Windows 8 introduced a number of new features, not all of which were welcomed by anyone upgrading from earlier versions of the operating system. As well as the new Start screen, the Charms bar that appears at the right hand side of the screen is one of the new ways in which you can interact with Windows.
But if you’re anything like me, you’ve probably found that the way the pop-up menu works can be a little irritating. It is very easy to accidentally call up the Charms bar when your mouse moves to the edge of the screen, or when you are attempting to use the Show Desktop button.
The fact that it is so easy to call up the Charms bar with the mouse, it’s easy to forget that that there is also a keyboard shortcut that can be used. Press the Windows key and C at the same time, and the right hand menu will pop into view whatever you happen to be doing.
There is a built in option that can be used to disable the hot corner at the upper right of the desktop. Right click an empty section of the taskbar and select Properties before moving to the Navigation tab. Untick the option labelled When I point to the upper-right corner, show the charms and then click OK.
This is a good start, but it is not going to prevent you from accidentally displaying the Charms bar when your cursor is near the lower right hand corner of the screen.
Thankfully, you can address this by editing the registry. Press the Windows key and R to bring up the Run dialog, type regedit and press Enter – click Yes if a User Account Control dialog appears.
Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\ImmersiveShell\EdgeUi
Right click the EdgeUi key and select New followed by DWORD Value. Name the new item DisableCharmsHint and then double click it before setting its value to 1.
Click OK and when you next log into your account, you’ll find that both the top and bottom right hand corners of the screen are no longer hotspots. Don’t forget the Windows + C shortcut to access the Charms bar when you do need it!