Activation in Windows is the process of verifying whether the product key used with your copy is genuine or not. If you want to use Windows 7 or Windows 8 without any troubles, your installation needs to be activated. Luckily, the activation process is taken care of in the background, once you provide the product key. But activation can fail for many different reasons. With the help of this article, you should be able to learn in no time if you have problems with the activation of your Windows copy and what those problems are.

Many of you know that Paint is a drawing tool that can be used for simple drawings and basic image editing. Paint has been included in every version of Microsoft Windows, starting with Windows 1.0 which was released in 1985. After more than 20 years of development, Paint reached version number 6.1 in Windows 7 and 6.2 in Windows 8. Even though the version number is different between Windows 7 and Windows 8, the application is the same in both operating systems. But, compared to earlier versions of Windows, Paint has been changed and improved dramatically, after years of stagnation. It finally feels like a basic image editing tool worth taking into consideration.

In this article we will show you where to find Paint, how to work with the new interface and which are the most important options and improvements.

The new Windows Calculator offers more precise calculations than ever and it also has a new and powerful interface. It now integrates the basic standard calculations with programming, scientific calculations and statistics. Beyond this, there are also other features which are very useful: things like mortgage calculation, a multifunctional converter and a few more options which deserve their share of attention. In this article I will present them one by one and also share some possible usage scenarios.

In this article I will show you how to setup Windows 7 and Windows 8 so that it will log you in automatically, without requesting you to type your user account password every time. Even though this tutorial can be found on many other sites, we decided to publish it as well. The problem with other similar guides is the fact that they are not complete and fail to give you all the information you must know. Therefore I will try to guide you through all the steps and share with you all the information you need to know, in order not to deteriorate your computing experience.

Bitlocker Drive Encryption is one of the most popular encryption solutions for Windows users. In Windows Vista and Windows 7 it is made available only in the more expensive editions, which means it is used by a smaller number of people. However, in Windows 8 it will be used a lot more, simply because it is also made available in the more affordable Pro version. In this guide, I would like to show the basics of encrypting your system partition with BitLocker whether you have a TPM chip in your computer or not.

While some users will prefer to install Windows 8 alongside Windows 7 or another version of Windows, others will want to make a straight upgrade and use only Windows 8. For those users, I prepared this step by step guide on how to upgrade to Windows 8. I will also share the requirements you need to consider before going ahead with the upgrade, so that there are no surprises.

Some people sent us messages asking how they can remove the test versions of Windows 8 they installed or even older versions of Windows, such as Windows Vista or Windows 7. It doesn’t matter what versions of Windows you have, the procedure for uninstalling one of them is the same and I will share it in this article. Two scenarios are covered: how to remove one version of Windows when you have multiple installations of Windows on your computer and how to remove Windows when it is the only operating system installed.

Do you want to use the Windows 8 logo as an icon on your computer? Are you interested in using other icons found in the final version of Windows 8? We extracted, converted and packaged together some of the Windows 8 specific icons, in a way that works on all versions of Windows and other non-Microsoft operating systems. Check them out!

As of today, Windows 8 is available through different official channels. And we would like to celebrate this event and share with you three Windows 7 themes that include the wallpapers and high-resolution images bundled with Windows 8. Until you get your hands on Windows 8 you can have your own Windows 8-like desktop in Windows 7.

On the Internet you may find plenty of guides on how to install Windows 8 on your computer but very few guides on how to create a dual boot setup and have it run alongside Windows 7, Windows Vista or Windows XP. That’s why we decided to help users who want to create a multiboot setup and share the steps required to install Windows 8 alongside earlier versions of Windows. Don’t hesitate to read the whole article and save yourself from problems and issues.

The Narrator program, one of several Ease of Access tools, can be used to read aloud text that appears on your screen. This can be useful for people who have vision or language issues and prefer to hear rather than to read. In this article we will go over how to access Narrator, what options it has available, and some basic shortcuts that will make it easier to use.

Everybody knows that installing lots of drivers and software on a computer increases its vulnerability from a security standpoint. As you install stuff, the complexity increases as well as the likelihood of encountering security issues. I always wanted a tool to evaluate how the security of a system evolves while installing software that you plan to use and so far I haven’t found one. Luckily, Microsoft released a free evaluation tool named Attack Surface Analyzer. If you want to learn more about it and how to use it, read this article.