him best match for color settings,
- Click on this within color settings we can choose our color
- Click on this drop down list
You can go with a light theme for Windows 10 which has been the standard for a long time, or now you can switch into a dark mode, custom allows you to do a mix of the two where you could set the windows mode to lighter dark and you can choose the default app mode to light or dark.
This now changes windows 10 to dark mode and all other windows 10 apps that run on Windows 10 respect the setting that you select in Windows. So all of your different app experiences should now be in dark mode.
WordPad with spell checker
Windows tips and tricks No.9 ➞ Windows 10 comes with a pretty feature rich, rich text editor and that's called WordPad to launch WordPad;
- Go down to the taskbar on the bottom
- Then type in WordPad
- Click on the best match.
- This opens up the WordPad editor and you could do all sorts of things you could choose different fonts, you can adjust the font size bold, italicize and underline.
You can even set the line spacing within WordPad now it has a lot of the functionality of what you might find in say a Microsoft Word. But the biggest omission from this app is there's no spellcheck.
Luckily, there are some add ins that you can install for example there's one app called tiny spell that you can get in tiny spell.com, and that will include a spell checker in WordPad.
So if you just want a free text editor that has most of the basic markup functionality, you can do that and plus as an added bonus, you can include a spell checker with WordPad
Magnifier & Read aloud
Tips and tricks of Windows No.10➞ is the magnifier tool and read aloud yes you can have Windows 10 read to you I don't know maybe you want to have it read a bedtime story to you.
So launch it press the Windows Logo key together with the plus key. This will open up the magnifier now just like the name says first off we can magnify on things or here we can zoom in to see things a little bit closer.
And there's also an option over here for it to read to us so let's click on this and see how that works magnifier and read aloud, check out that so my Windows computer is now reading to me, you could use the magnifier in any app you could be in a web browser you could be in a Word document wherever you are, you can have your computer read to you using the magnifier is nightlight
Night light
Windows tips and tricks No.11➞ Now one of the problems is as it gets late at night when you're sitting in front of your computer screen, your monitor emits a lot of blue light.
Now that causes your brain to think it's daytime and it makes it more difficult to fall asleep at night. Luckily windows 10 has a feature called nightlight which reduces the amount of blue that's emitted from your screen, so use it let's go down to search and then type in night light, and let's click on the best match setting.
Within nightlight you can set the strength for it so here you have just the normal monitor with all full blues being emitted.
And then you can make it so your monitor appears more yellowish or red or basically the absence of blues. Now my screen recorder won't pick up the yellow effects because it mainly affects the light coming from my monitor, but here you could set your setting and then you could turn it on and off.
You can even schedule it so as it's getting later at night the night light comes on and then the next day you can have it turn off again.
Quick assist for remote assistance
Tips and tricks of Windows No.12➞ Quick assist if you've ever had a family member who maybe wasn't quite as computer savvy I'm sure they've asked you to help them the most frustrating thing though is when you just try to help them through the phone and you can't see their screen.
Luckily windows 10 has a tool called Quick assist and that allows you to connect to someone else's computer, see their screen and even take control.
If you want to just make some quick edits to launch it let's go down to the taskbar and quot type in quick assist, you'll see the best match for quick assist and let's click on this.
This opens up the quick assist app and you can either get assistance from someone else, or you can give assistance when you want to give assistance you'll have to type in their email address and it'll also produce a code, the other person will receive that code and they'll enter it here, and that'll allow you to see their screen and you even have the ability to take over.
So you can make changes to their computer. It's a very handy tool if you need to help other people with their computer.
Enable & disable startup apps
Windows tips and tricks No.13➞ Did you know you can both enable and also disable startup programs, one of the biggest complaints is my computer gets slower over time.
And one of the biggest culprits of that is startup programs to modify and view your startup programs once again let's click into the search field and type in start up apps, you'll see the best match for startup apps, let's click on this.
This opens up settings where I can review all the apps that start when my computer starts here too I could see the impact that it has on the startup so high impact that's going to make your boot up a little bit slower, low impact it'll probably make a negligible difference here I can go through and you can toggle ABS on and you can toggle ABS off
Shake & snap
Tips and tricks of Windows No.14➞ Shake, and then separately snap so what do I mean by that, well let's say that I have this notepad window in my desktops a little cluttered in back.
I can simply shake my notepad window and everything else will disappear, but maybe it's getting a little lonely now how do I bring those apps back well let's shake again.
When I shake again those windows re up here. Now what do I mean by snap Well, I can simply take a window and snap it to the edge. And then once again I can snap the other window to the other edge and I can very quickly organize my desktop.
Now this is also where shortcut keys are very nice if I click on my word window here. I'm going to press the Windows Logo key and the left arrow that snaps it to the left. I'm going to press the Windows Logo key and the right arrow and it brings it back to where it was and then the right arrow again and that snaps it on the right.
Cortana
Windows tips and tricks No.15➞ Cortana windows 10 comes with its very own digital assistant and just like Siri or Amazon's Alexa, and it's actually getting better and better over time to use Cortana, you'll see a circle icon on your taskbar let's click on that to talk to Cortana.
Now what we can do is you could do all sorts of different commands for instance if you use Microsoft to do you can add something to your task list. Add bake cookies to my to do list. Nice. What's the definition of aardvark open word.
There are all sorts of things that you can do with Cortana, you can ask what your day looks like tomorrow you can ask for definitions, you could ask for the height of things you could ask how a specific stock is doing.
Just like with the other digital assistants out there you can do much of that with Cortana so it's worth a look and test it out and see how Cortana can help you.
Multiple desktops
Tips and tricks of Windows No.16➞ You can open multiple desktops on Windows 10, how do we do that and down on the taskbar. Let's open up the Task View. When we open up the Task View.
This will show me all the different windows that I have open on my computer and up in the top left hand corner there's an option to add a new desktop let's click on that. This opens up desktop number two. So here I have my current desktop.
Now I can jump to desktop two and I have a clean window so maybe you want to separate your work from your personal or maybe your school, you can keep everything in its own independent window. When I open up the Task View again if I no longer need a window I can click on this x and that will now close the desktop.
And I'm not just limited to two desktops, I can add any number of desktops now I don't know why you would need all that many but you do have that option.
Shortcut to open apps on taskbar quickly
Windows tips and tricks No.17➞ You can very quickly launch apps on your taskbar, by using the Windows Logo key, together with the number that represents the position of the app on your taskbar, for instance, let's say that I want to open up File Explorer.
This is the first app on my Taskbar so it's number one, I'm going to press the Windows Logo key enter the number one at the same time and that launches File Explorer, now I have this snip and sketch tool in position number two, so here too I'll press the Windows Logo key, enter the number two, and that now launches snip and sketch. So this is another quick way that you could launch apps that are on your taskbar.
Add additional clocks
Tips and tricks for Windows No.18➞ You can add additional clocks to Windows 10, when I go down to my Taskbar I see that here on the West Coast it's almost 4pm.
If I click down here I can click into date and time settings, and within date and time settings I can add clocks for different time zones.
Now my mom lives on the East Coast of the United States and that's three hours ahead of the West Coast, so I could check this box to show this clock, I could choose the time zone and I could enter a name, and then I could click on Apply now when I click in the clock in the bottom right hand corner now not only was he my current time, but I'll also see the current time on the east coast.
So this way I know especially as it gets later at night I won't call my mom after her bedtime.
Voice recorder
Windows tips and tricks No.19➞. Did you know that Windows 10 comes with its very own voice recorder and it works fairly well go down to search again and let's type in voice recorder and here you'll see the voice recorder app, let's click into this.
This opens up the voice recorder and I can click on this microphone icon to kick off a recording. I'm now actively recording I can pause the recording, I can even flag a spot in the recording so here I'm going to add a marker.
So let's say I'm sitting in a lecture or maybe I'm conducting an interview and the person says something especially interesting, I can add a marker. Once I'm all done, I'll click on stop.
This brings it into my main recording list. When I click on it, it'll playback the recording, I can trim the recording I can delete it, I can rename it or I can share it with others, a fairly powerful app.
Become a Windows Insider
Tips and tricks for Windows No.20➞ And this is the last tip of today, you've probably noticed from reading this post there is a ton of functionality in Windows 10, things are constantly being added things are being refined.
If you want to see those changes before the general public, you can join the Windows Insider program to join the Windows Insider program go down to search on your taskbar just like we've done with all the other Windows tips and tricks from today and type in Windows Insider.
Next, click on the best match option. This opens up the Windows Insider program and if you're not yet a part of the Windows Insider program, you can enroll. Once you enroll in the Windows Insider program, you can choose what channel you want to be part of.
You have three different channels that you can opt into, you have the dev channel where you get new features and functionality very early on, all the way down to the release preview channel where you get things a little bit later but still before the general public so it's gonna be a little bit more reliable and a little bit more stable.
I personally like a nice mix between the two of those and I'm part of the beta channel back on the main page.
You also have the option to toggle on and off, whether you get preview builds I currently have it turned on, so I'm getting some pretty new functionality, before the general public gets to see it.
Alright, well that's quite a bit of awesome functionality in Windows 10. Once again if you have a favorite emoji Feel free to leave it down in the comments below.
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