If your computer keeps reverting to the Lo ck
Scre en, the screensaver may be the culprit68 2 - 15 October 2019turns the screen back on, but it returns
to the Lock Screen andI have totype
mypassword to log in. It’s annoying to
have tolog in so often. I have tried
changingthe settings, but it still
happens. AmI missing something?
Trevor Cartwright, via email
A
There are several possible causes.
Open Settings, click Systemand
select ‘Power &sleep’. Enter your
preferred length oftimefor the screen
timeout when on battery and mains
power – for example, 10 minutes and 20
This fortnight,Roland has been lookingfor second-hand iPhone bargains from people upgradingto the iPhone 11Ask the ExpertQYears ago, I remember
Explorer having a sort
of filmstrip viewwhen
browsing the Pictures
folder on the hard drive.
The thumbnails were
arranged in the filmstrip
across the bottomand
clicking one showed a
large image above. I don’t see
anythinglike that built into Windows
now. Is there an alternative?
Ben Lightfoot, via emailAExplorer no longer displays that
particular viewbut there’s an
almost identical alternative that is
useful for browsing photos. Click View
in the Explorer menubar to open thePhoto viewermodeGENERAL PCConfigure Explorer to make browsing your photo
collection easier
tab andselect ‘Largeicons’ or‘Extra
large icons’. Click Navigation Pane
and deselect it to hide the sidebar.
Press Alt+Pto open the preview
pane.Position the mouse between the
icons viewandthe preview pane, and
click anddrag it left to increase the
size of the preview pane.The icons
can be sized to look like thumbnails,
making Explorer look like the old
filmstrip viewon its side.minutes. Set the Sleep ti meout to your
preferred settings, too.
Click the ‘Additional power settings’
link to open Power Options in the
Control Panel. Next to the currently
selected plan, click ‘Changeplan
settings’. The display andcomputer
sleep settings should be the sameas
the Settings app, but if they’re not,
changethemyourself.
Click ‘Change advanced power
settings’to open the detailed settings.
Expand the Sleep option, then open
‘Sleep after’ andcheck or changethe
settings. Expand Display, ‘Turn
off display after’ andcheck the
settings. Click the power or
battery icon in the taskbar anddrag the slider all the way to the right
for maximum power.
The problem may be dueto your
screensaver. Open the Settings app,
typescreen saverin the search box
andclick ‘Changescreen saver’ in the
search suggestions. The Blankscreen
saver with aWait timeof two minutes
and‘On resume,display log-on screen’
ticked (see screen grab, belowleft) will
have the effect you describe.To fix this,
set the screensaver to ‘(None)’ andclear
the ti ckbox below.GENERAL PC
Alternatives to snippingQI use the Snipping Tool in Windowsa
lot, but if I runit now, a message tells
meit is moving andI should try Snip &
Sketch instead. I don’t like it as much. Is
there an alternative for capturing parts
of the screen or web pages, marking
themup and saving them?
Sandra Wilson, via emailAThere are many screenshot tools to
choose fromanda popular choice
(1.2 million users, according to the
ChromeWeb Store) is the Chrome
extension Nimbus Screenshot & Screen
VideoRecorder (bit.ly/nimbus485).
LightScreen (lightscreen.com.ar ) is a
great freeapp with lots of options for
capturing screenshots. It’s very
customisable andcan be installed as a
portable app that runsfromanywhere.
Greenshot ( getgreenshot.org) hasn’t
been updated for a few years, but it still
works andis free.Right-click the taskbar
icon to configure it after installing.
Alternatively, keep a WindowsPaint
window open. Press Print Screen to
grab a screenshot, Alt+Tab to Paint and
pressCtrl+V to paste it. You can then
crop it, annotate it andso on.Taking screenshots is simple and you can paste them into Paint to tidy them up