1. Windows 8 Utilities
The
whole point of the new UI, apart from creating a tablet-friendly
interface for Windows, is to reduce and simplify. Thus, the PC Settings
(Control Panel) includes only the options that most people need, most of
the time. There’s nothing in here that anybody could really call an
advanced setting.
That having been said, there are still a couple of items here that
are useful for maintaining and troubleshooting a healthy computer.
The Refresh option is located in the General section under PC Settings,
as illustrated in Figure 1.
It’s very appropriate to discuss Refresh here because it can be used
by an end user to restore Windows 8 to a working copy while keeping
files, apps, software (if a custom image has been set), and Windows
settings intact.
Caution
If you are talking a user through the process of refreshing Windows, be careful to explain to her the difference between Refresh and Reset.
Windows Update section in PC Settings, which is enabled by default in Windows 8, is a very simple affair (see Figure 2). There’s just one button—Check For Updates—and that’s it.
This isn’t all good news, however, because this means that there will
be optional or extra useful updates that users might never see, or
pretty essential upgrades for components or software such as Internet
Explorer or Windows Live Essentials that users might not see for months
until they become mandatory.
However, as a basic way for users to be able to manage Windows Update, I very much doubt that Microsoft could have done a better job of it.
