Tag Archives: Windows 10

Taming Windows 10: Shrink that Massive Start Menu

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A reprint from the PC410 Security Newsletter:

As in most versions of Windows, the Windows 10 Start menu is ignored by most users. It’s usable if it isn’t enormous, but by default, it’s showing far too many apps and advertisements to be useful, and they’re in no order, and include advertising for apps with “in-game purchases”, like CandyCrush. You can drag the icon blocks to any position or order you like, and they’ll dock. But first, delete the blocks you won’t use, by right-clicking on each, and choosing “Unpin from Start”. If you remove enough blocks, the scrollbar will disappear. You can also turn off internet content on items like News, Finance, or Twitter: Right-click any of these blocks, and choose “More >” and then “Turn live tile off”. For any tiles you keep, you can change the size, choose “Resize >” and select an option.

Windows 10 Start Menu
Reminder: Removing these icon blocks does not uninstall the matching apps. To do that, click the start icon, go to the Settings app (the gear), System, Apps & features. This includes both desktop software and so-called ‘modern’ apps. The usual caution applies: There are hardware drivers in that list–lookup anything you don’t recognize before removing it.

Windows 10 Start menu Options

There are also settings to keep Windows from adding more tiles and ads to the Start menu. Go to Settings, Personalization, Start. Turn off “Occasionally show suggestions in Start”. You might also want to turn off “Show recently added apps”. These settings are not available in every version of Windows 10.

Taming Windows 10: Choose Which Folders Appear on Start

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A reprint from the PC410 Security Newsletter:

Windows 10: Choose which folders appear on start

Windows 10 removes the Documents and Pictures shortcuts from the Start menu. You can have them back, or choose to show Music, Videos, or the Network. Go to Settings, Personalization, Start, click on “Choose which folders appear on Start”. Turn on (or off) any of the folders in the list. If you turn a folder off, you can still get to it from File Explorer (the yellow file folder icon in the taskbar), or by pressing Start and typing in the folder name to search for it.

Taming Windows 10: Browser Defaults

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A reprint from the PC410 Security Newsletter:

Default browser settings in Windows 10

The browser default for Windows 10 is Edge, and it’s not ready for use on many websites, especially sites with advanced usage of forms. Switching the browser default to Internet Explorer 11 is an easy fix, or, even better, switching to either Google Chrome or Firefox, both of which protect users from evil sites better than Microsoft browsers, which are, in fairness, target number 1 for evil website developers.

To change the default browser, go to Settings, System, Default Apps, and in the Web Browser category, click on Edge, and select from the installed browsers in the list that appears.

Sometimes, Windows 10 will argue the point. Another way to set default apps is to go to Control Panel, Programs, Default Programs, Set Default Programs, find the program in the list on the left side, and on the right, click ‘Set this program as default.’