If that sounds unsettling and you’re concerned about your privacy, the good news is you can delete it. In fact, you can listen to all of your voice activities and get a text transcript as well. Google (and virtual assistant technology on other platforms) does this presumably to help improve language recognition and search results. Delete “OK Google” Voice Activity To check out your voice activity, head to Google’s Voice & Audio Activity page....

Being that I rarely use my Mint.com account, today, I decided to delete the account fully. Although Mint.com has a delete account feature, I will demonstrate a more thorough account deleting process to ensure all data is removed from the service. Let’s start by removing all accounts registered with the Mint service. Click Accounts Click Delete under each account. Confirm you want to Delete the account. Once all your accounts have been deleted from your profile, Mint....

The good news is you can customize notifications by using the Focus Assist feature or altogether disable update notifications. The apps you use can also provide select notifications. All these notifications can all end up becoming a bit overwhelming. Something you can do to help fix the problem is disable flashing apps on Windows 11 taskbar. Here’s how to do it. How to Disable Flashing Apps on Windows 11 Taskbar Notifications can be valuable, but they can also be distracting while you are trying to get things done....

If you’re getting a sluggish experience (like 100% disk usage) on Windows 11, you can disable Superfetch without any issues. Disabling Superfetch on Windows 11 might improve the performance of your PC overall. If you’re experiencing a sluggish Windows 11 experience, we’ll show you how to disable Superfetch on Windows 11. What is Superfetch (SysMain)? Superfetch, or SysMain as it’s now called, is a service that runs in the background and analyzes your PC usage....

It looks good, but if you find it’s too dark or aren’t a fan of it, you might want to get rid of it. The initial public build of Windows 10 (10240) did not have a built-in option to disable it. However, some third-party solutions became available. Unfortunately, they did not work as intended. We detailed our experiences trying to use one of them. Thankfully, Microsoft started listening to the complaints and added an option to disable it in the November Update within the Personalization settings....

Download a Windows 10 ISO To download the image file, you’ll need to go to Microsoft’s website. From there, under the “Create Windows 10 Installation Media” section click the “Download tool now” button. That will download the media creation tool. Run the tool and accept the EULA to kick off the wizard. When it starts check “Create installation media…” and click Next. Next, select the language, architecture, and edition of Windows 10 you want to download....

Microsoft Word allows you to format colors and brightness, add borders, crop image sizes, add special effects, and more, so here’s how to do it. While the instructions may vary, these instructions should work for Word 2016 and higher, including Microsoft 365 (formerly O365) and Online. Cropping Images in Microsoft Word There are a few ways to crop an image in Microsoft Word. Start by inserting the image into your Word document (Insert > Pictures) and selecting the image....

Photo Editing On the Go The app is available on iOS ($4.99) and BlackBerry ($3.99), and the Android version is available in the Google Play Store for $4.98. There is also a limited free Lite version for each platform too. The paid Android version, which is the one I’ll be demonstrating for this article, includes a lot more powerful features. It allows you to save print quality images, hundreds of frames, stickers, image layers, and even a meme creator....

You could have a Google Sheet formatted with a calendar template showing your upcoming events you’d like the public to attend. Or if you’re a teacher you could post assignments, details, and due dates in a spreadsheet on your class website. Any time you update the spreadsheet, it’ll automatically get updated on the page. Whatever your need for passing live information to readers, embedding Google Sheets can help. How to Format an Embedded Google Sheet Before you can properly embed a Google Sheet on a website, you need to make sure it’s formatted properly....

that enables Aero Peek previews for all Google Chrome tabs by using a Chrome.exe command line switch. This groovy tweak works with all Google Chrome channels, including the stable, beta and dev releases. Step One Create a shortcut for Google Chrome. If you already have a Chrome shortcut on your desktop or Quick Launch bar, you can use that one. Step Two Right-click the Chrome shortcut and Click Properties....

Log in to your Outlook.com account, click Settings (gear icon) and go to More Mail Settings. Under Managing Your Account, click on Send Automated Vacation Replies. Do note that if you recently registered on Outlook.com, you may have to wait for a few days for this feature to be activated or you can manually verify your account. Click on Verify Account and it will open a new pop where you can add your mobile phone number to verify....

Enable Microsoft Edge Startup Boost To get started, launch Microsoft Edge and click the Options button (three dots) in the upper-right corner of the browser. Then from the menu click on Settings. When Settings opens up click on System from the list on the left side. Then on the right, under the “System” section, turn on the Startup boost switch. That’s all there is to it. Now the next time you launch the browser after closing it or when signing into your device, it should launch faster....

Encrypt External USB Flash Drive Windows 10 Plugin your flash drive (you can do this with an SD card, too) and wait while Windows recognizes it. If AutoPlay comes up, select “Open folder to view files.“ From the Ribbon, select the drive you want to encrypt. Then from the Ribbon, click the Manage tab then BitLocker > Turn on BitLocker. Alternately, you can open This PC, right-click the drive, and select Turn on BitLocker....

Currently, when an update is available for your apps, you will see a notification badge on the App Store icon. You tap the icon and are taken to the Update section of the App Store. There you can update apps individually or all of them in one fell swoop. But with iOS 13, the Updates tab has been removed. Here is a look at where to manually check for updates for your apps from the App Store on iOS 13....

What if you decide that you no longer want to block a specific number, however? You may have blocked a genuine contact by mistake, or accidentally blocked an important customer service number. The good news is that it’s simple to unblock a number once you know how. Here’s how to find blocked numbers on iPhone so that you can unblock them again. How to Find Blocked Numbers on iPhone via Settings There are three different ways you can find blocked numbers on your iPhone....

Whatever the reason is for your missing AirPods, even if it’s just one of them, we’ll show you the steps to find and bring them back as a pair. Provided the AirPod has been paired with your phone, you can use the Find My app or iCloud in any browser to find one lost AirPod using the steps below. How to Find One Lost AirPod A straightforward way to find an AirPod is by using the Find My feature....

With a handy import feature, you can reuse slides from other PowerPoint presentations. And while the in process for using the feature differs slightly when you use Windows versus Mac, it’s still a convenient one. Reuse Slides in PowerPoint on Windows When you import slides from another PowerPoint file on Windows, you can choose which slides to use. For example, you can pick one slide or insert them all. With your current presentation open, go to the Home tab....

This isn’t a bug—this is a feature. Your phone is designed to go blank during calls to stop you from accidentally touching the screen. It’s also a power-saving feature that protects your screen and battery life during long calls. Unfortunately, the feature isn’t for everyone. If you want to know how to keep the screen on during a call on Android, follow the steps below. Why Does My Screen Goes Black During Calls?...

You may sometimes want to use only the main dictionary when spell-checking a document in Word or an email in Outlook. Maybe your custom dictionaries include terms that are not applicable to the current document. We’ll show you how to tell Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Outlook to only use the main dictionary. Word, PowerPoint, and Excel To only use the main dictionary in Word, PowerPoint, or Excel, go to File > Options if you’re in a document....

It’s also a good idea to do this if you’re watching Netflix on multiple devices on the basic package, which only allows one device to watch Netflix at any one time. If you want to control Netflix-watching habits in your family, this would be a good way to do so. Another reason to log out of Netflix on a TV is so others can sign in with their profile. Whatever the reason, here’s what you’ll need to do if you’re unsure how to log out of Netflix on a TV....