I recently bought an HTC One M8 and although it’s pretty old, I quite like the Sense UI that comes with HTC Phones. I’m currently on Sense 6.0 and I’m loving the features that the UI provides. But with HTC’s new Marshmallow release of the Sense 7.0, I’m wondering if I should update to the new version. But since HTC is not pushing the Marshmallow update for the M8, I’m wondering if it’s a good idea and if so, how would I go about updating?

— Pritam Basnet

Dear Pritam,

I would actually suggest updating to the new Marshmallow version of Sense, solely because Marshmallow has a lot of inherent benefits in contrast to the older Lollipop version. But, you also need to realise that HTC must have a reason for not pushing updates to your phone, probably because of hardware incompatibility, although I had read a few articles, back in 2015, promising the Sense 7 update for M8 devices after Christmas of that year. Have you checked if HTC has followed through on this promise? If your device is not updating over-the-air (OTA) then you can probably try connecting it to your computer and updating it via the PC software, sometimes that works. If HTC has officially pushed the Sense 7 update to your phone, you have less to worry about because they will have optimised the operating system for your device: meaning you won’t face a lot of problems after the update. So try that first and if HTC has not followed through on their promise, there are plenty of third-party Sense 7 ports for the M8. You might need to tinker with your device quite significantly to install these ROMs through, like rooting and unlocking your bootloader. Also keep in mind that once you root your phone, all warranty from HTC is instantly void. Fortunately, there are plenty of tutorials on how to go about these processes and if you follow them well, rooting and unlocking your bootloader should be relatively safe. The Sense 7 port by Team Venom on xda-developers.com should be a good one to consider if you’re thinking of taking the third-party ROM route.

I have been trying to install a fresh version of Windows on my Dell XPS 400 for quite some time now. I have tried everything that Google tells me to do but I am always greeted with the message, ‘Installation Media not found’. What should I do to get this to work?

— Sryan Shrestha

Dear Sryan,

This could be caused by a bad installation disk. Maybe the computer is not booting into your installation drive because the boot information is missing. Have you tried the same disk in any other computer? If not, try that. See if you can boot into your installation disk in a different computer, if it boots, the installation media is working well. If not, you might need to download a different installation image or buy a different DVD for your Windows. Also, try installing through USB. You can easily transfer your installation disk into a USB with tools like Rufus. See if you can boot from a USB stick, the problem could be happening because of a malfunctioning optical drive and using a USB would bypass that. This problem could also be the cause of a hard drive that has died. Or even a mismanaged boot order. To fix your boot order, boot into your BIOS and under boot order, place the installation drive, be it optical drive or USB, on top. This should force your computer to boot from the first drive. Another reason why you could be suffering from this issue could be because of your BIOS booting up in fast mode. In fast mode, the BIOS ignores a lot of processes to make your boot faster, one of these processes could be booting from a removable device. Change this option to Basic in BIOS and see if that helps. If nothing works, you might need to reset your BIOS. To do this, open up your computer and you should see a small round battery, remove this battery and wait about 10 seconds and put it back in. This will completely refresh your BIOS and it’ll revert back to the factory settings of your motherboard. See if this helps. If not, you might need to consider getting your hard drives checked out.

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