MORE TIPS AND TRICKS TO MASTER WINDOWS 10

DISABLE THE LOCK SCREEN 

The Windows 10 lock screen is great if you’re using a tablet, but for

most of us with standard PCs, it’s an unnecessary feature.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a straightforward way of removing it,

but there are a couple of methods that are easy enough even for

the true novice. My favourite one for example goes like this: 

To begin, press and hold the Windows button on your keyboard,

then hit the R key to open the Run dialog. Next, simply type “regedit”

and hit Enter. Next, right-click the Windows folder, then choose

“New” and select “Key.” From here, right-click this newly-created

key and choose “Rename,” then change the name to read

Personalization. When you’re done with that, right-click this

newly-created DWORD and choose “Rename,” then change the

name to read NoLockScreen. From here, double-click the 

NoLockScreen DWORD that you just renamed, then a small window

will pop up. In the “Value data” field of this pop-up, enter the number

 1, then click “OK.” At this point, just reboot your PC, and when you

get back up, you shouldn’t see the superfluous lock screen anymore.

CREATE MULTIPLE DESKTOPS

Start by clicking the Task View button next to the search bar

(or icon) in your taskbar, which will bring up a button in the bottom-right

corner of your screen labelled “+ New Desktop.” Just click this button

to create a second desktop, then click it again to create a third

and so on.

CUSTOMIZE THE START MENU AS YOU PLEASE

You can change the overall appearance of the Start menu by choosing

Settings, then go to Personalization. From there, select the Colours

option to change the background colour of your Start menu. Head to

the Start tab to adjust even more options, such as hiding most used

and recently added apps as well as the folders that appear and more.

CHANGE TITLE BAR COLOUR IN WINDOWS

What should’ve been a no-brainer ended up not being an option,

changing the colour of a window’s title bar. If you’re unhappy with

the drab white, there’s an easy trick you can do to change the colour.

To begin with, visit your update settings and see if build 10525 is

available for download and install. You will have to wait for the

download to install and your system to restore. After that you

will need to head back to Settings and click on Personalization.

Now, make sure “Show colour on Start, Taskbar, and Action

centre” is selected. Choose your colour…Yep you can

finally choose your own colour.

CHANGE THE LOGIN SCREEN BACKGROUND

Windows 10 uses the same “accent colour” used elsewhere on your

desktop. By default, it grabs an accent colour from your desktop

background. To change this, visit the Settings app, select

Personalization, select Colours, and disable the “Automatically

pick an accent colour from my background” option. The colour

you select here will be used on your login screen if you’ve

used the above registry hack.

CHANGE THE DEFAULT SEARCH ENGINE IN EDGE

Bing, unsurprisingly, is Edge’s default search engine, but it doesn’t
have to be. Navigate to another, and if it’s supported, you’ll see

an option to add it to Edge. If a search engine isn’t supported, 

change your search provider, click or tap the menu button, that’s

the button with three dots at the top-right corner of the MIcroosft

Edge window. Select “Settings” in the menu. Scroll down in the

Settings panel and tap or click the “View advanced settings”

button near the bottom. Scroll down again in the advanced

settings list and you’ll see the “Search in the address bar with”

box. Click or tap it and select “Add new.” You’ll see a list of

available search providers. Select the search engine you want

to use and click or tap “Add as default.” If the search engine

you want to use doesn’t appear here, be sure you’ve visited the

search engine’s homepage first. If you have and it still doesn’t

appear, that search engine probably doesn’t support

OpenSearch yet so be patient or pick another one.

ACCESS THE QUICK ACTIONS MENU

To access the Quick Actions menu, simply click the Action Centre

icon in your notification area, which looks a lot like a chat bubble icon.

From there, just click any icon to quickly adjust any of its settings.

ACCESS ALL YOUR APPS IN THE START MENU

Possibly the best thing about having the Start menu back is the ability

to access all your apps from it. All you have to do is just click the

“All Apps” option to see them in an alphabetical list.