Windows Phone 8.1 Tips and Tricks

To PIN people to your start menu, go to your People list and find the person you want to add.

Then Press and Hold on an item and select Pin to start

To protect your phone from kids, Windows Phone comes with a Kids Corner feature.

To activate it, go to Settings – Kids Corner and enable it. You can then enable or disable certain content that you want to prevent access to. Options include games, videos, music and apps.

Once it is setup, swipe from Right to Left and you should see Kids Corner. And then swipe Down to Up to remove the Lock Screen.

You can use your smartphone as an Xbox controller.

First, download and install the Xbox SmartGlass App (formerly known as My Xbox Live). Once this is installed go to Xbox hub and make sure your Xbox is turned on and connected to your Wi-Fi router. Then make sure the phone is connected to the same Wi-Fi network.

If that is all setup, then the App will sign you in and you can start controlling your Xbox with the phone.

Go to the People section and find a coloured Title (the colour will depend on your Theme). Press the tile and an alphabet should appear. Start typing the name of the contact you want to dial and it will appear

To silence incoming calls while the phone is ringing, you can simply press the Volume button.

If you also want to silence the call AND make the screen blank, then press the Power button.

To turn your phone into a Wi-Fi hotspot, then follow these instructions:

First, go to your Start screen and swipe left and go to Settings.

Then select Internet sharing and turn Sharing on.

From here you can name your connection by selecting Setup – Broadcast name and entering a name.

You can also secure your Wi-Fi hotspot but adding a password for the connection.

Next, go to another device and find your phone’s Wi-Fi hotspot service.

Note: This will use your data plan, so use wisely!

If you’re on a call, you can record the conversation. While speaking, put the phone on Speakerphone. Then hold down the Camera button to record the call.

Bing Vision is a great tool which works in a similar way to the QR / Barcode scanner on some phones.

Open the Bing Vision App and it will use phone’s camera to take a phone of an object, product, book etc. It will then scan any text on the object and search for relevant information. It can also translate the text into another language.

Any example might be to scan the cover of a book. Vision will search for the book and provide you a price comparison from various book sellers.

To change the homescreen background to white, then start from the homescreen and scroll to the right.

Then choose Settings – Theme.

You can then change the theme from dark/black to light/white.

A very useful feature is the ability to double tap your phone’s screen to wake it up. This may not work on all devices.

To enable this feature, go to Settings – Touch (this should be down the bottom). It could also be called Motion Launch.

Then change the option labelled Wake Up to On. Now when your phone is on standby, you can simply double press the screen to wake it up.