Welcome to another edition of Defragg, your curated tech newsletter packed with tips, productivity hacks, retro games, and a sprinkle of humor. This week, we’ve got some fantastic PC tips, a clever iPhone night-time hack, a tool to speed up your workflow, classic screensavers, and more. And if you’re looking for some downtime, we’ve got a way for you to play the classic Strike series games right in your browser—completely free. Ready? Let’s dive in!
Tech Tips
11 Steps to Fully Remove Malware (By an IT Pro) – When Jamie and I ran our IT services business, we frequently dealt with computers infected by malware. To thoroughly clean them and restore their performance, we always followed a specific set of steps. In this guide, we’ll walk you through the exact process we used to effectively remove malware and ensure the system runs smoothly again.
5 Ways to Stop Windows Update From Rebooting Your PC – Windows Update can be a pain. Rebooting for updates is one thing — but a forced reboot for updates that shut down your running applications when you’re trying to get work done? Now, that’s obnoxious.
How to Upgrade Your ‘Incompatible’ Windows 10 PC to Windows 11: Two Ways – Microsoft just added another roadblock, but we’ve got a new workaround. Here’s how you can bypass the latest restrictions and safely upgrade your Windows 10 PC – for free.
Tool of the Week
Photopea (Free Online Photo Editor) – Photopea is a free, online photo editing tool that works right in your web browser, so you don’t need to download or install anything. It has many features similar to Adobe Photoshop, making it a great choice for editing photos or creating designs. You can open and edit different types of files, like PSD, PNG, and SVG. Since it’s free, Photopea is perfect for students, freelancers, and anyone looking for a powerful editor without having to pay for expensive software.
Quick Tips
How to Record Your iPhone Screen
1. Add Screen Recording to Control Center:
- Open Settings, tap Control Center, then tap the green + next to Screen Recording.
2. Start Recording:
- Swipe down from the top-right (or up from the bottom on older iPhones) to open Control Center.
- Tap the Screen Recording button (circle icon). A 3-second countdown will begin.
3. Stop Recording:
- To stop, open Control Center and tap the Screen Recording button again, or tap the red bar at the top and select Stop.
4. Find Your Recording:
- The recording will be saved in the Photos app.
Productivity
Listary Tips & Tutorial: A Better Windows Search Tool – Windows Search is often slow and unreliable, struggling with incomplete names and long indexing times. Listary solves these issues with instant results, even for partial names, and learns your habits to prioritize frequently used files. Its Quick Switch feature also lets you move between folders quickly, making it a far better option for boosting productivity.
Life Hacks
Dim Your iPhone More Than “Brightness” Setting With a Simple Triple-Click (Great for Nighttime Reading) – A bright phone screen can be both useful and frustrating. It’s helpful in bright sunlight but harsh in a dark bedroom, especially if your spouse is sleeping nearby. While Night Shift and brightness controls help, they often aren’t enough. This article will show you two ways to dim your screen further and easily activate them with a triple-click of your iPhone’s Home button.
Nostalgia
The History of Screensavers (Do You Remember These?) – Rediscover the screensavers that defined early computing and why they still hold a special place in geek hearts and tech history. From After Dark’s Flying Toasters to Windows’ 3D Maze and Underwater scenes, these quirky creations turned idle screens into digital art.
2004 Was the First Year of the Future – A week’s worth of stories about the future, as we lived them in the past.
Retro Gaming
Play the Strike Series Games for Free – Remember the Strike series, where you could fly a helicopter, destroy enemy bases, and save hostages? Did you know you can still play these classic games online today? In this article, we’ll look at each game in the series and show you how to play them now. Get ready to relive the action!
Tech News
The Internet Archive Is Back as a Read-Only Service After Cyberattacks – The Internet Archive is back online in a read-only state after a cyberattack brought down the digital library and Wayback Machine last week. A data breach and DDoS attack kicked the site offline on October 9th, with a user authentication database containing 31 million unique records also stolen in recent weeks.
FTC Finalizes Rule That Makes It Easy to Cancel Unwanted Subscriptions – Companies will soon have to make it as easy to cancel a subscription as they made it to sign up for one under a new Federal Trade Commission rule aimed at ending predatory business practices that lock consumers into paying for services they don’t want.
Microsoft Warns Nation-State Hackers, Ransomware, DDoS Attacks on the Rise – Microsoft says its customers face 600 million cyberattacks daily—and has found that ransomware attacks and tech scams are on the rise, as are attacks by nation-state hackers.
Windows 11 24H2 Update Comes With 8.6GB Junk File You Can’t Delete – Some Windows 11 users noticed that after updating their PCs, System > Storage > Temporary files shows a “Windows Update Cleanup” cache that’s 8.63GB in size. “The update cleanup file is not getting deleted no matter how many times I remove it,” one Windows 11 user explains. “I even tried restarting.” Using Microsoft’s Disk Cleanup tool doesn’t seem to remove the file, either, according to multiple users.
To Offer Gigabit Speeds, SpaceX’s Starlink Makes New Push For 30,000 Satellites – SpaceX is making a new push to receive regulatory clearance to operate nearly 30,000 Starlink satellites in Earth’s orbit. The company is making the request to the US Federal Communications Commission as part of an effort to upgrade the Starlink network to deliver gigabit speeds to users.
This Week in Tech History
- Creator of Ruby on Rails David Hansson born (Oct 15, 1979)
- Nintendo Entertainment System released in North America (Oct 18, 1985)
- The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) launched (Oct 17, 1990)
- Mosaic Netscape 0.9, the first Netscape browser, officially released (Oct 13, 1994)
- Computer game Age of Empires released (Oct 15, 1997)
- Yelp launched (Oct 13, 2004)
- Acer completes $710M acquisition of Gateway (Oct 17, 2007)
- iPhone 4s released (Oct 14, 2011)
- Windows 8.1 and Internet Explorer 11 released (Oct 17, 2013)
Bytes of Insight
“The real danger is not that computers will begin to think like men, but that men will begin to think like computers.” – Sydney Harris (Journalist)