It’s likely that any machine more than a couple of years old will not be compatible with (and therefore not upgradable to) Windows 11. And PCs are even more unlikely to be compliant if they're older, lower-end machines, Gold said.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Fri Apr 15, 2022 6:15 am

We started the first phase in the Windows 10, version 21H2 rollout for machine learning (ML) training. We are targeting devices on Windows 10, version 20H2 that are approaching end of servicing to update automatically to version 21H2.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Mon Jan 24, 2022 12:09 pm

"Windows 10 Home and Pro"—no code names, no minor version numbers—is now listed as retiring on October 14, 2025. "Retiring" is a part of the Modern Lifecycle Policy and means that the retired product leaves support entirely; this does not follow the old Fixed Lifecycle Policy with "mainstream" and "extended" support. Retired is retired—hit the pasture.

For now, it's unclear what a new "Windows 11" means for end-users—there are no guarantees that existing Windows 10 licenses will allow the use of Windows 11, let alone an in-place upgrade. We also have no concrete idea about when new releases of Windows 10 will cease, when the first Windows 11 will be available, or what costs will be.

We do have an educated guess or two, though. Microsoft's generous upgrade policies from Windows 7 to Windows 10 (you can still upgrade for free today!) strongly imply a similar policy for 11, which Microsoft will presumably be keen to get users on. We also don't expect under-the-hood changes as sweeping as the ones that took place between 7 and 10. In all likelihood, in-place upgrades will be available.

There are three key hardware requirements from this morass of information:

Windows 11 requires a 64-bit CPU;
Windows 11 requires TPM 2.0;
Windows 11 requires at least an eighth-generation Intel processor or an AMD processor from no earlier than 2019.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:06 am

Starting with last month's Windows 10 preview cumulative updates, Microsoft enabled News and Interests for all users running Windows 10 1909 and later.

However, as most Windows users do not install the preview updates, many Windows 10 devices did not get the new feature until Microsoft released yesterday's June 2021 Patch Tuesday mandatory cumulative updates.

To disable the News and Interests widget, right-click on an empty portion of your taskbar, select 'News and interests,' and then click on 'Turn off.'

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Fri Jun 11, 2021 1:05 pm

There is only a handful of new features in Windows 10 21H1, including support for multiple Windows Hello-enabled cameras; Windows Defender Application Guard improvements, and improvements in Windows Management Instrumentation via Group Policy. The new Chromium-based Edge browser also is available as part of today's 21H1 release.

Windows 10X was going to appear in 2021 as more of a Chrome OS competitor, and Microsoft had spent years trying to modernize Windows in an attempt to bring a more lightweight version to market. Windows RT first released alongside the original Surface tablet in 2012, and then Windows 10 S arrived in 2017. Both failed to simplify Windows, but Windows 10X had some promising features that will now start to appear in Windows 10 instead.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Wed May 19, 2021 11:03 am

There are times when it is important to determine what version of Microsoft Defender is currently installed in Windows 10 so you can diagnose a problem or determine if you have the latest version installed.

Unfortunately, Microsoft does not make it very clear how to find this information. This tutorial aims to clear up that confusion.

To find the version number for the installed Microsoft Defender in Windows 10, please follow these steps

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Thu May 06, 2021 8:41 am

According to multiple reports (1, 2, 3, 4) over on the social media sites, Feedback Hub and our comments section, it looks as though there is a growing number of users unable to install the latest Windows update on their hardware.

KB5001330 issues:

Blue Screen of Death (system crashes, boot loop)
Temporary user profile bug.
FPS drop.

The update in question won't remove third-party installations of the Flash player—only versions that have been bundled with Windows itself. The change seems unlikely to significantly impact most people—Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Apple Safari each ended Flash support by January 1, 2021.

Although Internet Explorer 11 (and the IE mode in Microsoft Edge) supports direct installation of downloaded Flash players as a plug-in, the Adobe Flash Player itself has a built-in "kill-switch" causing it to refuse to play Flash content if the system date is later than January 12, 2021.

In addition to all builds of Windows 10, KB4577586 is available and will be installed as a security update on Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012, and Windows Embedded 8 Standard.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Mon Apr 19, 2021 6:55 am

Notepad app is now updateable via the Microsoft Store outside major OS updates. Also, Microsoft is removing Notepad from the Windows Accessories folder in the Start menu. Instead, Notepad will have its own place in the Start menu. Finally, Microsoft revealed the new icon of the Notepad app, check it out above.

With the release of the latest Windows 10 preview 'Dev' build, Microsoft is offering a glimpse at some of the new features and changes they are developing. These features range from a sneak-peek of the upcoming Sun Valley animations to a new File Explorer layout.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Thu Mar 18, 2021 8:48 am

Microsoft has announced a new enterprise-only flexibility in Windows servicing that lets IT professionals roll back individual non-security elements of an update when a change breaks something.

The feature, dubbed "Known Issue Rollback," aka KIR, is an unusually frank admission that the company's nearly six-year-long experiment of forcing customers to either accept everything in an update or pass on the update entirely, is flawed.

"Even as quality has improved over the last five years, we do acknowledge that sometimes things can and do go wrong," Namrata Bachwani, principal program manager lead, said in a March 2 session video from Microsoft's all-virtual Ignite conference. "In the past, you had two choices: all or nothing," Bachwani continued. "You either take it all, so you install the update and you get all the great fixes that you want and the problem, which is causing an issue for your customers. Or you take nothing.

The Windows 10 KB5000802 and KB5000808 cumulative updates released yesterday are causing Blue Screen of Death crashes when printing to network printers.

Yesterday, Microsoft released the Windows 10 KB5000802 and KB5000808 cumulative updates as part of the March 2021 Patch Tuesday.

Since then, there has been a constant stream of complaints that printing is causing Windows 10 to crash with an "APC_INDEX_MISMATCH for win32kfull.sys" blue screen of death crash.

This indicates that Microsoft has pulled the updates from Windows Update while they look into the issues. However, the updates are still available via the Microsoft Update Catalog.

Furthermore, some of our machines are being offered the KB4601382 Preview cumulative update released on February 24th, but not yesterday's KB5000802 update, indicating that a security update is likely causing the crashes.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Mon Mar 08, 2021 8:19 am

Microsoft is ramping up the forced rollout of Windows 10, version 20H2 to more devices approaching end of service (EOS), as part of a new rollout phase.

This new automated feature update rollout phase follows the addition of Windows 10 2004 to the broad deployment channel in February, which made it available to everyone via Windows Update.

Windows 10 20H2 is also rolling out to users manually checking for updates (seekers) on devices running Windows 10 1903 or later starting October 2020.

If you are running a Windows 10 version nearing EoS and you're not offered to update via Window Update, you should check the Windows 10 Health Dashboard for any known hardware blocks affecting your device.

Microsoft should notify you if your computer is blocked from upgrading by a compatibility hold. The only known blocks for Windows 10 20H2 updates are for devices with Conexant ISST audio drivers.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Thu Mar 04, 2021 10:13 am

With the upcoming Windows 10 21H1 feature update being a minor release with few improvements, Microsoft will likely include all of the new features they have introduced in Insider builds in Windows 10 21H2.

Microsoft plans to release Windows 10 21H2 in the fall of 2021 after Windows 10 21H1 is released in the spring and Windows 10X afterward.

Codenamed "Sun Valley." Windows 10 21H2 will be a full-featured update that includes numerous new features and improvements for the Start Menu, Taskbar, Action Center, and more, which we have outlined below.

According to a recent entry to the Microsoft 365 roadmap, text predictions will roll out to Microsoft Word users in March. Microsoft notes that the feature will help "users write more efficiently by predicting text quickly, timely and accurately."

Once rolled out, Word users will see grayed out predictions which can be accepted by pressing the 'Tab' key or rejected by pressing the 'Esc' key. Over time, these predictions will get better based on the user's writing style. If you are not interested in using predictions, you will be able to turn them off completely as well.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Tue Feb 23, 2021 8:07 am

On Windows 10, Meet Now is a feature, part of the Skype communication platform, which allows you to quickly connect with family and friends using voice and video without sign ups or additional downloads.

The feature appears as a camera button in the taskbar notification area on devices running the Windows 10 May 2020 Update and higher releases. It allows you to quickly create a special link that you can share with other people and use with a web browser to make free video calls that can last 24 hours with up to 99 other people. You only need a camera, microphone, and a supported browser, including Microsoft Edge or Google Chrome.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Mon Jan 11, 2021 12:21 pm

It's going to show up automatically, although you can easily remove it by right-clicking on it. Then, you can personalize it. You can say that you want to see "More stories like this" or "Fewer stories like this". You'll get updates for news, weather, sports, and more, and news will come from over 4,500 sources such as The New York Times and BBC.

The regular mode is easier than the other methods and anyone with basic knowledge of Command Prompt should be able to recover their files. While the regular mode is more user friendly, it might not work if the free space in your drive was overwritten, especially if your PC comes with a solid-state drive (SSD).

If you’re trying to recover files that were deleted a long time ago, Microsoft recommends using the new ‘extensive mode’, which works even when a disk has become corrupted.

Since the initial release of Windows File Recovery in 2020, Microsoft says it has received valuable feedback from the users and more improvements will be released to the tool in the coming months.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Thu Jan 07, 2021 6:39 am

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Thu Dec 31, 2020 12:21 pm

While Microsoft doesn't say which Windows 10 versions are affected by this new known issue, the bug was acknowledged on the dedicated pages for the KB4592438 and KB4586853 updates issued for Windows 10 versions 2004 and 20H2 in December and November, respectively.

Microsoft has also provided mitigation measures for customers who already tried to run chkdsk and inadvertently damaged their computers' file system.

To repair their devices' boot capability, users are advised to go through the following procedure:

The device should automatically start up into the Recovery Console after failing to start up a few times.
Select Advanced options.
Select Command Prompt from the list of actions.
Once Command Prompt opens, type: chkdsk /f
Allow chkdsk to complete the scan, this can take a little while. Once it has completed, type: exit
The device should now start up as expected. If it restarts into Recovery Console, select Exit and continue to Windows 10.
After going through all the above steps, your device might automatically run chkdsk again on restart to fix any logical or physical errors.

However, once it completes the check, the computer should once again start up as expected.

Statistics: Posted by burger2227 — Tue Dec 22, 2020 7:54 am