Windows 8 all in one for dummies

Windows 8 All-In-One For Dummies, his 40th and most ambitious computer book, takes on both sides of the Windows 8 interface, then branches out to cover the ways Windows interacts with a

Windows ® 8

A L L - I N - O N E

FOR

Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies

Copyright © 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published simultaneously in Canada

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in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners John Wiley & Sons, Inc is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2012949004

ISBN 978-1-118-11920-4 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-22461-8 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-23799-1 (ebk);

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Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

About the Author

Curmudgeon, critic, and fiercely independent “Windows victim,” Woody

Leonhard has dished up the truth about Microsoft products since his first

Windows book two decades ago Windows 8 All-In-One For Dummies, his 40th

and most ambitious computer book, takes on both sides of the Windows 8 interface, then branches out to cover the ways Windows interacts with all sorts of products — iPads to Google Apps, Facebook to Mac networks, VPNs

to Android Woody’s unique reader-first approach ensures that you get the best advice about solving your problems — whether Microsoft likes it or not

Woody is best known online as a Senior Contributing Editor for Infoworld, and Contributing Editor of Windows Secrets Newsletter He also runs AskWoody.

com, the web’s leading source of news about Microsoft updates He tweets frequently on tech topics from @woodyleonhard

He’s a Microsoft MVP, one of the first Microsoft Consulting Partners, and

a charter member of the Microsoft Solutions Provider organization He delights in being a constant thorn in Microsoft’s side Along with several coauthors and editors, Woody has won an unprecedented six Computer Press Association awards and two American Business Press awards

Woody moved to Phuket, Thailand, in 2000, with his teenage son His dad joined them in 2006 Woody married a southern Thai lady — yes, they met in Starbucks — and now have a toddler who keeps life running a mile a minute

Thanks, also, to Claudette Moore and Ann Jaroncyk at Moore Literary Agency, the best agents in the biz.

My thanks to Rob Oppenheim for his research on Windows search As you can see in Book VI, Chapter 8, Windows search is a complex topic that’s barely documented elsewhere — and much of the published documentation

is wrong Rob’s show-me attitude brought many oddities to light

I also want to thank the people at TechSmith for keeping their screen-capture program, Snagit, working through the Windows 8 versions I’ve use Snagit for all the screen shots in all my books, going back as far as I can remember Snagit is a workhorse — one of the most reliable pieces of software I’ve ever encountered

Publisher’s Acknowledgments

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments at http://dummies.custhelp.com For other comments, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S at 317-572-3993, or fax 317-572-4002.

Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

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Acquisitions Editor: Amy Fandrei

Copy Editors: Jen Riggs, Debbye Butler

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Sr Editorial Assistant: Cherie Case

Cover Photo: © Veer/Blend Images

Jennifer Creasey, Corrie Niehaus

Proofreaders: John Greenough,

Evelyn Wellborn

Indexer: BIM Indexing & Proofreading Services

Special Help: Jean Nelson

Publishing and Editorial for Technology Dummies

Richard Swadley, Vice President and Executive Group Publisher

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Kathleen Nebenhaus, Vice President and Executive Publisher

Composition Services

Debbie Stailey, Director of Composition Services

Contents at a Glance

Introduction 1

Book I: Starting Windows 8 9

Chapter 1: Windows 8 4 N00bs 11

Chapter 2: Windows 8 for the Experienced 41

Chapter 3: Which Version? 55

Chapter 4: Upgrades and Clean Installs 63

Book II: Personalizing Windows 79

Chapter 1: Getting around Windows 81

Chapter 2: Changing the Lock and Logon Screens 101

Chapter 3: Working with Charms and Notifications 113

Chapter 4: Controlling Users 125

Chapter 5: Microsoft Account: To Sync or Not to Sync? 141

Chapter 6: Privacy Control 153

Book III: Navigating the Start Screen 163

Chapter 1: Controlling the Start Screen 165

Chapter 2: Searching in and with the Start screen 187

Chapter 3: Sharing Among Tiled Apps 199

Chapter 4: Settings, Settings, More Settings, and Devices 207

Chapter 5: Taking Control of the Windows Store 217

Chapter 6: How Do I Turn Off This Thing? 227

Book IV: Maximizing Tiled Windows 8 Apps 233

Chapter 1: The Tiled Internet Explorer 235

Chapter 2: Windows 8 Mail, People, and Calendar Apps 255

Chapter 3: The Windows 8 Photos App 283

Chapter 4: Using SkyDrive in Windows 8 299

Chapter 5: The Windows 8 Messaging App 317

Chapter 6: Xbox Music and Video 329

Book V: Connecting Online with Tiled Apps 341

Chapter 1: Getting Started with Facebook 343

Chapter 2: Getting Started with Twitter 367

Chapter 3: Getting Started with Flickr and Pinterest 379

Chapter 4: Getting Started with LinkedIn 393

Chapter 5: Bing News, Finance, Travel, and Sports 403

Chapter 6: Games, Games, and Games! 423

Book VI: Working on the Desktop 433

Chapter 1: Running the Desktop from Start to Finish 435

Chapter 2: Personalizing the Desktop 467

Chapter 3: Start Screen Mods for Desktop Users 493

Chapter 4: Maintaining Your System 507

Chapter 5: Using Windows (Live) Essentials 525

Chapter 6: Choosing and Using a Desktop Web Browser 551

Chapter 7: Music on the Desktop 595

Chapter 8: Searching on the Desktop 633

Book VII: Controlling Your System 645

Chapter 1: Controlling Control Panel 647

Chapter 2: Troubleshooting and Getting Help 669

Chapter 3: Working with Libraries 693

Chapter 4: Storing in Storage Spaces 701

Chapter 5: Getting the Most from HomeGroups 711

Chapter 6: Running the Built-In Desktop Applications 731

Chapter 7: Working with Printers 743

Book VIII: Maintaining Windows 8 757

Chapter 1: File History, Backup, Data Restore, and Sync 759

Chapter 2: A Fresh Start: Restore and Reset 775

Chapter 3: Using and Avoiding Windows Update 791

Chapter 4: Monitoring Windows 811

Chapter 5: Using System Tools 835

Book IX: Securing Windows 8 853

Chapter 1: Spies, Spams, Scams — They’re Out to Get You 855

Chapter 2: Fighting Viri and Scum 887

Chapter 3: Running Built-In Security Programs 901

Chapter 4: Top Security Helpers 925

Book X: Enhancing Windows 8 939

Chapter 1: Using Your iPad and iPhone with Windows 941

Chapter 2: Kindle, Nook, Android, and Windows 8 961

Chapter 3: Getting Started with Gmail, Google Apps, and Drive 975

Chapter 4: Using Hotmail and Outlook.com 991

Chapter 5: Windows’ Best Free Add-Ons 1003

Index 1015

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

About This Book 1

Foolish Assumptions 3

What You Don’t Have to Read 3

How This Book Is Organized 4

Conventions 5

Icons 6

Where to Go from Here 7

Book I: Starting Windows 8 9

Chapter 1: Windows 8 4 N00bs .11

Hardware and Software 13

Why Do PCs Have to Run Windows? 14

A Terminology Survival Kit 16

What, Exactly, Is the Web? 19

Getting inside the Internet 21

What is the World Wide Web? 22

Who pays for all this stuff? 24

Buying a Windows 8 Computer 25

Inside the big box 27

Inside a touch-sensitive tablet 30

Screening 31

Managing disks and drives 32

Making PC connections 35

Futzing with video, sound, and multitudinous media 38

Netbooks and Ultrabooks 39

Chapter 2: Windows 8 for the Experienced 41

What’s New for the XP Crowd 44

Improved performance 45

Better video 45

Sizing up other improvements 46

What’s New for Windows 7 and Vista Victims 47

Getting the hang of the tiled Start screen 48

What’s new in the old-fashioned desktop 48

What’s New for All of Windows 50

Security improvements 51

What’s new in the cloud 52

What you lose 52

Do You Need Windows 8? 54

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Chapter 3: Which Version? 55

Roll an 8 — Any 8 56

Buying the right version the first time 57

Narrowing the choices 58

Choosing 32-Bit versus 64-Bit 60

Chapter 4: Upgrades and Clean Installs 63

Deciding Whether to Upgrade Your Old PC 64

Choosing Your Upgrade Path 65

Upgrading to Windows 8 online 66

Installing Win8 from a DVD or USB drive 72

Cleaning the Gunk Off New PCs 76

What If the Wheels Fall Off? 77

Book II: Personalizing Windows 79

Chapter 1: Getting around Windows 81

Windows’ Jekyll and Hyde Personality 82

A tale of two homes 82

Switching from the Start screen to the old-fashioned desktop and back 85

Navigating around a Touchscreen 86

Navigating with a Mouse and Keyboard 94

Keying Keyboard Shortcuts 96

Working with the App Bar 98

Shutting Down Apps .98

How Do You Turn This Thing Off? 98

Chapter 2: Changing the Lock and Logon Screens 101

Working with the Lock Screen 101

Using your own picture 103

Adding and removing apps on the lock screen 104

Logging In Uniquely 106

Using a picture password 106

Creating a PIN 110

Bypassing passwords and logon 110

Chapter 3: Working with Charms and Notifications .113

Bringing on the Charms 113

Search charm 115

Share charm 118

Start charm 118

Devices charm 119

Settings charm 120

Setting and Responding to Notifications 121

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Chapter 4: Controlling Users .125

Why You Need Separate User Accounts 126

Choosing Account Types 127

What’s a standard account? 127

What’s an administrator account? 128

Choosing between standard or administrator accounts 128

What’s Good and Bad about Microsoft Accounts 130

Adding Users 131

Enabling the Guest Account 134

Changing Accounts 136

Changing other users’ settings 136

Changing your own settings 140

Switching Users 140

Chapter 5: Microsoft Account: To Sync or Not to Sync? 141

What, Exactly, Is a Microsoft Account? 142

Deciding Whether You Want a Microsoft Account 143

Setting Up a Microsoft Account 144

Setting up a Hotmail/Outlook.com account 146

Making any e-mail address a Microsoft account 148

Taking Care of Your Microsoft Account 149

Controlling Sync 150

Chapter 6: Privacy Control .153

Why You Should Be Concerned 154

Knowing What Connections Windows Prefers 155

Controlling Location Tracking 156

Blocking all location tracking 159

Blocking location tracking in an app 160

Minimizing Privacy Intrusion 161

Book III: Navigating the Start Screen 163

Chapter 1: Controlling the Start Screen 165

Touring the Start Screen 166

Changing Tiles on the Start Screen 172

Changing the Start screen Background 174

Organizing Your Start Screen 175

Changing your picture 175

Adding apps to the Start screen 178

Organizing with Semantic Zoom 180

Working with Tiled Snap 182

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Chapter 2: Searching in and with the Start Screen 187

General Approaches to Searching 188

Searching for Programs/Apps 190

Searching for Settings 193

Searching for Files 194

Searching for Other Tiled Things 196

Removing Apps from the Search List 197

Chapter 3: Sharing Among Tiled Apps .199

Sharing the Easy Way 200

Stepping Through a Photo Share 203

What Can You Share? 204

Controlling Share 205

Chapter 4: Settings, Settings, More Settings, and Devices .207

Using the Settings Charm 207

Changing PC Settings 209

Touring the Start Screen Settings 212

Doing the Devices Charm 213

Chapter 5: Taking Control of the Windows Store 217

Checking Out What a Tiled App Can Do 217

Browsing the Windows Store 220

Searching the Windows Store 222

Adjusting Your Store Accounts and Preferences 223

Chapter 6: How Do I Turn Off This Thing? .227

Turning Off Your PC 227

Understanding the new windows sleep state 229

Adjusting sleep settings 230

Turning Off Individual Apps 231

Book IV: Maximizing Tiled Windows 8 Apps 233

Chapter 1: The Tiled Internet Explorer 235

Introducing the Two Faces of IE 236

Navigating the Tiled Internet Explorer 239

Surfing with the address bar and navigation buttons 240

Tapping Tiled IE’s recently visited sites 242

Navigating with Flip Ahead 243

Flipping to the desktop IE 243

Sharing and Printing Web Pages 244

Sorting Out Your Settings 245

Charming tiled IE settings 245

Changing your default search engine 246

Table of Contents xv

Settings and whitelists for Adobe/Flash 246

Managing passwords 247

Choosing and Setting a Default Browser 247

Setting the default Windows browser 248

Setting the default IE browser 249

Exploring IE under the Hood: Flash and HTML5 .250

Chapter 2: Windows 8 Mail, People, and Calendar Apps 255

Choosing a Mail/Contacts/Calendar app 256

Comparing e-mail programs 256

Comparing calendar apps .258

Checking out contact apps 259

Choosing the right package 259

Drilling Down on Windows 8 Mail 260

Navigating the Windows 8 Mail screen 261

Adding a new account 262

Creating a new message 264

Searching for e-mail in Windows 8 Mail 267

MIA in Windows 8 Mail 267

Putting All Your Contacts in the Win8 People App 268

Adding accounts to Win8 People 268

Navigating the Windows 8 People app 270

Editing a contact 274

Adding people in Windows 8 People 275

Avoiding Windows 8 Calendar App Collisions 277

Adding Calendar Items 280

Struggling with Calendar shortcomings 281

Chapter 3: The Windows 8 Photos App .283

Discovering What Windows 8’s Photos App Can Do 283

Touring Photos 284

Adding Photos 288

Connecting Photos to SkyDrive 289

Connecting to Facebook or Flickr 289

Importing pictures from a camera or external drive 294

Pinning Photos within the Photos App 298

Chapter 4: Using SkyDrive in Windows 8 .299

What Is SkyDrive? 300

Using the Windows 8 Tiled SkyDrive 302

Running SkyDrive on Your Desktop 305

Installing SkyDrive: The legacy program 305

Using the SkyDrive program on the desktop 308

Running SkyDrive on the Web 309

Fetching 312

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Chapter 5: The Windows 8 Messaging App .317

Getting Started with the Windows 8 Messaging App 318

The differences between MS Messaging and SMS 318

The differences between MS Messaging and Skype 319

Whom you can message 319

How Messaging works 320

Fishing for Messaging Friends 321

Running a Windows 8 Messaging Chat 324

Using Messaging Effectively 326

Chapter 6: Xbox Music and Video 329

Why You Might Want Xbox Music or Video 330

Playing Your Music with Xbox Music 331

Viewing Your Videos with Xbox Video 335

Managing Playlists 337

Turning Off the Tiled Apps as Default Media Players 339

Book V: Connecting Online with Tiled Apps 341

Chapter 1: Getting Started with Facebook 343

Signing Up for a Facebook Account 344

Choosing basic Facebook settings 348

Interpreting the Facebook interface lingo 352

Choosing basic Facebook security settings 353

Building a Great Timeline 355

Locking Down Your Facebook Info 360

Connecting to Windows 364

Chapter 2: Getting Started with Twitter 367

Understanding Twitter 368

Setting Up a Twitter account 371

Tweeting for Beginners 374

Beware hacking 374

Using the @ sign and Reply 375

Re-tweeting for fun and profit 376

Hooking Twitter into Windows 377

Chapter 3: Getting Started with Flickr and Pinterest 379

Using Flickr with Windows 8 381

Signing up for Flickr 381

Getting around Flickr 383

Sharing and licensing your photos 385

Pinning with Pinterest 387

Signing up for Pinterest 387

Getting around Pinterest 388

Table of Contents xvii

Chapter 4: Getting Started with LinkedIn 393

Signing Up for LinkedIn 393

Hooking LinkedIn into Windows 398

Using LinkedIn for Fun and Profit 400

Chapter 5: Bing News, Finance, Travel, and Sports .403

Recognizing the Bing in Everyone 404

Reading the News with Bing 404

Getting around Bing News 404

Customizing Bing News 409

Pinning Finance for Fun and Profit 413

Traveling with Your Tablet 417

Sports Fans Everywhere, Take Note 420

Chapter 6: Games, Games, and Games! 423

Searching the Store for Games 424

Cutting the Rope with Style 426

Tapping Pirates Love Daisies 428

Starting with Sudoku 429

Beating Birzzle 431

Book VI: Working on the Desktop 433

Chapter 1: Running the Desktop from Start to Finish 435

Getting Around 436

Knowing the desktop’s hot spots 436

Snapping windows into place 439

Changing the mouse 441

Exploring Files and Folders 442

Nailing the basic terminology 443

Navigating 445

Viewing and filename extensions 447

Previewing 448

Creating files and folders 449

Copying, moving, and modifying files and folders 451

Sharing Folders in the Public Folder 456

Touching on the Taskbar 459

Recycling 460

Creating Shortcuts 461

Sleep: Perchance to Dream 464

Chapter 2: Personalizing the Desktop .467

Recognizing Desktop Levels 467

Setting Color Schemes on the Desktop 469

Picking a Background 470

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Controlling Icons 473

Selecting Screen Savers 475

Using Desktop Themes 477

Seeing Your Desktop Clearly 478

Setting the screen resolution 478

Activating and adjusting ClearType 480

Showing larger fonts 481

Using magnification 482

Tricking Out the Taskbar 482

Anatomy of the taskbar 483

Jumping 484

Changing the taskbar 486

Making your own little toolbars 487

Working with the taskbar 489

Controlling the Notification Area 489

Chapter 3: Start Screen Mods for Desktop Users 493

Installing New Programs and Dealing with Their Tiles 495

Finding and Adding Programs to the Start Screen 497

Sorting through the Default Tiles 500

Organizing the Start Screen for a Lean, Mean Desktop 503

Chapter 4: Maintaining Your System .507

What’s the Difference Between Restore, System Repair, Recovery Mode, Refresh, and Restart? 507

Using a Password Reset Disk 508

Creating a Password Reset Disk 510

Resetting your password 511

Maintaining Drives 513

What is formatting? 514

Introducing hard-drive–maintenance tools 514

Running an error check 515

Defragmenting a drive 516

Maintaining Solid State Drives 517

Zipping and Compressing 518

Compressing with NTFS 521

Zipping the easy way with Compressed (zipped) Folders 522

Chapter 5: Using Windows (Live) Essentials .525

Introducing the Applications and How They’ve Changed 526

Getting the Windows Essentials Apps 528

Using Windows Live Mail 530

Choosing an e-mail program 530

Running Windows Live Mail 532

Adding e-mail accounts 534

Creating a message 536

Table of Contents xix

Managing Windows Photo Gallery 537

Leafing through the Gallery 538

Adding photos to Photo Gallery 541

Tagging pictures 542

Finding a tagged picture 544

Touching up pictures 545

Planning panoramas and fuses 547

Panning Windows Movie Maker 549

Chapter 6: Choosing and Using a Desktop Web Browser .551

Which Browser’s Best? 552

Considering security 552

Looking at privacy 553

Picking a browser 554

Setting a browser as your default 556

Using Internet Explorer on the Desktop 557

Setting a default Internet Explorer 558

Navigating in desktop IE 560

Dealing with cookies 565

Changing the home page 567

Turning on key features 569

Searching with alacrity and Google 570

Customizing Firefox 572

Installing Firefox 573

Browsing privately in Firefox 574

Bookmarking with the Fox 575

Adding Firefox’s best add-ons 577

Optimizing Google Chrome 579

Installing Chrome 579

Navigating in Chrome 580

Searching on the Web 583

Finding what you’re looking for 584

Using Advanced Search 585

Pulling out Google parlor tricks 587

Working with RSS Feeds 588

Referring to Internet Reference Tools 592

Internet speed test 592

DNSStuff 592

3d Traceroute 593

Down for everyone or just me? 594

The Wayback Machine 594

Chapter 7: Music on the Desktop .595

Getting Started with Windows Media Player 595

Pinning WMP to the Start menu or taskbar 596

Setting WMP right the first time 597

Tweaking privacy options after installation 600

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Playing with Now Playing 601Controlling the playback buttons 603Playing a CD 604Copying from a CD (Also Known As Ripping) 606Understanding music file formats 606Adjusting the WMP ripping settings 607Organizing Your Media Library 611Leafing through the library 611Changing album and song data 613Rating songs 613Sorting songs 614Searching 614Managing Playlists 615Creating a new playlist 616Renaming and deleting playlists 617Burning CDs and DVDs 618Burning an audio CD 619Burning data CDs and DVDs with Media Player 623Sharing Your Windows Media Player Media 624Customizing WMP 626Where to Find and Buy Good Music 627Buying music and videos online 628Using the Amazon music store 629Finding new music you’ll like 631

Chapter 8: Searching on the Desktop 633

Indexing to Speed Up Searches 634Using Search Wisely and Sparingly 634Knowing Search’s Idiosyncrasies 635Limiting and Expanding Searches through the Ribbon 636Introducing AQS 638Searching for a filename 639Using wildcards in ways that make sense 639Making Windows Index Where You Search 641Book VII: Controlling Your System 645

Chapter 1: Controlling Control Panel .647

Exploring the Real Control Panel 647Bringing up the Control Panel 648Scouting out the Control Panel 649Relying on Device Manager 651Stuffing AutoPlay 654Uninstalling/Changing Programs 656Turning Windows Features On and Off 659

Table of Contents xxi

Setting Default Programs 660Changing the default for a filename extension 660Changing the default browser or e-mail program 662Adding and Switching Clocks 664Changing Languages 665Enabling Ease of Access Features 667

Chapter 2: Troubleshooting and Getting Help 669

Troubleshooting in the Action Center 670System Stability and the Reliability Monitor 671Tricks to Using Windows Help 673The problem(s) with Windows Help 674Using different kinds of help 674Staying online 675Choosing the index versus search 676How to Really Get Help 676Snapping and Recording Your Problems 678Taking snaps that snap 679Recording live 680Connecting to Remote Assistance 683Understanding the interaction 683Making the connection 684Limiting an invitation 689Troubleshooting Remote Assistance 690Getting Help Online 690

Chapter 3: Working with Libraries .693

Understanding Libraries 693Working with Your Default Libraries 694Customizing Libraries 696Adding a folder to a library 696Changing a library’s default save location 698Creating Your Own Library 699

Chapter 4: Storing in Storage Spaces 701

Understanding the “Virtualization” of Storage 701Setting Up Storage Spaces 704Working with Storage Spaces 708

Chapter 5: Getting the Most from HomeGroups .711

Preparing a PC for a HomeGroup 711Connecting to a HomeGroup 713Setting up a new HomeGroup 715Joining an existing HomeGroup 717Sharing Files and Printers in a HomeGroup 717Navigating to a HomeGroup Folder 719

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Caring for Your HomeGroup 720Using the tiled HomeGroup interface 720Changing the HomeGroup password 721Adding or blocking folders in the HomeGroup 723Venturing beyond HomeGroups 724Sharing and granting permissions 725Sharing on mixed HomeGroup, workgroup,

and Apple networks 727

Chapter 6: Running the Built-In Desktop Applications 731

Getting Free Word Processing 731Running Notepad 733Writing with WordPad 735Taming the Character Map 738Calculating — Free 739Painting 740Sticking Sticky Notes 741

Chapter 7: Working with Printers .743

Installing a Printer 744Attaching a local printer 744Connecting a network printer 746Using the Print Queue 749Displaying a print queue 749Pausing and resuming a print queue 750Pausing, restarting, and resuming a document 751Canceling a document 752Troubleshooting Printing 752Catching a Runaway Printer 754Book VIII: Maintaining Windows 8 757

Chapter 1: File History, Backup, Data Restore, and Sync 759

What Happened to the Windows 7 Backup? 760Backing Up and Restoring Files with File History 761Setting up File History 761Restoring data from File History 765Changing File History settings 767Storing To and Through the Cloud 768Considering cloud storage privacy concerns 769Reaping the benefits of backup and storage in the cloud 771Choosing an online backup and sharing service 771

Chapter 2: A Fresh Start: Restore and Reset .775

The Three R’s — and a Fourth RE 775Refreshing Your PC 778

Table of Contents xxiii

Resetting Your PC 780Restoring to an Earlier Point 782Creating a restore point 783Rolling back to a restore point 784Entering the Windows Recovery Environment 787

Chapter 3: Using and Avoiding Windows Update .791

Patching Woes 792Choosing an Update Level 795Selectively Patching: A Panacea for Those Woes 799Patching Windows manually 801Checking for updates manually 805Getting What You Need from a Security Bulletin 807Decoding a security bulletin 808Getting patches through a security bulletin 809Checking and Uninstalling Updates 809

Chapter 4: Monitoring Windows 811

Obeying the Action Center 811Entering the Action Center 812Working with the Action Center 814Watching Security settings 814Checking Maintenance settings 816Running Your Windows Experience Index 818Checking your Windows Experience score 819Interpreting the numbers 820Turning the numbers into real improvement 821Reviewing Your Network Status 823Turning sharing on or off 824Troubleshooting network adapters 825Setting up a virtual private network 827Viewing Events 828Using Event Viewer 828Events worthy — and not worthy — of viewing .830Gauging System Reliability 830

Chapter 5: Using System Tools .835

Tasking Task Manager 835Task Manager Processes 838Task Manager Performance 838Task Manager App History 839Task Manager Startup and Autoruns 840Task Manager Users .842Task Manager Details and Services 843Installing a Second Hard Drive 843Running a Virtual Machine 846

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Book IX: Securing Windows 8 853

Chapter 1: Spies, Spams, Scams — They’re Out to Get You .855

Understanding the Hazards — and the Hoaxes 856The primary infection vectors 857Zombies and botnets 858Phishing 860

419 scams 865I’m from Microsoft and I’m here to help 8680day exploits 869Staying Informed 870Relying on reliable sources 871Ditching the hoaxes 872

Am I Infected? 873Evaluating telltale signs 874Where did that message come from? 874What to do next 876Shunning scareware 877Getting Protected 879Protecting against malware 880Disabling Java and Flash 881Using your credit card safely online 881Defending your privacy 883Reducing spam 884

Chapter 2: Fighting Viri and Scum 887

Basic Windows Security Do’s and Don’ts 887Making Sense of Malware 891Scanning for Rootkits with Windows Defender Offline 893Deciphering Browsers’ Inscrutable Warnings 896Chrome 897Firefox 898Internet Explorer 10 899

Chapter 3: Running Built-In Security Programs .901

Working with Windows Defender 901Adjusting Windows Defender 903Running Windows Defender manually 904Judging SmartScreen 906Booting Securely with UEFI 909

A brief history of BIOS 909How UEFI is different from/better than BIOS .910How Windows 8 uses UEFI .912Controlling User Account Control 913

Table of Contents xxv

Poking at Windows Firewall 916Understanding Firewall basic features 917Speaking your firewall’s lingo 918Peeking into your firewall 919Making inbound exceptions 920

Chapter 4: Top Security Helpers .925

Deciding about BitLocker 926Managing Your Passwords 929Using password managers 929Which is better: Online or inhand? 929Rockin’ RoboForm 930Liking LastPass 931Keeping Your Other Programs Up to Date 932Blocking Java and Flash in Your Browser 934Fighting Back at Tough Scumware 937Book X: Enhancing Windows 8 939

Chapter 1: Using Your iPad and iPhone with Windows .941

Running iTunes on Windows, Or Maybe Not 942Why you may need or want iTunes for Windows 943Installing iTunes 944Setting up iTunes 946Pulling Internet videos onto your iPad 949Creating a movie playlist 950Great iPad Apps to Use with Windows 953Controlling Windows from your iPad 953Delivering PowerPoint presentations with your iPad 955Extending your Windows display with iDisplay 955Move files between your PC and the iPad 956Working with Windows documents on the iPad 956Playing with Kids on Your iPad or iPhones 957

Chapter 2: Kindle, Nook, Android, and Windows 8 .961

Wrangling E-Book Files 962Introucing popular e-book formats 963Reading e-book files on your PC 963Organizing your e-book files with calibre 964Getting Media from Your PC to Your Kindle 967E-mailing books from your PC to your Kindle 967Receiving e-mailed books from a friend 969Adding music to your Kindle 970

Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies

xxvi

Using the Tiled Kindle App 972Syncing Contacts and Calendars 973Syncing Outlook contacts with Android devices 973Syncing calendars 973

Chapter 3: Getting Started with Gmail, Google Apps, and Drive 975

Finding Alternatives to Windows with Google 976Setting Up Gmail 978Using Google Docs/Drive 982Moving Your Domain to Google 986

Chapter 4: Using Hotmail and Outlook com 991

Getting Started with Outlook.com 991Bringing Some Sanity to Outlook.com Organization 996Handling Outlook.com Failures 996Importing Outlook.com Messages into Gmail 998Weighing the Alternatives 1000

Chapter 5: Windows’ Best Free Add-Ons 1003

Windows Apps You Absolutely Must Have 1003File History 1003VLC Media Player 1004PSI Inspector .1006Recuva 1006The Best of the Rest — All Free 1007Revo Uninstaller 1008Paint.net 10087Zip 1008Dropbox, Google Drive, SkyDrive, or 1009You may not need to buy Microsoft Office 1010Don’t Pay for Software You Don’t Need! 1010Windows 8 has all the antivirus software you need 1011Windows 8 doesn’t need a disk defragger .1011Windows 8 doesn’t need a disk partitioner 1012Windows 8 doesn’t need a Registry cleaner 1012Windows 8 doesn’t need a backup program 1012Don’t turn off services or hack your Registry 1013Index 1014

Windows 8 shows two completely different personas: the traditional

desktop and the tiled Start screen interface The traditional Windows desktop resembles every Windows desktop you’ve seen over the past decade, give or take a bit More than a billion people have used it The tiled “immer-sive” persona, which Microsoft calls the Start screen (and in this book, I do, too), represents the future of Windows

I think of the desktop as the staid, dependable, conservative Dr Jekyll and the tiled Start screen as the dashing, new, outlandish, and occasionally inexplicable Mr Hyde

You may prefer Jekyll You may prefer Hyde You’ll certainly find yourself, from time to time, jumping between the two, sometimes at the moment you least expect But, armed with this book, you can make both places work the way you want

Prefer the desktop? I show you how to change the Start screen so it’ll help you get more out of the desktop Prefer the showy tiles? I show you how to get a lot done — quite possibly almost everything you want a computer to

do — without leaving the tiles behind

This isn’t the manual Microsoft forgot This is the manual Microsoft

wouldn’t dare print I won’t feed you the Microsoft Party Line, or make excuses for pieces of Windows 8 that just don’t work My job is to take you through the most important parts of Windows, give you tips that may or may not involve Microsoft products, point out the rough spots, and guide you around the disasters Frankly, there are some biggies

I also look at using non-Microsoft products in a Windows way: iPads, Androids, Kindles, Gmail and Google Apps, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Dropbox, Firefox, Google Chrome, and iCloud Even though Microsoft competes with just about every one of those products, each has a place in your computing arsenal and ties into Windows in important ways

I’ll save you more than enough money to pay for the book several times over, keep you from pulling out a whole shock of hair, lead you to dozens if not hundreds of “Aha!” moments, and keep you awake in the process Guaranteed.About This Book

Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies takes you through the Land of the

Dummies — with introductory material and stuff your grandmother could

About This Book

Then I dig into the desktop and take you through all the important pieces

I don’t dwell on technical mumbo jumbo, and I keep the baffling jargon to

a minimum At the same time, though, I tackle the tough problems you’re likely to encounter, show you the major road signs, and give you a lot of help where you need it the most

Whether you want to get two or more e-mail accounts set up to work taneously, hook into your Facebook page, or publish photos of your Boykin Spaniel on the web, this is your book Er, I should say ten books I’ve broken out the topics into ten different minibooks, so you’ll find it easy to hop around to a topic — and a level of coverage — that feels comfortable

simul-I didn’t design this book to be read from front to back simul-It’s a reference Each chapter, and each of its sections, is meant to focus on solving a particular problem or describing a specific technique

Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies should be your reference of first resort,

even before you consult Windows Help and Support There’s a big reason why: Windows Help was written by hundreds of people over the course of many, many years Some of the material was written ages ago, and it’s con-fusing as all get-out, but it’s still in Windows Help for folks who are tackling tough “legacy” problems Some of the Help file terminology is inconsistent and downright misleading, largely because the technology has changed so much since some of the articles were written Finding help in Help frequently boggles my mind: If I don’t already know the answer to a question, it’s hard

to figure out how to coax Help to help Besides, if you’re looking for help on connecting your iPad to your PC or downloading pictures from your Galaxy phone, Microsoft would rather sell you something different The proverbial bottom line: I don’t duplicate the material in Windows 8 Help and Support, but I point to it if I figure it can help you

A word about Windows 8 versions As we went to press, Microsoft was paring a completely different kind of Windows, made for small, light, highly portable tablets known as “ARM architecture,” because the computers innards are designed by a company called ARM This book doesn’t cover ARM computers, or the version of Windows called Windows RT (code-named WOA “Windows on ARM,” get it?) While many of the interactions with the tiled Mr Hyde side of Windows 8 are basically identical to those on Windows

pre-RT, there are many, many differences Don’t try to psych out Windows RT using the nostrums in this book

What You Don’t Have to Read 3

Foolish Assumptions

I don’t make many assumptions about you, dear reader, except to edge that you’re obviously intelligent, well-informed, discerning, and of impeccable taste That’s why you chose this book, eh?

acknowl-Okay, okay The least I can do is butter you up a bit Here’s the straight scoop: If you’ve never used Windows, bribe your neighbor (or, better, your neighbor’s kids) to teach you how to do four things:

✦ Play a game with your fingers (if you have a touchscreen) Any of the

games on the tiled side of Windows 8 will do If your neighbor’s kids don’t have a different recommendation, try Cut the Rope

✦ Start File Explorer

✦ Get on the web

✦ Put Windows to sleep (Hint: nudge your finger or mouse in the upper

right corner, choose Settings, then look for the Power icon.)That covers it If you can play a game, you know how to turn on your computer, log in if need be, touch and drag, and tap and hold If you run File Explorer, you know how to click a taskbar icon After you’re on the web, well, it’s a great starting point for almost anything And, if you know that you need to use the Charms bar — that weird flyout on the right — you’re well on your way to achieving Windows 8 Enlightenment

And that begins with Book I, Chapter 1

What You Don’t Have to Read

Throughout this book, I’ve gone to great lengths to separate “optional” ing from “required” reading If you want to find out more about a topic or solve a specific problem, follow along in the main part of the text You can skip the sidebars as you go, unless one happens to catch your eye

read-On the other hand, if you know a topic pretty well but want to make sure that you catch all the high points, read the paragraphs marked with icons and be sure that the information registers If it doesn’t, glance at the sur-rounding text

Sidebars offer information above and beyond what you need to know for those who are curious about a specific topic — or who stand knee-deep in muck, searching for a way out

How This Book Is Organized

4

How This Book Is Organized

Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies contains ten minibooks, each of which

gives a thorough airing of a specific topic If you’re looking for information

on a specific Windows topic, check the headings in the Table of Contents or refer to the index

By design, this book enables you to get as much (or as little) information as you need at any particular moment Want to know how to e-mail a picture from your Facebook account to a friend? Look at Book III, Chapter 3 Want

to change to a picture logon? Flip to Book II, Chapter 2 Windows 8 All-in-One

For Dummies is a reference that you will reach for again and again whenever

a new question about Windows comes up

Here’s a description of the ten minibooks and what they contain:

✦ Book I, Starting Windows 8 takes you through the two very different

faces of Windows 8 Whether you’re just starting out, or you’ve been using Windows for decades, there’s a whole lot of stuff that you’ve never seen before This is where you start to earn your chops

✦ Book II, Personalizing Windows runs you all around the Windows

play-ing surface, pointplay-ing out what you can do, what you should do, and where you might fall into a rabbit hole It shows you how to get your Lock screen and Logons working right, add new users, take advantage of cloud syncing

of your Windows settings, and stay on top of your privacy Yeah, even some of the stuff Microsoft doesn’t want you to know about

✦ Book III, Navigating the Start Screen goes through the whole nine

yards Mr Hyde gets a thorough deconstruction, with every important Start screen setting fully explicated

✦ Book IV, Maximizing Tiled Windows 8 Apps, introduces you to the

latest and greatest programs from Microsoft They’re free, they’re flashy, and they’re oh-so-frustrating when they don’t do what you want See how to tame them into submission

✦ Book V, Connecting Online with Tiled Apps, shows you all the

impor-tant online apps both from Microsoft and from Microsoft’s competitors Whether you use Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, financial apps, news apps, or games, this is where you can find the real story

✦ Book VI, Working on the Desktop, takes you on a very thorough tour of

the desktop — the part of Windows you’ve probably seen before You’ll get advice on picking a web browser, setup instructions, and a bunch of important tips on browsing on the Internet You’ll also see my full Start screen makeover for people who really prefer to use the desktop

✦ Book VII, Controlling Your System goes through the Control Panel and

then covers many new and exciting Windows 8 capabilities, like the hard drives that heal themselves (and keep your system running even when

Conventions 5

go through some school-of-hard-knocks tips on working with printers and other worse-than-senseless things

✦ Book VIII, Maintaining Windows 8 explains how to restore, refresh,

and reset your computer, using tools that Microsoft touts, as well as the ones Windows hides I also talk about how to use the key built-in Windows programs and tools, including how to keep independent his-torical file backups, so you’ll never lose old data It’s easy

✦ Book IX, Securing Windows 8 goes way beyond the usual

recommen-dations about Windows Defender and Firewall I talk about the biggest security vulnerability on all Windows systems — the person behind the keyboard And I step you through a couple of real-life takedowns of scammers, to show you how to take care of yourself

✦ Book X: Enhancing Windows 8 takes you to the outside world How

do you get your iPad to work with your PC? What you can do with an iPhone? Where do Android tablets and phones fit into the picture? This minibook explains all that You also find out how to use Google Apps and Docs, Microsoft’s largest online app competitor

See I told you this is a manual Microsoft wouldn’t dare to publish

Conventions

I try to keep typographical conventions to a minimum:

✦ The first time a buzzword appears in text, I italicize it and define it

immediately That makes it easier for you to glance back and reread the definition

✦ Whenever I want you to type something, I put the letters or words in

bold For example: “Type William Gates in the Name text box.” If you

need to press more than one key at a time on the keyboard, I add a plus

sign between the keys’ names; for example, “Press Ctrl+Alt+Delete to

initiate a Vulcan Mind Meld.”

✦ I set off web addresses and e-mail addresses in monospace For example,

my e-mail address is woody@AskWoody.com (true fact), and my website is

at AskWoody.com (another true fact) You may be accustomed to seeing web addresses (commonly known as URLs) spelled out in their entirety, such as http://www.dummies.com Mercifully, some printed media drop the (completely superfluous) http:// and the most progressive printed sources drop the www That’s the convention you see in this book: I write dummies.com instead of http://www.dummies.com If you type dummies.com into your Web browser and it comes back with http://ww9.redirect.dummies.com/index.asp?lang=en,source=ohmy, don’t be too surprised, okay? Computers talk funny

6

There’s one other convention, though, that I use all the time: I always, lutely, adamantly include the filename extension — the period and (usually) three letters at the end of a filename, such as doc or vbs or exe — when talking about a file Yeah, I know Windows 8 hides filename extensions by default, but you can and should change that setting Yeah, I realize that Bill

abso-G himself made the decision to hide the extensions and that Steve B and Steve S won’t back off (At least, that’s the rumor.)

I also know that, years ago, hundreds — probably thousands — of Microsoft employees passed along the ILOVEYOU virus, primarily because they couldn’t see the filename extension that would’ve warned them that the file was a virus Uh, bad decision, Bill

Icons

Some of the points in Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies merit your special

attention I set off those points with icons

When I’m jumping up and down on one foot with an idea so absolutely cool that I can’t stand it anymore, I stick a Tip icon in the margin You can browse any chapter and hit its highest points by jumping from Tip to Tip

When you see this icon, you get the real story about Windows 8 — not the stuff that the Microsoft marketing droids want you to hear — and my take

on the best way to get Windows 8 to work for you You find the same take on Microsoft, Windows, and more at my eponymous website, AskWoody.com

You don’t need to memorize the information marked with this icon, but you should try to remember that something special is lurking

Achtung! Cuidado! Thar be tygers here! Anywhere that you see a Warning icon, you can be sure that I’ve been burnt — badly Mind your fingers These are really, really mean suckers

Okay, so I’m a geek I admit it Sure, I love to poke fun at geeks But I’m

a modern, New Age, sensitive guy, in touch with my inner geekiness

Sometimes, I just can’t help but let it out, ya know? That’s where the

Technical Stuff icon comes in If you get all tied up in knots about techie-type stuff, pass these paragraphs by (For the record, I managed to write this whole book without telling you that an IPv4 address consists of a unique 32-bit combination of network ID and host ID, expressed as a set of four decimal numbers with each octet separated by periods See? I can restrain myself sometimes.)

Where to Go from Here 7

Where to Go from Here

That’s about it It’s time for you to crack this book open and have at it

If you haven’t yet told Windows 8 to show you filename extensions, flip to Book VI, Chapter 1 If you haven’t yet set up the File History feature, go to Book VIII, Chapter 1

Don’t forget to bookmark my website: www.AskWoody.com It keeps you up-to-date on all the Windows 8 news you need to know — including notes about this book, the latest Windows bugs and gaffes, patches that are worse than the problems they’re supposed to fix, and much more — and you can submit your most pressing questions, for free consultation from The Woodmeister himself

For updates specific to this book, point your browser to www.dummies.com/go/windows8aioupdates

See ya! woody@AskWoody.com

Sometimes it’s worth reading the Intro, eh?

8 Windows 8 All-in-One For Dummies

Book I

Starting Windows 8

Chapter 2: Windows 8 for the Experienced 41

What’s New for the XP Crowd 44What’s New for Windows 7 and Vista Victims 47What’s New for All of Windows 50

Do You Need Windows 8? 54

Chapter 3: Which Version? 55

Roll an 8 — Any 8 56Choosing 32-Bit versus 64-Bit 60

Chapter 4: Upgrades and Clean Installs 63

Deciding Whether to Upgrade Your Old PC 64Choosing Your Upgrade Path 65Cleaning the Gunk Off New PCs 76What If the Wheels Fall Off? 77

Chapter 1: Windows 8 4 N00bs

In This Chapter

✓ A newbie’s quick guide

✓ Hardware is hard — and software is hard, too

✓ Windows’ place in the grand scheme of things

✓ Those computer words that all the grade schoolers understand

✓ What, exactly, is the web?

✓ Buying a Windows 8 computer

Don’t sweat it Everyone started out as n00bs (or newbies).

All those high-falutin’ technical words you have to memorize, eh?

If you’ve never used an earlier version of Windows, you’re in luck — you don’t have to force your fingers to “forget” so much of what you’ve learned Windows 8 is completely different from any Windows that has come before, and Windows 7 (or XP) users who try to apply their hard-gained knowledge frequently get very frustrated just trying to get to first base with Win8.The easiest way to learn about the new tiled “immersive” interface formerly known as “Metro” is to forget everything you ever knew about Windows and

be prepared to start again from scratch Considering more than a billion people around the world have used Windows 7 and earlier, that’s a whole lot of forgettin’ goin’ on

So you’re sitting in front of your computer and this thing called Windows 8

is staring at you Except the screen (see Figure 1-1), which Microsoft calls

the lock screen, doesn’t say “Windows” much less “Windows 8.” In fact, the

screen doesn’t say much of anything except the current date and time, with maybe a tiny icon or two that shows you whether your Internet connection

is working, how many unopened e-mails await, or whether you should just take the day off because your holdings in AAPL stock soared again

Good for you That’s the right attitude.

Windows 8 ranks as the most sophisticated computer program ever made It cost more money to develop and took more people to build than any previous computer program — ever So why is it so blasted hard to use? Why doesn’t