Microsoft Support & Discussions
Free PC Help Forum microsoft products support and discussions. If you need help with Microsoft Windows, Windows Server software, Microsoft 365, Microsoft Azure or any other Microsoft product you can post here. If you want to discuss Microsoft and their line of products you can do that here also.
84,928 topics in this forum
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Sprint and RadioShack pen deal to establish 1,750 co-branded stores
by Guest Dan Thorp-Lancaster- 0 replies
- 28 views
After hearing various rumblings on such an agreement in recent days, it looks like Sprint has struck a deal with RadioShack that would see the carrier expanding into 1,750 RadioShack locations. According to the press release, the deal will "establish co-branded stores that will exclusively sell mobile devices across Sprint's brand portfolio as well as RadioShack products, services and accessories." From Sprint: Under the terms of the new agreement, Sprint would effectively operate a store within a RadioShack store, occupying approximately one third of the retail space of each location. Sprint employees will sell mobile devices and plans on all Sprint brands inc…
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Lightroom for iPhone and iPad now lets you make the same edits to multiple photos
by Guest John Callaham- 0 replies
- 32 views
Lightroom, the free photo editing app from Adobe, has been updated for the iPhone and iPad. The new 1.3 version includes some features that Adobe says will make editing images faster, along with a quicker way to find photos. Here's a break down of what's been added and what's been fixed in this 1.3 update: New Features: Edit images faster by copying image adjustments and pasting them onto another photo Easily find your favorite images ! The new Segmented view in Collections gives you a different way to view and engage with your photos. Want to pass your device around the family to look at your photos? With Presentation Mode, you can do that without worryin…
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What you need to know about Photos for OS X
by Guest Serenity Caldwell- 0 replies
- 51 views
Our long national iCloud photo-syncing nightmare is almost over: Apple's put out some new information about Photos for Mac, OS X Yosemite's official successor to iPhoto, and released an early private beta inside OS X 10.10.3 for developers. When can you expect to see Photos arrive on your own computer? What's changed from iPhoto? What's stayed the same? Read on. When is it coming out? Apple's website and marketing materials say "Spring 2015," which technically means any time before June. But we're thinking April sounds like a good target for the official OS X 10.10.3 and Photos app release. That said, you may not have to wait until spring to get your paws…
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New UXKit developer framework identified in Photos for Mac
by Guest Peter Cohen- 0 replies
- 32 views
Apple released 10.10.3 to developers today, offering up the first release of Photos for Mac, the long-awaited replacement for iPhoto. It's not available publicly yet — only to registered developers and others with access to Apple's development builds of OS X Yosemite, at this hour. But something's caught the eye of developers who have downloaded it. Jason Snell, writing for Six Colors: Today Apple dropped Photos for Mac via a developer release, and some developers are reporting signs that Apple has built this new app using something called UXKit, which sits above the Mac's familiar AppKit frameworks and strongly resembles UIKit on iOS. UIKit is a programming fr…
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It will soon be a lot easier to unlock a phone from America's top carriers — here's what...
by Guest Derek Kessler- 0 replies
- 267 views
The top five carriers in the United States will on Feb. 11 implement new unlocking procedures for smartphones, tablets, and other cellular devices sold on their networks. The new unlocking standards were set forth by the CTIA in late 2013 and, though a voluntary commitment by the carriers, define the conditions under which carriers must unlock your devices — and it's all looking good for the consumer. Once you've paid off your phone, you'll probably be able to get it unlocked, and it'll be even easier with future smartphones. Here are the broad strokes of what you need to know: AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular, and Verizon will all adopt these standards …
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New Photos app for Mac beta included in OS X 10.10.3 developer preview
by Guest John Callaham- 0 replies
- 51 views
The all new Photos app for Mac, which Apple first announced and showed off at WWDC 2014, is now available as a developer beta, included in OS X 10.10.3. The new Photos app has been made to replace the current iPhoto software for Mac. Apple has also posted more info on the new Photos app, which will be officially released sometime later this spring. Apple The beautiful all-new design of the Photos app uses Moments, Collections, and Years views to automatically organize your photos and videos by time and location. With dramatically more screen space devoted to your photos, you can easily scan your entire library at a glance and quickly find the content you're looki…
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Microsoft’s ads continue to inspire long after big game – Weekend Reading: February 6th Edition
by Guest Athima Chansanchai- 0 replies
- 58 views
Welcome back to another edition of Weekend Reading, with stories about empowering ads that debuted during Sunday’s big game, a very cool update to Microsoft Research’s Image Composite Editor and how cloud computing is being used to accelerate research that could lead to breakthroughs in treating cancer and other diseases. Football’s biggest game of the year is famous for its commercials, and this year a pair from Microsoft stood out. As a stalwart Seattle fan, it’ll be hard for me to watch the highlight reels from Sunday’s big game for a long time, but two 60-second ads from Microsoft are worth seeing over and over again. One is focused on Estella Pyfrom, 78, who cashe…
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Mail Pilot 2 for iPhone and iPad review
by Guest Allyson Kazmucha- 0 replies
- 38 views
Mail Pilot version 2.0 is now available for both iPhone and iPad and includes a lot of refinements and new features that make your inbox even easier to manage. With the addition of iCloud sync, better gestures, and enhanced navigation, Mail Pilot 2 transforms your emails into individual tasks so you can get things done even faster. If you've used Mail Pilot prior to the new version, you'll still feel right at home. The overall experience is more refined, more mature even. Mail Pilot 2 supports a few different color schemes, all of which are tasteful and beautiful. The most important feature remains easy access to the inbox — you'e only ever one downward swipe away. Y…
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Transformers: Battle Tactics rolls out for the iPhone and iPad
by Guest John Callaham- 0 replies
- 26 views
Transformers: Battle Tactics, the latest game in the long running "Robots in Disguise" franchise, is now available for the iPhone and iPad from the App Store. Players can control teams of Autobots and Decepticons in turn-based combat. The free-to-play game contains a single player campaign plus online multiplayer battles with over 75 Transformers to choose from. Here's a list of its features: Compete in live real-time PVP showdowns with players from around the globe while earning rare TRANSFORMERS characters, valuable resources, and prestige at the top of the leaderboards Collect iconic TRANSFORMERS characters while teaming up AUTOBOT and DECEPTICON characters s…
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Secret Castro gestures for podcast scrubbing, settings, and more!
by Guest Rene Ritchie- 0 replies
- 25 views
Castro, the podcast player app by Supertop, is bold but minimalist by design. It also makes use of gestures for several of its more handy features. If you've been using Castro but haven't poked around enough to find them yet, here's what you need to know. $3.99 - Download now Scrubbing lets you quickly move your way through a show so, at the touch of a finger, you can swipe from the beginning to just exactly the time code you want to listen from. In Castro, you scrub forward by touching and holding the grabber on the bottom left and dragging to the right. You scrub backwards by touching and holding the grabber on the bottom right and dragging left. Combined, t…
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Sci-fi shooter Midnight Star launching worldwide for the iPhone and iPad
by Guest John Callaham- 0 replies
- 26 views
Midnight Star, the free-to-play sci-fi first person shooter from developer Industrial Toys, is now available to download for the iPhone and iPad worldwide. The game got a soft launch in a few countries starting in July before today's wider release. Industrial Toys was founded by Alex Seropian, who previously was a co-founder of Bungie, the creators of the Halo first person shooter series. Here's a summary of the game and its features: Set 120 years into our future, Midnight Star takes players aboard the MSRV-Joplin, a research vessel newly outfitted with military weaponry to explore a mysterious signal coming from within our Solar System. When disaster strikes,…
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Switching to Mac: Translating Windows terminology to OS X
by Guest Peter Cohen- 0 replies
- 25 views
When you switch to the Mac, it can feel disorienting at first. That's especially true if you've used Windows PCs for years. Adjusting to the Mac doesn't take long, but if you're used to finding certain applications, files, and system settings on Windows, it helps to quickly pick up their OS X equivalents. Here's a short glossary with all the essentials. Alt key: The Mac equivalent is the option key, which may be marked alt as well. Close button: The close button on Windows and OS X work very differently. The X, or close button on a Windows app will stop all processes associated with an app. The red close button on the Mac will only close that app's active window. To …
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iOS Help: My keyboard shortcuts aren't syncing after updating to iOS 8
by Guest Allyson Kazmucha- 0 replies
- 24 views
This how-to is part of our iOS Help feature, where every week I try and help you fix the problems you're having with your iPhones and iPads. If you have a question or need help with something iOS related that you just can't figure out, I encourage you to drop a question in our iMore forums or email ioshelp@imore.com! This week's question comes to us from William: My keyboard shortcuts no longer sync with my iPad. Any ideas how to fix this? William, you definitely aren't the only person having issues with keyboard shortcuts, particularly after updating to iOS 8. Whether they're just not syncing or you find them disappearing from a particular device altoget…
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FiftyThree's Paper tools are now free -- draw to your heart's content
by Guest Serenity Caldwell- 0 replies
- 24 views
There are a ton of veritable sketching, drawing, and handwriting apps out and about on the App Store, but the one that holds a special place in my dock is FiftyThree's Paper. The app's won many a convert for its excellent drawing tools, previously encumbered by an $8 in-app purchase; as of Thursday, however, those tools are now completely free for everyone and anyone to scribble to their heart's content. FiftyThree doesn't give detailed reasoning behind its decision, published in a blog post earlier this morning, though the company does note that it hopes to grow its Mix platform and overall usage of the app: At FiftyThree, we built Paper to remove barriers to …
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Sprint scores almost a million new connections in Q3, but the growth comes at a cost
by Guest Rich Edmonds- 0 replies
- 30 views
Following its preliminary publication, Sprint has today shared its final report for Q3 2014. The US carrier managed to bag just short of one million new connections, boasting "significant progress on building a consistent and reliable network". It's not all good news, however. As the recent Super Bowl ad teaser revealed, the company hopes you're watching. First, the good stuff. The report shows the total new connections up 42 percent year-on-year, adding 30,000 postpaid, 410,000 prepaid and 527,000 wholesale (via Virgin Mobile and Boost Mobile brands) customers in the quarter alone. The postpaid gross additions is the highest in three years and 4G LTE coverage has re…
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Apple Retail roundtable: The stores of today and tomorrow
by Guest Serenity Caldwell- 0 replies
- 27 views
April will mark the one year anniversary of Apple's SVP of Retail and Online, Angela Ahrendts, joining the company, and it sounds like the training wheels are off and the retail veteran is ready to start making her mark on the company. Amidst new stores launched and announced, and ongoing rumors of new outfits, new designs, and new areas for the Apple Watch, we decided to put together our own thoughts on Apple Retail, both where it is today and where it looks to be heading tomorrow. On the styling Ren: As a former Apple Retail survivor, I can't help but have an odd fondness for the wooden, glass, and steel architecture of the stores. But I'd be foolish to insist…
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Top hospitals in the US are actively deploying Apple HealthKit pilot programs
by Guest Rich Edmonds- 0 replies
- 30 views
Apple is currently rolling out its HealthKit service, with 14 of the top 23 hospitals polled in the US stating that they are already in the first stages of pilot programs built on the solution. Reuters noted that while Apple is ahead of Samsung and Google in reaching out to hospitals and deploying its health services, hospitals were also eager to try out Google Fit. According to the Reuters report: Apple has recruited informal industry advisors, including Rana and John Halamka, chief information officer of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, to discuss health data privacy and for introductions to the industry. The company said it had an …
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iPhone or iPad out of storage space? Clean it up with the PhoneExpander beta
by Guest Serenity Caldwell- 0 replies
- 33 views
Big iOS updates, bigger app bundles, and 16GB devices have many an iPhone and iPad user tearing their hair out when it comes to doing just about anything. But there's a better way than manually deleting images on your phone or removing apps — it just requires a nearby Mac. We've published a few how-tos on finding storage offenders and removing data from your phone, but on-phone removal can be clunky and frustrating. iTunes is worse: App sync is frustrating and outdated, with the program often hanging or glitching when you least want it to. For those who want a speedier solution, however, there's a new app beta on the block and it's called PhoneExpander. The fre…
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Radio Shack, Apple and the ever-changing face of retail
by Guest Peter Cohen- 0 replies
- 26 views
Reports indicate that Radio Shack, that venerable retail electronics store chain, will soon file for bankruptcy protection. Amazon and Sprint are reportedly interested in acquiring some of the retail locations for their own purposes. It's a sad footnote to a company that holds a dear place in my heart. Meanwhile, Apple retail stores pull in record earnings per square foot. It's an interesting juxtaposition. As a teenage computer nerd in the 1980s, Radio Shack was one of the few retail jobs I could get that didn't bore me to tears. I worked there selling computers, stereo equipment, electronic parts, but mostly giving away batteries to elderly patrons who came in with…
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Apple's Luca Maestri named most admired Fortune 500 CFO
by Guest Dan Thorp-Lancaster- 0 replies
- 31 views
As it turns out, if your company rakes in billions upon billions in profit, you become quite popular in management circles. According to a recent study, Apple CFO Luca Maestri is the "most admired fortune 500 CFO." The survey, which was conducted by Model N, revealed that 24 percent of the C-level executives it surveyed listed Maestri as most admired, with over half of them listing Apple's outstanding performance as the reason for their choice. Maestri was in good company as well, with Walmart CFO Charles Holley and For CFO Bob Shanks following up with 15 percent and 8 percent respectively. This follows up on a breakout quarter for Apple, which saw the company rak…
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Microsoft's buying Sunrise calendar for more than $100 million
by Guest Derek Kessler- 0 replies
- 36 views
Sunrise calendar is getting snapped up by Microsoft for "at least $100 million." The calendar app, which integrates sources diverse as Google Calendar and Trello project management and is available on Android, iOS, OS X, and the web, has carved out a niche for itself on the devices of many users. According to TechCrunch, Microsoft's plans for Sunrise are varied: We've heard Microsoft will keep its apps alive as stand-alone products, while using some of its technology for its own future products. That's similar to what it did with Acompli, which Microsoft acquired for $200 million. Acompli recently relaunched as Outlook on iOS and Android, offering a fully-…
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The arctic adventure game Last Inua makes its way to the Mac for $7.99
by Guest John Callaham- 0 replies
- 30 views
Last Inua, a side-scrolling adventure game that was first released for the PC in December has now made its way to the Mac platform. It's now available on the Mac App Store for $7.99. The game was developed by Glowforth and is being published by Wired Productions. Here's a quick look at its premise: Last Inua is designed for both young and old, mixing classic platform genres as it tells the tale of an Inuit family's fight for survival against a fearsome demon and the harsh Arctic elements. As the demonic trickster Tonrar has awoken to spread his darkness over the north the father and son team of Ataataq and Hiko are the only hope to restore balance in the world.…
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Spoilers vs. spoiled: On Apple beta screenshots and expectational debt
by Guest Rene Ritchie- 0 replies
- 28 views
A few weeks ago, code-divers found the Apple Watch companion app for iPhone lurking within the iOS 8.2 beta. Work-in-progress screenshots were shown off and potential new features revealed. Today, a deeper dive was posted. The two pertinent bits of information there: "work in progress" and "potential". Here's the thing: When it comes to spoilers, we need to make sure we're not the ones who get spoiled. At WWDC 2013, Apple altered the way the iOS beta non-disclosure agreement worked: Traditionally, the NDA slammed a black curtain around its beta testers, from which no light nor sound was allowed to escape. Two years ago, however, Apple lifted many of the restrictio…
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Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today brings the undead to the Mac April 10
by Guest John Callaham- 0 replies
- 31 views
Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today, the first game from Spain-based Fictiorama Studios, will be released via digital download for the Mac, PC and Linux platforms on April 10 for the price of $19.99. Here's the rather morbid storyline summary for the 2D adventure game: In Dead Synchronicity, you play as Michael, a man with no past, who must recover his identity and decode the two events that brought the world to the edge of collapse: the so-called Great Wave, an inexplicable chain of natural disasters, and a pandemic that turned humans into the "Dissolved", infected beings whose sick bodies will eventually dissolve into blood. However, before they die thei…
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FCC Chairman states outright: they plan to classify internet access as a utility
by Guest Derek Kessler- 0 replies
- 26 views
It's official, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler wants to reclassify internet service providers as utility providers under the FCC's Title II authority. The move aims to preserve the principles of net neutrality in law, barring ISPs from blocking, throttling, or prioritizing traffic. Said FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler: "I am submitting to my colleagues the strongest open internet protections ever proposed by the FCC. These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services. I propose to fully apply—for the first time ever—those bright-line rules to mobile broadband. My prop…