allheart55 Cindy E

I've never had a problem with the programs, just the drivers. :D Learn something new every day. :D

I've never gotten a 32 bit driver to work on a 64 bit OS, Rich.

In less than two weeks, Microsoft will begin revealing information about the Windows Technical Preview, the first pre-release look at the next version of Windows. The actual Preview won't be out until October, I'm told. But there's no reason to wait: Here's what you're going to see. Obviously, a lot of information about the Windows Technical Preview has leaked already. But information I believe to be truly new is bolded below so you can find it more easily. The current build is 9841. I'm not sure if this is the exact build of the public Technical Preview. Start menu Microsoft is bringing back the Start menu in the new Windows. But this isn't the old Windows 7 Start menu, it's a new and enhanced version that combines functionality from the Windows 7 Start menu with some features we saw in the Windows 8.x Start screen. You get to the Start menu the same way as before: Just press the Start key on your keyboard or click the Start button on the Windows taskbar. You can pin items like desktop applications, Modern apps, folders and contacts to the Start menu. Pinned items appear on the right side of the menu as tiles, and you can resize individual tiles and position them as you wish, as with today's Windows 8 Start screen. You can even resize the Start menu itself. The left side of the Start menu works much like it does in Windows 7: There's a most recently used (MRU) list, an All Apps link, and a Search box. Above these items are two new items: Your user account name, which you can click to access an account menu, and a power button that triggers a power management menu; both look and work like the similar menus on today's Windows 8.1 Start screen. If you would prefer to the use the touch-friendly Start screen (from Windows 8.x) you can do so: Open Navigation properties (with Search) and then click the Start menu tab and select "Use the Start menu instead of the Start screen." Click OK. Apps Like Windows 8.x, the Windows Technical Preview comes with Modern mobile apps for photos, music, movies, email and more, and you can of course use the Windows Store to find more. Store is unchanged from Windows 8.1. You can pin a favorite app to the Start menu—or to the Start screen, if that's what you prefer to use—by opening the All Apps item in the Start menu (or by navigating to Apps from the Start screen), right-clicking the app, and choosing "Pin to Start" from the pop-up menu that appears. Modern mobile apps now run in floating windows on the desktop. These windows include a new Options button ("...") to the right of the window control button that provides app commands (which vary by app), plus system commands that used to be part of Charms. These include Search, Share, Play, Print, Project, Settings, and Full Screen, the latter of which toggles the app between floating window and full-screen views. The Windows Technical Preview runs the same apps that work with Windows 8.1. Any app you install in the Windows Technical Preview can run in Windows 8.1 and vice versa. To switch between running apps, you can use the new Task view button on the taskbar. This view is used to create custom desktops (i.e. virtual desktops) within which you can group apps for productivity, entertainment, software development, or whatever you prefer. Once you create an addition desktop, you can use the Task view button to switch between these desktops as well. You can also use Task view to position apps into snapped views. Just drag the app thumbnails to the correct positions onscreen. Files File Explorer has been improved again in the Windows Technical Preview and includes a new Home location that is the new default view. From Home, you can access your favorite folders, most recently used folders, and recent files, and from any File Explorer view you can access Home, Favorites, OneDrive, This PC and Network from the navigation bar as in Windows 8.1. OneDrive integration is identical to that in Windows 8.1. A prominent new Share button on the Share tab in File Explorer works like the similar button in Windows Phone, allowing you to share selected items using compatible Modern mobile apps. Personalization PC Settings looks and works much like that in Windows 8.1, and more advanced settings are still accessed from Control Panel. Feedback Microsoft has created a new Windows Insider Preview Program so that users can get more frequent preview builds and provide feedback to the company. Once you've signed up, you can use the Windows Feedback app to navigate through a menu of top-level choices (Recent Applications, Apps and Windows Store, Hardware and Devices, Download and Install, Internet Explorer, and so on) and then fine-tune it further (Mail, Maps, Messaging, Movie Moments, Music, etc.). You can search to see whether other Insiders have given similar feedback, add more details to that feedback, or start your own, adding text and screenshots as needed. Microsoft will even trigger Windows notification toasts to ask you for feedback as you use Windows. These notifications are triggered by specific events

I like Internet Explorer, I teethed on it beginning with IE4. It has everything I want or need and with the proper layered security for protection, I have never been infected. (Except when I have deliberately set out to be for testing purposes.)

Microsoft is busy preparing a "Windows Technical Preview" for later this month, but the software maker is also privately testing an "Office Technical Preview" for the next version of its popular Office suite. Sources familiar with Microsoft’s Office plans tell The Verge that the company has been distributing copies of a future version of Office to partners and testers recently, providing an early look at new features. While testing is in the early stages, we understand Microsoft is adding the "Tell Me" helper found in its Office Online apps to the desktop versions. Tell Me sits at the top of documents as a type of help and search tool. It’s similar in function to Clippy, providing a quick way to discover features and ask questions without digging into the vast help documentation found in Office. There’s no animated character like Clippy, just a simple bulb icon to indicate its presence in documents. Asking questions like "how do I insert images?" will bring up relevant features and additional help. It’s mainly a tool to help Office users discover the vast amount of features that are available across all the individual apps. A new black theme was the number one request for Microsoft Office. Microsoft’s Office Ribbon is still present, and there are no major user interface changes just yet. Microsoft has, however, added a new black. We’re told that the black theme was the number one feature request for Office 2013 — likely because it existed in Office 2010 — and Microsoft is seeking feedback on its implementation to tweak any areas that are too bright. It’s an unusual look for Office, but if you’re used to regularly working in documents then it appears to be easier on the eyes than the white theme. The black theme isn’t default, it’s just an option for Office users alongside the light gray, dark gray, and white themes. Microsoft Office 16 screenshots Other new features include automatic image rotation, allowing Microsoft to use camera metadata to correctly position images in Office documents. Once pictures are inserted, Office will automatically rotate a picture to match the camera’s orientation, with options to manually rotate afterwards. Microsoft is also improving its Outlook email client with sync options to just download 1 day, 3 days, 7 days, or 14 days of email. In the existing version of Outlook you can only download a minimum of one month of email, so the new option will improve any space issues on Windows laptops and tablets with limited storage. The majority of Microsoft’s improvements in what is known as "Office 16" are fairly minor changes. This next version of Office should set the schedule and the ability for Microsoft to regularly update Office 365 with new features, improvements, and fixes. That was the promise of a subscription version of Office, and it appears Microsoft is planning to deliver that for its desktop users.

You're welcome, Mike! :D

No, Drivers designed for 32-bit versions of Windows don't work on computers running 64-bit versions of Windows. Drivers designed for the 64-bit version of Windows don't work on computers running a 32-bit version of Windows. See : http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/32-bit-and-64-bit-windows#1TC=windows-7

Why not just bookmark the sites you want to keep, N3? Wouldn't that be easier?

No, Mike, it's not okay. The 64 bit drivers won't even install on a 32 bit system. :help:

Makes sense to me. :big_grin:

:D All of my keyboards and mice are wireless. I hate cords! :D

Glad to hear it, Mike.

Let us know how you fare, Mike.

You have to highlight or select the drive in the upper window in order for the delete and format options to be available.

Boot to the Windows DVD and after you reach the license agreement click on the Custom or Advanced tab. Click the Drive Options or Advanced tab and Select Format. See screenshot....

Oh, you want to format it using a Windows disk?

I would strap the hard drive to another computer and format it from there.

Right-click computer > Manage > Disk Management. In the DM Window (At the bottom) select the drive you wish to format. Right-click the drive select Format > NTFS > Quick. See screenshot.

Well, the invite has finally arrived, and as expected, Microsoft will discuss what's next for Windows at a press and analyst event in San Francisco on September 30. This event will be enterprise-focused, as rumored, Microsoft told me. Here's the invite. There's not much to say yet, beyond a few tidbits: Chapter 2. If you think of Build 2014 as Chapter 1 for the next Windows, you can think of this event as Chapter 2. There will be more chapters, so to speak, and what we see on the 30th won't be everything that's in the next Windows. Not consumer focused. More specifically, this event is not focused on consumer features. Presumably, that will be saved for a consumer event. What's next for Windows. No mention of Windows 9 per se. It's "the next Windows" and the event is about "what's next for Windows." Not a product launch. The next Windows is happening later—April 2015, unless something has changed. So this isn't a launch. Just the next step. The usual suspects. This event will be led by Terry Myerson and Joe Belfiore.

Yay! Thanks, Bob. I hate not having TechNet anymore.

One good, one bad. This is the pattern many associate with new versions of Windows and with good reason: 1995 – Windows 95 – Good 1998 – Windows 98 – Bad 2000 – Windows 2000 – Good 2000 – Windows ME – Bad 2001 – Windows XP – Good 2007 – Windows Vista – Bad 2009 – Windows 7 – Good 2012 – Windows 8 – Bad Needless to say they are oversimplifications (I like a lot about Windows 8) but history suggests Windows 9 should be good and I’m happy to say a flurry of highly promising new leaks give us hope that this will be the case. Let’s break them down: User Interface – Return of the Start Menu Screenshots of the new Windows 9 start menu appeared last month and now a two minute video courtesy of German site WinFuture has shown it in action thereby all but confirming its welcome return. The big news is the slick integration of the traditional start menu seen in Windows 7 with the controversial Modern UI. Interestingly Microsoft MSFT-0.88% also looks set to give users the option to toggle between using the start menu or the Modern UI screen as used by Windows 8. Many will say they can’t see much adoption of the latter, but for those with touchscreen laptops and tablets it will be an appealing option and one that shows Microsoft rightly isn’t doing a complete U-turn on the innovations it introduced in Windows 8. Multiple Desktops This is a big one – both in terms of usefulness and finally catching up to rivals. The ability to open, close and quickly switch between multiple virtual desktops has long been a part of Linux and Mac OS X and WinFuture has also has a video of this working on Windows 9 (above). Unsurprisingly the interface is similar to both Linux and Mac OS X which will no doubt lead to taunts from fans of those platforms, but with portable laptops driving PC sales the ability to better utilise the precious real estate on smaller screens is vital. New Notification Center Concluding a hat-trick of scoops, WinFuture has also published a video showing a new notification center. It works in conjunction with the alerts posted by Modern UI apps and it groups apps, system and hardware alerts all in one place. The video shows the notifications have little interaction at present (you can’t reply to Skype messages directly, for example) and acts more like a list of shortcuts. That said there is plenty of time for Microsoft to add greater functionality and offer it to third party developers. GoFone with only ‘Windows’ branding – image credit: My Go microsite Name Change It may only be semantics, but recent Microsoft promotional ads also imply that the company is planning to ditch the numerical Windows naming as well as the Windows Phone branding and unify everything simply under ‘Windows’. This is backed up by the My Go microsite for the ‘GoFone’ which shows the first ‘Windows’ branded smartphone. The GoFone still references Windows Phone 8.1 in the technical specifications, but leaked shots of its rear reveal only ‘Windows’ is printed on its back. While potentially confusing, unifying the Windows brand should prove a wise move. Microsoft has almost finishing unifying the platforms’ respective app stores so the line continues to blur between the Modern UI and Windows Phone. GoFone without Windows Phone branding Availability Microsoft remains silent as we near the middle of September, but it is still widely expected that a Technical Preview will be made publicly available to users before the end of the month. September 30 is the date ringed in many calendars and if Microsoft can deliver on the promise of these leaks we may finally have the operating system the company craves to finally drag users away from Windows XP and Windows 7. ___

Multiple users of anonymous web browser Tor have reported that Comcast has threatened to cut off their internet service unless they stop using the legal software. According to a report on Deepdotweb, Comcast customer representatives have branded Tor "illegal" and told customers that using it is against the company's policies. Tor is a type of web browser that, in theory, makes all your internet activity private. The software routes traffic through a series of other connected internet users, making it difficult for governments and private companies to monitor your internet usage. Up to 1.2 million people use the browser, which became especially popular after Edward Snowden leaked information showing that the NSA was eavesdropping on ordinary citizens. Prior to that, Tor had been popular among people transacting business on Silk Road, the online market for drugs and hitmen. The problem is that downloading or using Tor itself isn't illegal. Plenty of people might have legitimate reasons to want to surf the web in private, without letting others know what they were looking at. But Tor has been pretty popular with criminals. Comcast has reportedly begun telling users that it is an "illegal service." One Comcast representative, identified only as Kelly, warned a customer over his use of Tor software, DeepDotWeb reports: Users who try to use anonymity, or cover themselves up on the internet, are usually doing things that aren’t so-to-speak legal. We have the right to terminate, fine, or suspend your account at anytime due to you violating the rules. Do you have any other questions? Thank you for contacting Comcast, have a great day. Comcast customers, speaking to Deepdotweb, claimed that Comcast repeatedly asked them which sites they were accessing using Tor. In a statement to Business Insider, Comcast refuted the claims made in Deepdotweb, stating that they had launched an internal review into the discussions reported above: Customers are free to use their Xfinity Internet service to visit any website or use it however they wish otherwise. Like virtually all ISPs, Comcast has an acceptable use policy or AUP that outlines appropriate and inappropriate uses of the service. Comcast doesn’t monitor users’ browser software or web surfing and has no program addressing the Tor browser. he anecdotal chat room evidence provided is not consistent with our agents’ messages and is not accurate. Per our own internal review, we have found no evidence that these conversations took place, nor do we employ a Security Assurance team member named Kelly. Tor’s own FAQs clearly state: 'File sharing (peer-to-peer/P2P) is widely unwanted on Tor' and 'BitTorrent is NOT anonymous' on Tor. Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/comcast-threatens-to-cut-off-tor-users-2014-9#ixzz3DOhUPdhO