Most Windows users use the run box to open a page or programs, and as you have opened a lot of pages and applications using run commands, you may have lots of pre-loaded commands in run box history. Sometimes that bothers us. Here is the Guide to ” How to clear Run history in Windows .”

Clear Run History in Windows 10

We do use the registry editor to clear the run history, so to start, open the Run box by pressing the Windows key and R at the same time. Write regedit in the run and hit enter to go to the registry editor.

The above step will lead you to open the registry editor. In the registry editor go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER

In the HKEY_CURRENT_USER directory, you may see lots of subdirectory, find the Software folder and open it.

Now you are in the Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software directory. In the software, the folder goes to the subfolder named Microsoft.

From  Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft  go to the folder Windows>CurrentVersion.

Currently, we are in the Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion directory. Now we have to go to the Explorer directory. To navigate to the Explorer directory scroll down and find the Explorer folder.

After opening the Explorer folder, scroll down and find the folder named RunMRU.

Here ( Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\RunMRU ) are the directory where we can clear run history in Windows.

On the right side, for everything you are seeing in the run commands history, right-click on any of these files and delete the file.

Read also: How to Delete Windows 10 Temporary Files?

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Remove or delete Windows 10/11 update files to free up system drive space and speed up your PC. When you update Windows, the update files are cached on your Windows system drive. You can manually delete Windows 10/11 update files or use a third-party application. The built-in Disk Cleanup feature in Windows is great for deleting Windows temporary files. However, to delete Windows 10/11 update files, you can use the Windows 10/11 Installed Updates section.

Related Articles: 

• How to Delete Windows 10/11 Temporary Files?
• Official Windows 10/11 Keyboard Shortcuts

This is the most common problem users ask us about. We have explained how to fix it for previous Windows versions, such as Windows 8.1 and Windows 7. Fortunately, the same solution works for all Windows versions. So try cleaning up your system temporary files to speed up your computer’s performance, especially Windows 10.

Delete Windows 10/11 Update Files

There are two ways to delete Windows 10/11 update files.

• The first way is to delete an installed update file from Windows Update. This is sometimes necessary if an update is causing problems. To do this, open Windows Update and go to the “View installed updates” section. From there, you can right-click on the update that you want to delete and select “Uninstall”.
• The second way is to delete the update cached files in Windows 10/11 using Disk Cleanup. This will remove all of the temporary files that were created during the update process. To do this, open Disk Cleanup and select the “Windows Update Cleanup” option. Then, click on the “Clean up system files” button.

Delete Windows 10/11 update files and temporarily cached files:

1. Check Windows 10/11 Update files.
2. Delete an installed update file.
3. Remove Windows 10/11 temporary files.
4. Cleanup Windows 10/11 with Disk Cleanup

Follow the below step-by-step guide to delete Windows 10 update files, temporary files, and other cached files. Let’s begin with uninstalling an update file.

1. Press Windows+R to open the Run and type “appwiz.cpl” on the Windows Run to open Program and Features. On the programs and feature page, select View installed updates.

2. To delete an installed update, select and right-click the installed update you want to uninstall, then click Uninstall.

Note: Some Windows updates are not removable, you can’t simply uninstall them with Windows Programs and Features section.

Remove Windows Update Files and Cached Data

This is the second method to delete Windows update files and other cached data or temporary files. Just follow up on the below guide.

1. Open your File Explorer (This PC or My Computer). Right-click the Windows system drive and click Properties to open the Local Disk (x) Properties. The system drive is where your Windows 10 has been installed currently.

2. On the Properties of the system drive, click Disk Cleanup to open Disk Cleanup for the drive (C:). Then select all from Download Program files to Thumbnail files under Files to delete. When you have selected all of them, click Clean up system files.

3. Now on the Disk Cleanup tab, select all options again, then click OK to delete all Windows 10 update files and temporary files.

If you want to delete System Restore and Shadow Copies, select the More Options tab and click Clean up to remove system restore and shadow copies.

Remember: This action will remove all system restore points, you will not be able to restore to the preview point unless the system will create a new restore point.

4. Just click Delete Files to make sure that all files will remove successfully. Until it will not finish, don’t close the process window or shut down your system.

5. Now all Windows 10 update files and other cached files must be deleted. Close the System Properties window.

That’s it, easy and simple.

To do the same task or need to more about deleting system-cached files or removing Windows update files, I recommend you to read the below articles.

• Delete System Restore and Shadow Copies to Get Free Disk Space

How to delete downloaded Windows Update files

This is the manual task you can do to delete downloaded Windows update files. It is easy to delete all cached update files. This works on all supported versions of Windows, including Windows 7, Windows 8.1, and Windows 10.

1. Open the Run.
2. Type services.msc.
3. Right-click on the result, and select “run as administrator” from the context menu.
4. Locate the Service Windows Update. The services listing is sorted alphabetically by default. Click on the name to revert the order so that you don’t need to scroll as much.
5. Right-click on the service Windows Update and select Stop from the menu.
6. Go to C:\WINDOWS\SoftwareDistribution\Download using Explorer or any third-party file browser. If you navigate to the folder manually, you may need to enable the showing of hidden files first.
   1. Do so with a click on File > Change folder and search options.
   2. Go to View, and scroll down until you find “Hidden files and folders” listed.
   3. Select “Show hidden files, folders, and drives”.
   4. Remove the checkmark from “Hide protected operating system files (Recommended)”.
   5. Click Apply, then OK.
7. Select all files in the folder. The easiest way to do that is to use Ctrl-A while the folder is active.
8. Hit the Delete key on the computer keyboard.
9. Windows may need administrator privileges to delete certain files. Select “Do this for all current items” and click Continues to grant the permissions.
10. Go back to the Services window.
11. Right-click on the Windows Update service, and select Start from the list of options.

Cleanup Windows 10 with third-party Software

PC Scan & Repair by Reimage software is also a good tool to completely scan and repair your computer. Download and install it then start scanning. The below screenshot is the scan results of my Laptop.

Also, there are more third-party apps that will do this for you, but doing Windows tasks with a built-in Windows app is better and free. It will let you discover your computer features and functions more.

Related Queries:

• Delete Windows 11 update cache
• Delete Windows update files Windows 11
• Delete Windows update files Windows 10/11
• Delete downloaded Windows 10/11 updates
• Windows update cache location Windows 10/11
• Windows 10 update files location
• How to delete downloaded but not installed Windows updates in Windows 10
• Clear Windows update cache and fix Windows updates

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Windows Server 2012 R2 Initial Configuration for newly installed. After installation, you need to configure the initial requirements of the server.  The essential configuration are changing host name, set IP address , update Windows, Desktop configuration, and activate the Windows Server etc. In the Windows Server 2012 R2 installation article we talk about benefits of Windows Server.

1. Desktop configuration

For Windows Server 2012 R2 Initial Configuration after the first log on to Windows Server, you will see  server manager like the below screenshot.

The server manager dashboard will open every time you restart or log off your server. You can stop it from Server Manager Properties. Just tick the Do not start Server Manager automatically at Log on.

The Windows Server 2012 R2 interfaces are different from earlier Windows Servers. I like to have desktop icons the same as older Server desktops, but by default we are not able to bring icons like My Computer, Documents and Network. To do this , you must install ‘Desktop Experience’ from Windows Server Features.

Note: It is not good idea to enable some extra features or install software in Windows Server for bringing desktop icons. I just show you the ways as a tips. 

From Server Manager dashboard, go to ‘Add Roles and Features’, select ‘Role-based or Feature-based installation’ without any changes to other roles and features, select ‘Desktop Experience’ from User Interface and Infrastructure… under Features.

Click Next and then click install. You must restart the server when the installation has complete.

After restarting Server, right click on the desktop, click Properties and check tick of all icons you need as mentioned below.

You can change desktop background, etc. But must tell you again, do not install desktop experience, because of security issue.

2. Change Server Name

The next step, you must change the host name or Server name. The Server name must be unique and easy to read for users. In order to change the Server name, Press Windows+R to open the Run and type Sysdm.cpl then press enter. This will open the System properties.

In the System Properties for Computer description type a description for you computer according to it’s roles. This will help you to determine and find your computer quickly in the network. Then click Change button, type computer name and click OK to save the changes.

When ask you to restart server click OK twice then click Restart Now. The server will restart to complete the tasks.

3. Enable Update Windows Server 2012 R2

We need to update Windows Server in order to patch the latest bugs and software updates. In the real world updating Windows is necessary and must set the Windows update to automatically.

To enable Windows update go to Control Panel and Windows update to open Windows update page or press Windows+x then press P to open Control Panel then click Windows update. Now click Turn on automatic update to enable.

Now you should see checking for updates without any errors. Let the Windows perform the process of updates completely.

Some updates need to restart the system to complete the installation. Just restart you server and check the update again.

Updating Windows  can validate Windows Server 2012 R2 evaluation for 180 days. It’s enough for a student or a testing lab environments to study about Microsoft Certification like MCSA or MCSE.

4. Change the default User name and Shutdown event Tracker

The admin user name in all Windows is Administrator, but it is better to change the default name of administrator to your favorite name. In order to change or rename it, type lusrmgr.msc in Windows Run and press enter to open local Users and Groups.

In local Users and Groups just right click the administrator name then click rename. When it has complete, once log off the and log on again with new user name.

For a test lab environment you should disable the Shutdown event tracker for group policy.

Display shutdown event tracker is a policy in Windows Server for recording the shutdown process and need a reason from user for shutting down or restarting.

Type gpedit.msc in Windows Run and press enter to open Windows Group Policy. Go to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > System and double click Display Shutdown Event Tracker policy.

Only check the Disabled and click OK then close the group policy window.

 5. Configure Server Networking Connections

Always in your network set the Servers IP addresses manually. Because the network Servers are very important and always must have unique address, not release different IP address each time from DHCP Server.

Type ncpa.cpl in Windows Run and press enter to open Windows Network Connections window. When the Network Connections page open, right click Ethernet0 and click Properties then select Internet Protocol Version 4 and click Properties. In the new page set IP address as mentioned on screenshot.

When everything is don, click OK and close all opened windows.

You can perform networking tasks with command line tool as well. Configure Windows IPv4 Networking with Netsh

So end of  Windows Server 2012 R2 Initial Configuration. If you are using Hyper-V or VMWare create a Check Point or Snapshot for your servers then start your other tests and practice.

Be free and ask your question about Windows Server 2012 R2.

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