Fixes for Some Windows 10 Issues; Info on Text-to-Speech and Lower Cost Mobile Phone Services

If your computer is running Microsoft’s Window 10 operating system, you should be familiar with one of its features called “Windows Update.” In a nutshell, Windows Update helps to keep a computer’s operating system (as well as some computer hardware components and Microsoft software products that may also be installed on your computer) up to date. Unfortunately, Windows Update sometimes gets itself into a state where it stops being able to successfully download and install one or more updates.

If you have a Windows 10 computer that has stopped being able to update properly, I would encourage you to refer to an article titled “How to reset Windows Update on Windows 10 to fix downloads and installs issues.” The article is available on the pureinfotech.com website and provides easy to follow instructions that will guide you through a process that should be able to get your computer’s Windows Update feature working once again. Here’s a link to the article…www.tinyurl.com/y8vjptpa

Is Your Windows 10 Microphone And Camera
No Longer Working in Certain Apps?

Did your computer’s microphone and camera stop working after the Windows 10 April 2018 Update (version 1803) was installed? If so, you’re not alone. Fortunately, there’s a good chance you’ll be able to get things working again as the “problem” likely relates to changes that Microsoft made to your “Privacy” settings during the update process. To learn more about the “problem,” its cause and the remedy, please visit the Windows Report website and review an article titled “Apps can’t access camera/mic on Windows 10 April Update? [FIX].” Here’s a courtesy link to the article…www.tinyurl.com/y9fhoh7q

How to Turn Off/Manage Notifications in Windows 10

If your Windows 10 computer is constantly showing you unwanted notifications, you can do something about it! Managing notifications isn’t difficult once you know how, but it does take a little time to work through things. However, once your notification settings are configured to your liking, you’ll enjoy not being interrupted by as many or any unwanted notifications. To start the process of configuring Windows 10’s notification settings, I would encourage you to browse through a digitaltrends.com article that’s titled “How to turn off notifications in Windows 10.” The article provides easy to follow instructions that should result in you being able to access and manage your notification settings to your liking. For your convenience, here’s a link to the article…www.tinyurl.com/yavpbam6

Speech to Text in Windows 10

If you haven’t tried speech-to-text dictation before, it’s something that you might want to learn more about…and try! Windows 10 comes with a built-in speech-to-text (a.k.a. speech recognition) solution. Becoming proficient with speech recognition is a skill that requires patience, practice and a fair amount of voice command memorization. However, if you’re willing to spend a few minutes (okay, I guess it’ll end up being more than a few minutes) to learn how to set things up, do a little initial voice training and review/practice using some of the most commonly used voice commands, you may be in for a nice surprise. If you can talk a lot faster than you can type, that’s the primary efficiency/value proposition that makes speech-to-text a productivity-enhancing skill. To get started, I would suggest you first read an article on the topic that I recently came across on the digitaltrends.com website. The title of the article is “How to set up speech-to-text in Windows 10” and you can find it here…www.tinyurl.com/y79pzaht

Alternative (Lower Priced) Cell Phone Plans

Are you interested and willing to consider lesser known (mobile) phone services/plans? If so, I came across an interesting article titled “The 8 Best Cheap Cell Phone Plans to Buy in 2018” at Lifewire.com. The article identifies and discusses several lower-cost mobile phone/data plans that may meet your needs. To get to the article so that you can see whether any of the options might be able to meet your needs and save you some money, please visit…www.tinyurl.com/y9wnt2db

Fun With Wi-Fi Network Names (A Little Fun for a Change)

When you create a Wi-Fi network, at some point you give it a name. After you name the network, that name is typically broadcast out (wirelessly) so that others who want to connect to the network can identify/find it. Some people give their Wi-Fi networks creative/funny names. I came across an article titled “200+ Best Funny Wi-Fi Names of Router Network SSID” at alltechbuzz.net. A few examples of funny/creative Wi-Fi network names that are on the list include…” Mom Use This One,” “This LAN Is My LAN,” “Text ###-#### for Password.” If you want to view some more creative Wi-Fi network names visit…www.tinyurl.com/ycd9yrh4

If you have comments, suggestions, tips, questions or just want to say “Hi,” you are invited to contact me at john@johnvrooman.com. I always enjoy hearing from you!

John Vrooman
John Vrooman keeps an eye out for cool new hardware, software, apps, gadgets; SaaS solutions; social media developments, trends as well as personal/SMB productivity and related solutions. He gathers information for his column from a diverse range of resources and he enjoys sharing his discoveries with others. He has been authoring this column since August 2000 and welcomes feedback from his readers.