Each of the following Windows 8 recover methods performs a specific type of operating system reset:

• Refresh
• Reinstall
• Restore

By choosing the according recover method for your particular scenario, you may be able to save yourself some time and also reinstall Windows properly. Here are some tips for using each of the main recover methods.

Refresh – You can refresh without losing your photos, music, videos and other personal files

The Windows 8 Refresh option allows you to refresh Windows while still keeping your personal files and data that you have saved on your PC. As described in Windows 8, here’s what will happen if you Refresh a PC:

Refresh your PC

• Your files and personalization settings won’t change.
• Your PC settings will be changed back to their defaults.
• Apps from the Windows store will be kept.
• Apps you installed from discs or websites will be removed.
• A list of apps will be saved to your desktop.

To Refresh your PC in Windows 8, start by launching the Charms menu and clicking the Settings listing. Next, select the Change PC Settings option.

Scroll down to the General listing and click the Get started button listed under Refresh your PC without affecting your files.

You can also check out my other post on creating your own Windows backup image, which will allow you to install all of your apps and programs, create your image and then be able to restore to that image instead of losing all your programs.

Reinstall – Remove everything and reinstall Windows

The Windows 8 reinstall option allows you to completely reinstall the operating system without having to manually reformat the hard drive and install using a Windows 8 disc or USB drive. When you reinstall Windows 8 using the Reinstall option:

• All of your files, data, apps, programs and Windows settings will be removed. Windows will completely reinstall itself and your PC will be completely revert to a fresh Windows 8 installation.
• No prior PC data or saved data will be transferred to the fresh install.

To Reinstall Windows 8, start by launching the Charms menu and selecting the Settings listing. Select the Change PC settings option from the menu.

Scroll down to the General listing and select it. From the right-side submenu, locate the Remove everything and reinstall Windows option and click the Get started button.

Restore – Restore Windows from an Earlier Time (System Restore Point)

The Windows 8 Restore option allows you to restore, or roll back Windows to an earlier time when a System Restore point was created. This option reverts Windows to the state of the System Restore point. Here are a few details of how the Restore option operates:

• System restore does not affect any of your documents, pictures or other personal data.
• Recently installed programs and drivers might be uninstalled.

Read my post on how to enable/disable and use System Restore. To restore Windows 8, start by launching Control Panel. From the Control Panel, scroll down to the Recovery listing and click to select it.

From the Recovery window, select the Open System Restore option.

This will launch the System Restore panel, where you can select a System Restore point to revert Windows to.

Those are the three main ways to recover the operating system in Windows 8. Also, check out my other post on how to clean install Windows 10. Enjoy!

The fact is, many people will be updating their operating systems to Windows 8 later this month and many won’t. Windows 8 has been the primary focus of many tech blogs for the last few months, and many critics have dubbed Windows 8 as a flop; following Microsoft’s pattern of inconsistency, releasing a quality operating system, then a poor operating system:

• Windows XP (considered to be a solid OS)
• Windows Vista (considered to be a crappy OS)
• Windows 7 (considered to be a solid OS)
• Windows 8 (not even officially released yet, but is being considered to be a crappy OS)

With the tech critics and many others casting judgment on Windows 8’s new metro interface and other non-traditional features, many consumers may be a bit cautious about making the jump to Windows 8. However, I believe that the underlying factor of all of this criticism towards the new OS is simple… Windows 8 is different, so it comes off as an operating system that is complicated or difficult to understand. Additionally, using Windows 8 requires a slight learning curve and some change; most people do not like change and are creatures of habit.

With that noted, the best way to tell whether or not Windows 8 is an operating system that you will like is to simply download the Release Preview, so that you can try out the next gen OS for yourself. Still not sure whether or not to make the jump to Windows 8? Here are some tips that may be of help.

Windows 8 features a non-traditional Start Menu (Metro Interface)

Actually, Windows 8 has a start screen… Dubbed the Metro Interface, which is tablet friendly. Windows 8’s new Start Menu is the single most controversial (hated and loved) feature of the new operating system. Many criticize the new metro interface as being too tablet optimized for use on a PC computer, but I don’t find it quite as hideous as many critics make it out to be. It’s different, and it does take some getting used to, but after you use it for a month or so, you may come to like the Windows 8 Metro feature.

Because the Windows 8 Metro UI replaces the traditional Start Menu, you will find yourself utilizing Windows Explorer a lot more, to navigate to file directories and other PC paths. This is not a new feature that wasn’t around in Windows 7, but I for one, never used Windows Explorer in Windows 7, because the Start Menu was there and I simply preferred that. In Windows 8, you will definitely use Windows Explorer.

So, the Start Menu is gone and you now navigate to paths and directories in Windows using Windows Explorer. To launch apps and programs, you use the Metro UI. However, if you simply can’t use Windows without a Start Menu, you can add it back! The following add-ons can add the traditional Start Menu to Windows 8:

• Start8
• Power8

So, if you can add the traditional Start Menu to Windows 8… maybe the switch wouldn’t be too bad… considering Windows 8 has some other new features that you might like, which we will get to later!

Windows 8 being great for tablets, but not for enterprise or productivity…

When I initially started using Windows 8 and was just getting accustomed to the new operating system, I would have agreed with that statement. Without the traditional Start Menu, the home screen can be quite distracting. In tablet environments the Metro interface is sweet, but in an enterprise or productivity environment, one could care less about the visual appeal of the Metro UI… the traditional Start Menu is more productive, as it can be used to access apps, folders, files, and basically any path in Windows.

However, once learned and adapted to, 8’s Metro UI can actually be quite snappy. You just have to get accustomed to it. Need to launch an app quickly from the desktop, but don’t want to have to launch the Start Screen to get to the app? Simply attach it to the desktop’s taskbar.

Windows 8’s Metro UI could also be very beneficial in enterprise environments, but for that, program and app developers will need to get busy updating their apps to be Windows 8 friendly, incorporating live tile support, full screen app support, etc…

Here’s an example: If you were considering using Windows 8 in a IT business model or enterprise environment with updated and current apps, it may go something like this:

Of course, you would need to have all of your company’s apps updated to Metro UI compatibility. If the above screenshot included live tiles with status updates, it could be very beneficial in a IT business’s enterprise environment, even more so than the standard Windows 7 desktop.

Control panel interfaces tend to do great in enterprise as is, so with all of your company’s apps updated to Windows 8 compatibility, you could utilize the Metro UI as a main control panel, easily customizable to be specific for each department of your business.

Windows 8 for Consumers

While enterprise use is directed towards productivity, consumer use is more for fun and simplicity. Windows 8 does a great job of that as is, if you can get accustomed to the metro interface. Full screen apps in Windows 8 are cool, and the new apps in the Microsoft Windows 8 store, along with more Xbox compatibility, makes for a more fun PC consumer experience!

Should You update to Windows 8

As mentioned, the best way to go about Windows 8 updating is to try the free Release Preview first, then decide. However, I would recommend that you don’t use the new OS for a few days and then disregard it as being too different. Use Windows 8 for a month or so, then try out Windows 7. Which one do you prefer at that point? Remember, Windows 8 is only priced at $40.00 USD for an upgrade.

I believe that Microsoft has been bold in creating an OS like Windows 8. They have decided to make a major move and to do something different with this OS. I will be updating all of my PCs to Windows 8 because I like the new improvements that Windows 8 offers throughout, such as the new Windows Explorer Ribbon and the speed of the OS.

Even if you can’t stand the new Metro Interface, you can simply disable it using some online tutorials or regain the traditional Start Menu. From there, you can utilize the other updates to Windows that you may like, such as the new Windows Explorer, instant-boot and other technologies, while not being bothered by the Metro UI.

Thank you for stopping by the site for today’s post. Will you be updating to Windows 8? Or is Windows 7 still the better choice? Let us know in the comments!

It would give me an error saying Windows Media Player encountered a problem while downloading the playlist, whatever that means. However, for some reason, by default Windows 8 would try to open the video file in Windows Media Player every time. I had to manually keep right-clicking on the files and choosing Open With to use the Video app.

In this article, I’ll quickly go over how you can change the default video player and photo viewer in Windows 8. By default, the Photos app in Windows 8 will open most picture files, but if you want to use a different program, you’ll have to manually go change it.

Change Default Video Player in Windows 8

The easiest way to change the default program for a video file is to right-click on the video file, click on Open with and then click on Choose default program.

You can then pick the app from the list or click More options if the program you want to use is not listed. This is the easiest method for changing the default program for one particular file type, but if you want to change the default player for all video file types, for example, this would be very time consuming.

Instead, you can go to Control Panel and click on Default Programs.

Then click on Set your default programs.

Scroll down the list until you get to Video and it’ll tell you how many defaults are set to that app or program.

Go ahead and click on Choose defaults for this program and you’ll be able to see exactly which files types are associated with which program in Windows 8.

As you can see, the .m2ts files had Not selected set as the current default. If you want the current program to open the files, just check the box and then click the Save button. This will then associate the current program with that file type. So if you wanted to change from using Windows Media Player, you would check the box and then click Save.

For Photos or any other app, it’s the same procedure. Click on Photos to see what files are set to open with the program by default and check or uncheck depending on which program you want to use.

If you want a different app to open photos, go to the defaults for that app and then check the boxes for the files types you want to open automatically using the other app. For example, if I wanted Windows Photo Viewer to open photos, then I would go to it’s defaults and check all the boxes for the file types it supports.

That’s about it! You can easily control which files are opened with which programs using the Default Programs feature in Windows 8. Enjoy!

Note: Microsoft has removed all gadgets from Windows 8.1 and Windows 10. If you want gadgets back, you have to install them using a third-party tool. The one we recommend is 8GadgetPack. It’s virus, malware and spyware free. Also, a better option than gadgets is Rainmeter. 

Unfortunately, there is no official Microsoft gadget gallery for Windows 8. By default, there are 8 gadgets that come built-in with Windows 8:

Those gadgets are Calendar, Clock, CPU Meter, Currency, Feed Headlines, Picture Puzzle, Slide Show, and Weather. If you want more gadgets, you can search for them online, download and install them, but they could contain malware or spyware, so you have to be careful.

To install a desktop gadget in Windows 8, first open the Control Panel and then click on Desktop Gadgets.

Then simply right-click on the gadget you want and choose Add.

Now your gadget will appear in the right-hand side of the screen like it did in Windows 7:

For those of you who have been using Windows 8 for a while, you might be wondering what happens if you snap a Metro app to the right-side of the screen and also have a desktop widget installed? Well, this is what it would look like:

Basically, Windows 8 moves the widget over to the left side of the snapped Metro app. I thought it would mess up somehow and either not display the gadgets or do something else, but luckily they thought about this and you can see both at the same time. So if you have a monitor that supports some ridiculous resolution and you have the extra space, you can run a few gadgets and snap Metro apps to your desktop without a problem. Enjoy!

The process of adding a Windows 8 machine to a Windows 7 homegroup is pretty easy. First, open the Charms bar by pressing Windows Key + C or hovering the mouse over the top-right corner of the screen. Then click on Settings.

Next, click on Change PC Settings at the very bottom.

Now go ahead and click on HomeGroup in the left-hand pane:

Now make sure that at least one Windows 7 computer is turned on that is joined to the homegroup. You also have to make sure that both of the computers are on the same network. In Windows 8, it will automatically search for a homegroup on the local network. You’ll see a screen like this saying “A homegroup is available” and a place to enter the homegroup password.

Once you type in the password, you’ll see a list of toggle switches where you can turn on and turn off what you want to share on your Windows 8 PC.

You can also choose whether or not you want your content to be streamable to TV’s or game consoles like the xBox and PlayStation. That’s pretty much it! Now you can easily access data between your Windows 7 and Windows 8 machines without any technical know-how. If you’re having problems connecting to a homegroup or the homegroup is not showing up, post a comment and I’ll try to help. Enjoy!