Windows Fundamentals 1 - TryHackMe

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3 min read

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This is a free room on TryHackMe.com which is targeted at giving an introduction to Windows.

The task starts by giving a history of windows operating systems starting from Windows XP. The task does not cover Windows 95 or MS-DOS. We also touch upon topics such as end-of-life support and the impact it can have on security and organizations.

My overall rating of this room was extremely beginner-friendly, anyone with over 3 months of use of a windows environment should be able to answer this question with extreme ease.

Task 2

This was an easy question but an important one, as Bitlocker was developed by Microsoft in 2004, It is the default Encryption offered.

Question 1 of 1 What encryption can you enable on Pro that you can't enable in Home?

-Bitlocker

Task 3

In task 3 we cover some basic navigation of the windows environment UI I would recommend this for people who are new or inexperienced with the windows operating system.

Question 1 of 3 Which selection will hide/disable the Search box?

-hidden

Question 2 of 3 Which selection will hide/disable the Task View button?

-show task view button

Question 3 of 3 Besides Clock, Volume, and Network, what other icon is visible in the Notification Area?

-Action Center

Task 4

This task taught me the most mainly about the history and the use of NTFS, FAT16/FAT32, and HPFS as well as touching upon Alternate Data Streams (ADS).

ADS further reading as this is an extremely interesting and in-depth topic:

winitor.com/pdf/NtfsAlternateDataStreams.pdf Thank you to Marc Ochsenmeier for your amazing work

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Question 1 of 1 What is the meaning of NTFS?

-New Technology File System

Task 5

This was another easy task touching upon Environment variables and Sytem32 structure within windows.

Question 1 of 1 What is the system variable for the Windows folder?

-%windir%

Task 6

This is a useful task as it introduces us to the usage of lusrmgr.msc to manage users, groups, and policies, In a corporate environment, you would be using Active Directory to do this.

Question 1 of 4 What is the name of the other user account?

-tryhackmebilly

Question 2 of 4 What groups is this user a member of?

-remote desktop users, users

Question 3 of 4 What built-in account is for guest access to the computer?

-guest

Question 4 of 4 What is the account status?

-Account is disabled

Task 7

Introduction to UAC, is not covered in the task but something to note UAC is extremely easy to bypass and you should not rely on this.

Question 1 of 1 What does UAC mean?

  • User Account Control

Task 8

This was another basic task of exploring the Windows UI and in particular this time this control panel.

Question 1 of 1 In the Control Panel, change the view to Small icons. What is the last setting in the Control Panel view?

-Windows Defender Firewall

Task 9

Task 9 was a useful task about a keyboard shortcut to access Task Manager, it is really useful to learn and use keyboard shortcuts as it can save lots of time.

Question 1 of 1 What is the keyboard shortcut to open Task Manager?

-Ctrl+Shift+Esc