13 MORE Windows Settings You Should Change Now!

Microsoft Windows, most of you are probably using it now, or at least familiar with it. But as you might expect, there are a ton of

settings

that you probably don't know about, but at the same time you

should

probably

change

, either by disabling the default

settings

or vice versa. You may have seen my other video that talks about 15 Windows settings to

change

, but this one is like part 2, with 13 completely different settings than that. So if you haven't seen that video, I'm very grateful to you, I recommend you watch it later, so I'll put that link in the description and it has a little pop-up icon that you can click on and that's it.

Likewise, in this video I'm going to point out that I'll be using Windows 10 and build 1909, so things may look a little different depending on your version, but for the most part they

should

look the same. Before we start, check out my Instagram account where I post interesting things about technology and the funniest tech memes out there. Don't blame me if you die of a heart attack from laughing too much. So my username is simply @ThioJoe, so be sure to check it out on Instagram. So let's start with number 1, which is a feature called "Clipboard History", which can be found in Settings, System, Clipboard, then turn it on.

Then you can use that instead of pressing Ctrl + V, press Windows key + V. It's self-explanatory, but I personally think this feature is really useful, because there are many times that I want to access the text that I copied before, but already It's not there because I overwritten something else or forgot about it. You now have the option to sync clipboard history across different devices, but I personally don't use it. If you manage to do it, you can choose to sync everything automatically or just certain things manually, so you have a lot of control over them. And of course, you can clear the history buffer at any time.

Definitely a feature worth trying. Ok, the next quick one can be found in Settings, Personalization, Start, then look where you can “Choose which folders appear at startup”. These selections change the display of folders at the top left of the Start menu when you open it. Things like documents, images, videos, but also networks, settings and a few others. So you can decide what you want to appear there, or maybe you just want to show everything, it's up to you. Well, we have another setup that some of you power users will probably like, but don't worry if you don't know what I'm talking about with this one.

It's also in Settings, Personalization, but this time on the taskbar. And it's called "Replace the command line with Windows Power Shell", blah blah blah. This is actually on by default. Windows 10 forces people to use Shell power instead of the old command line. Now PowerShell is very powerful, but I think even

more

advanced users, including myself, find it much

more

familiar than the old command line, and prefer to continue using it in most cases. Disabling this feature won't disable PowerShell or anything like that, it just makes the command line the default option in most cases. However, if you don't even know what I'm talking about, you can keep this setting the same, it literally won't change it for you.

Okay, now number 4 is very simple but SO basic in my opinion and has to do with the task manager. So you can open this by simply pressing Ctrl + Shift + Esc, if you didn't already know that shortcut. Now, at the top, go to Options and then click on "Always on top" so that it is selected. That seemingly simple setup is actually a lifesaver. This makes it so that whenever the task manager is open, it always appears in front of all other

windows

, even full screen

windows

, and will not crash. Obviously, one of the most common reasons to use the task manager is when the program freezes and becomes unresponsive, and only the task manager can terminate the process.

But sometimes, especially with full screen windows like games, it will push the task manager behind it right after you open it, you can't even use it to close the program! And then you just have to turn off the computer and that's a hassle. This way this should never happen, or at least unless the frozen program actually breaks and it could save you a lot of headaches. It will always be at the top, so you can always access it. Ok, let's go to Settings, Search, Search Windows, then find the settings under "Find my files" and change it to "Enhanced".

If it's set to classic, when it searches your computer, it won't actually search your entire computer, just your various libraries like documents, images, videos, and desktop, but nothing else, which completely defeats the purpose of searching! ! We're not done yet, because if you're a more advanced user and sometimes need to search for files and folders in strange places, keep in mind that even with "enhanced" mode, Windows will still exclude many folders from searching, listed below. on the menu. By default, this even excludes the Program Files folder and the AppData folder, which is where most of the configuration files you might want to explore are stored.

So I personally removed the program files and AppData folders from the exclusion list, so it will look for them and keep in mind that there may be more of each if you install programs on multiple drives. All that said, if you're the typical user you probably don't need to worry about all that, just changing the settings to Enhanced is fine. And if you don't know what those disabled folders are, you don't need to change them. Well, number 6, this is a basic privacy setting that you definitely want to change. You can find it in Settings, Privacy, Activity History and then turn off the setting called "Send my activity history to Microsoft." This has to do with the Activity Timeline feature that was added in the update, so this setting wasn't there in my last video on Windows Settings to Change.

As a reminder, there are many other privacy settings in that other video that still need to be changed, so again be sure to watch that video after this one, the link is in the description and will also be at the end. . When we talk about Windows updates, the number 7 is alone in it. These settings can be found in Update & Security, Windows Update, then look for "Change active hours." And here you can set a time of 18 hours every day during which Windows will NOT automatically restart to install updates. I doubt I need to tell you why this is useful, the whole Windows Update restart thing has been a meme since the beginning of time.

And of course, you can always start installing updates manually if you want during this window. Well, in the next few days we will change some settings in File Explorer. So for these, you can open any Explorer window and go to View, Options, Change Folder and Search Options, then View tab. So the next ENABLE setting here is called "Show full path in title bar" , which as the name suggests, does exactly that so that Explorer windows now always show the full directory path, instead of just showing the current folder name. Which I think makes a lot more sense, so you can always know where you are.

The next number is called "Run 'folder windows in a separate process'" and you'll probably want to enable it. This will make it so that every time you start Explorer and open a new separate folder window, that window will have its own process. This way, if you have multiple explorer windows open and one of them freezes, in theory ONLY one will freeze, rather than killing all the others, so if it ends up crashing, or you'll have to kill the process using . the task manager, the others are more likely to be intact, which can save you a lot of trouble.

Ok, the next setting is actually in the "General" tab and is called "Open Explorer in" in the drop-down menu. By default, it's set to "Quick Access," but I think it makes a lot more sense to set it to "This PC," which used to be called "My Computer" in older versions of Windows. Open a new explorer window like on the taskbar, you'll see all your drives and network locations, and it doesn't just show the quick access items, which are still only on the left side, so it was completely redundant! So setting it up like this makes more sense, but obviously if you're really used to it, the other way is optional.

Well, with number 11, this is a short two-part story. Then, look at the top of any browser window and click the drop-down arrow icon, which allows you to customize the quick access toolbar. I suggest NO BREAK where it says "minimize ribbon", so you always have access to that ribbon at the top with all the settings. Obviously this is a preference, but I think it's better to always have all the options there rather than hidden. The other little thing here is to CHECK where it says "retry" so that you also have a redo button at the top of the Explorer window.

Since the undo button is there by default, it only makes sense to have the redo button there if you need it. Okay, before we move on from the configuration file explorer, the additional configuration is important here, it won't count, which I mentioned in the other video, but it's so important to me that it needs to be mentioned here twice. You're back on the View tab in those menu options, and here you want to UNCHECK "Hide file extensions for known file types". I went into more detail in an old video about this, but it ensures that it always shows all files. by their file extensions so you always know which file you are dealing with.

Which is incredibly important. Well, we have a few more and these remaining settings are in Control Panel, which you can access by simply opening the Start menu and searching for Control Panel. As a quick bonus tip, you can right-click this sheet music to pin it to your start menu for easier access later. Anyway, number 12 can be found in Control Panel, then System and Security, then Power Options. Here you will find several different performance profiles and the default value is probably set to "Balanced". But if you're on a desktop that's on all the time, you should probably change this to High Performance so your computer is never throttled.

If you have a laptop, you probably shouldn't set it to high performance unless it's plugged in indoors, because it will drain the battery much faster. It's a curious fact that in some editions of Windows like "Pro for Workstations" and Enterprise, there is even a "Maximum Performance" mode which you can see here, which supposedly squeezes out some more power, but don't worry if you don't. . If you have that, high performance will continue to harness the full potential of your computer. And finally we have number 13, which again can be found in Windows Update, Advanced Options, and then if it is not already disabled, make sure to disable the option called "Restart this device as soon as possible after a reboot is required to install the update", I know it's a mouthful, but it works exactly as it should say.

When enabled, Windows will try to restart immediately after installing an update and will only give it a few minutes to respond and delay, even if you are actively using the computer. So make sure you disable this or you'll never know when Windows Update will appear next. And now we have completed part 2 of Windows Setup to change serial. Again, you really need to watch the first one if you haven't already; Honestly, the setup is even more important than the one in this video. So you can click on this thumbnail to see it here, or I'll also put a link in the description just in case.

Well, thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next video.