Sergey Tkachenko, Author at Winaero

How to enable the Mobility Center on a desktop in Windows 8.1

The Mobility Center application is designed to run on portable devices like laptops and tablets. It allows you to control the screen brightness, change the power plan, toggle the synchronization state of offline files and some other options which can be vary on different devices.

However, on a desktop PC, you will find that the Mobility Center is disabled. It may be of use on a desktop PC as well because it aggregates all the useful settings in one place - for example, the Mobility Center is a very fast way to switch the current power plan or turn off the display. So, it will improve the usability of Windows 8.1. Let's discover how to enable the Mobility Center on a desktop PC in Windows 8.1.

Daily Bing #29 theme for Windows 8

Daily Bing #29

How to get Windows 8.1 installation date

Often, there are times when you may want to know when exactly your copy of Windows 8.1 or Windows 8 or Windows 7 was installed on your PC. It is possible to get this information using built in Windows tools. Read this article to see a simple way to see the age of your Windows OS.

Nature HD#26 theme for Windows 8

How to create a shortcut to Power and sleep settings in Windows 8.1

Power and sleep is a very simple part of the Modern Control panel in Windows 8.1. It is located inside the PC Settings application, in the PC and Devices category. It will allow you to change the screen turn off timeout and the sleep interval.

In Windows 8.1, it is possible to create a shortcut to open those settings directly with one click. Let's create a shortcut to open them directly!

How to take a screenshot in Windows 8.1: three ways without using third party tools

Very often, when I ask users of my apps to take a screenshot in order to troubleshoot issues they are having, they get confused. Some of them do not know how they can take a screenshot which is why I decided to write this article.

Windows 8.1 offers you three different options to make a screenshot without using third party tools. Let's discover them to get the full benefits from the modern Windows version.

How to disable Australis in Firefox and get back the classic interface

Starting next year, on in March 2014, Mozilla is planning to bring the Australis user interface for all Firefox users with version 28 of the browser. While the Australis experience has an attractive look and a unified appearance on all supported platforms, it will reduce many customization features available in Firefox at this moment. For example, tabs will stick to the top and you will not be able to change their location. You will be unable to re-arrange buttons and the addons toolbar will also be gone. With Australis, the appearance of the Firefox browser will be more like Google Chrome's UI.

If you prefer the classic user interface over the new Australis appearance, let's see how to disable Australis in Firefox.

A shortcut to open Windows Update in Windows 8.1

Windows Update is a very important part of any Windows installation. It allows you to keep your OS secure, fresh and safe. With Windows Update enabled you will be able to receive security updates, bug-fixes, updated drivers and Windows apps such as Internet Explorer, service packs and many other useful things.

In Windows 8.1, Windows Update settings are more streamlined and located inside PC Settings. You might wish to create a shortcut to open Windows Update settings directly with one click.

Daily Bing #28 theme for Windows 8

Daily Bing #28

Internet Explorer 11 offline installer direct links (IE11)

Microsoft has released Internet Explorer 11 with lots of improvements. This version has support for Windows 7 SP1 x86, Windows 7 SP1 x64, and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1. However, Microsoft annoyingly shows you only the web installer by default. For those who need the offline installer for any of these OSes, here are direct links to the offline installers of Internet Explorer 11.