Anyone know how to do this in Windows 10?

This is what I want to see when I right-click on the "Notepad" tile.

This is what I want to see when I right-click on, say, the “Notepad” tile.

I got a new laptop right after Christmas — my old one was running slower and slower — and it’s great, but I’m still figuring out a few things on it.

That’s mainly because the new one runs on Window 10, but also because this is my first Asus machine, and it does some things slightly differently from a Dell or an HP.

Over the weekend, I finally figured out how to turn off the touchpad when a mouse is in use — those things drive me nuts; the heels of my hands are always touching them and causing my cursor to do something bizarre and occasionally causing me to lose everything I’ve typed (don’t ask me how). And sometimes, CTRL+Z doesn’t bring it all back, at which point the Urge to Kill arises…

Anyway, that’s fixed. And fixed better than on my old laptop. On that one, I just had to turn it off. On this one, in an emergency when my mouse stops working, the touchpad should reactivate. A bit redundant since this has a fancy-schmancy touch screen, but nice to know.

Here’s my latest question, and I’m tired of Googling for an answer, so I’ll see if any of y’all know…

I had the foresight to install Windows 10 on my old machine several weeks ago, to see if I could stand it (I’d heard so many horror stories about 8). If I could not stand it, I was going to order a machine with Windows 7 online (you can’t get them in stores anymore, and I was determined to buy at Best Buy this time, so I wouldn’t have to FedEx my laptop to the other side of the world when something goes wrong with it).

And after about three weeks with it, I decided this was a system I could work with. There were still some things that are ridiculously irritating, such as the fact that you can’t decide what will appear in the vertical list that pops up on the left-hand side of the screen when you hit the Windows Start key.

But you can work around that by putting them in the tiles over to the right. And I found that was just as good as having them in the list on the left, because you could right-click on the tile and see all recent files used in that application. Which is nice.

Trouble is, that doesn’t happen when I right-click on the tiles on my new machine. I just get three or four options such as “Unpin from Start.” I don’t know why it works on the old machine; I didn’t do anything to make it do that; it just does it.

I know there’s some really, really simple setting change that will fix this (maybe it’s just that I’ve used too few files for it to activate; I don’t know); I’ve just been unable to find it. And it occurs to me that maybe one of y’all will know the answer.

How about it?

10 thoughts on “Anyone know how to do this in Windows 10?

  1. Brad Warthen Post author

    Oh, and here’s a pet peeve…

    I really hate it when I want an answer about some product, and I go searching for it, and instead of an authoritative answer from the company that makes the thing — which is what I want — I get no end of forums of pedestrians who MAY know what they’re talking about, but just as likely do not.

    Maybe that aspect of crowdsourcing doesn’t bug you. But it does me. I want an answer, not a conversation. And when you enter the product name, model number, and a specific question, you ought to get one…

  2. Keith Marsh

    Have you tried this?

    – Click the Windows button in the lower left side of the screen

    – Click the “Settings” link

    – A settings window will open, click “Personalization” (looks like a computer monitor with a pen on it)

    – On the left side of the window, click the “Start” link

    – On the right side of the window make sure the slider named “Show recently opened items in Jump Lists on Start or the taskbar” is turned on

    1. Brad Warthen Post author

      Thanks, Keith. That sounds like it would work, and I followed your instructions eagerly — but I found that switch was actually already turned on.

      So I tried turning it off, and turning it on again. Doesn’t work either way.

      I don’t get it…

  3. Scout

    I just recently got windows 10 on my old laptop. I’m still getting used to it. I had no idea you could right click and get a list – Cool!

    So I do get lists on mine…for microsoft word and excel and email and chrome and adobe reader, which are what I mostly have used. All the other things just give the menu about unpinning. Maybe it has to do with what directories are pinned in your quick access in the little folder file structure thingy (which probably has another name). I’m just guessing.

    I’m still trying to figure out the file structure quick access pinning thing. It has frustrated me a few times.

  4. Assistant

    My personal laptop is an Asus and I have access to several of them through family and friends. My four-year-old G73 i7 ASUS came with Windows Professional 7 installed, and I have been quite pleased with its features and performance, especially after replacing the original hard drive with an SSD.

    I tried out a cute, cheapo $170 Intel Atom-based ASUS mini laptop with Windows 8.1 as a candidate replacement for my original ASUS tablet that was slowly degrading. That experience made me reluctant to install Windows 10 on my laptop. But I did relent several months ago and am quite pleased with the results. I’ve noticed no degradation in performance. In fact, some functions are faster with W10. I still use the desktop rather than the tiles, so my laptop boots into that mode. I’m pleased with the results.

    Regarding your mouse issues:

    Go to Control Panel and click on Mouse. Click on the [Device Settings] tab and check the box in the middle of the screen before this: Disable internal pointing device when external USB device is attached.

    This will automatically disable the touchpad when you boot your computer if a wired or wireless mouse is installed.

    As for displaying recent files when you right-click on an app, on my laptop that works. I’ll have to research a bit further…

  5. Assistant

    Research done regarding displaying recent files. Just do this:

    Open File Explorer (Hold down Windows key, hit E once).
    Go to the View section from the top bar
    At the far right click on Options, select “Change folder and search options.”
    Toward the bottom of the General tab on the “Folder Options” window you’ll see the “Privacy” section. Put a check in both the “Show recently used files in Quick Access” and “Show frequently used folders in Quick Access.”

    Click on OK and you should be in business.

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