AMD's first graphics driver of July, Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.7.1, landed today with optimizations for EA's latest racer, the RX 6600M and 6700M mobile GPUs, as well as several bug fixes.

The Codemasters-developed racer F1 2021, the first game to arrive from the company after the EA acquisition, launched today, and those with a graphics card from the red team will want to upgrade to this driver to get the best performance.

While running the new 21.7.1 driver and compared to the previous 21.6.2 release, F1 2021 can see performance gains of up to 6% when raytracing is enabled, and up to an impressive 26% performance increase when it is disabled. The company's test bench for getting these results were running a Radeon RX 6800 XT GPU paired with a Ryzen 9 5900X CPU, while the game settings were cranked up to ultra at 4K resolution.

Here are the included bug fixes:

• An Oculus service error may be received on Radeon RX 5000 & 6000 series graphics products which prevents the Oculus Link setup software from running.
• Lighting corruption may be experienced in Apex Legends™ when Radeon™ Boost is enabled.
• Some users may experience elevated memory usage by AMD User Experience Program.
• A driver mismatch error may appear when two versions of Radeon software (Windows Store & AMD Support versions) are installed on your system.
• Some users may experience higher than expected memory utilization when running 3DMark Time Spy™.
• While playing Carrion™, some users may experience image corruption when Anisotropic Filtering is enabled.

The known issues list comes next:

• Game Compatibility advisor in Radeon™ Software Experience may incorrectly advise some users their CPU and/or GPU do not meet the minimum requirements to play some games.
• Resident Evil Village™ may experience an intermittent application hang or TDR on AMD Radeon VII graphics products in the first mission of the game.
• Enhanced Sync may cause a black screen to occur when enabled on some games and system configurations. Any users who may be experiencing issues with Enhanced Sync enabled should disable it as a temporary workaround.
• Connecting two displays with large differences in resolution/refresh rates may cause flickering on Radeon RX Vega series graphics products.
• Radeon performance metrics and logging features may intermittently report extremely high and incorrect memory clock values.
• If Ryzen Master is not detected in Adrenalin software after installation, a system restart may be required.
• If Blue or Black screen is observed in mobile systems, temporarily disable Enhanced sign-in.
• A Blue or Black screen may be observed after updating to the latest Radeon Software. A workaround is to disable core isolation.
• Lower than expected performance may be observed on select AMD Athlon™ mobile systems.

The Radeon Software Adrenalin 2020 Edition 21.7.1 driver is available for download via the optional section in the Radeon Software app on Windows. Standalone download links can be found on the driver's official release notes page here.

It’s a new week, which means it’s time for a Windows 11 Dev channel build. Today’s build – the third update that is rolling out to Windows 11 – bumps up the build number of the OS to 22000.71 and brings with it a bunch of improvements. These include a refreshed right-click context menu that adheres to the Windows 11 design, bringing acrylic blur.

As users would notice, unlike the Windows 10 Dev channel builds, Windows 11 releases are cumulative updates. This is because the OS is almost done in terms of the under-the-hood code is concerned, and it will only be serviced through cumulative updates. The other reason that this is possible with Windows 11 is that the firm has decoupled the underlying bits of the OS from the UI stack, allowing them to update the UI elements via Feature Experience Packs.

In addition to the changes to the context menu design, the build also adds a new Entertainment widget to the widgets pane with a link to the Microsoft Store. However, features such as the ability to install and run Android apps on Windows 11 are yet to be added to these builds. There are, as usual, a bunch of fixes and general improvements that have been made based on user feedback.

Here is the complete list of new features in this build:

• We’re introducing a new entertainment widget! The entertainment widget allows you to see new and featured movie titles available in the Microsoft Store. Selecting a movie will direct you to the Microsoft Store to see more information about that title. Just open widgets and click or tap on the “Add widgets” button and choose the entertainment widget.

• The new context menus and other right-click menus have been updated to use acrylic material.

• We are testing the usability of a SplitButton for making new folders and files in the File Explorer command bar.
• The Taskbar previews (when you mouse-over open apps on the Taskbar) have been updated to reflect the new visual design of Windows 11.

As mentioned, there are a bunch of fixes being made with this build. These include fixes to taskbar behavior across multiple monitors, Settings app fixes, and other improvements to enhance the reliability of the OS.

Here is the complete list of fixes:

• Taskbar:
  • We fixed an issue where if you drag app icons on the Taskbar to rearrange them, it was making the apps launch or minimize when you released the icon.
  • Using a long press with touch on an app icon in the Taskbar to open the jump list should now work.
  • After right-clicking the Start icon in the Taskbar, clicking somewhere else should now dismiss the menu more reliably.
  • Shift + Right-click on an app icon in the Taskbar will now bring up the window menu like it used to and not the jump list.
  • We’ve addressed an issue that was making your mouse move slowly when hovering over the Taskbar previews.
  • We’ve included the fix for an issue when using multiple Desktops where an app icon in the taskbar might give the appearance of multiple windows being open when that wasn’t the case on that Desktop.
  • When using the Amharic IME you should no longer see an unexpected X next to the IME icon in the taskbar.
  • The issue where if you click on the input indicator on the Taskbar and it would unexpectedly highlighted Quick Settings has been fixed.
  • When you hover over Task View, the preview flyout for your Desktops will no longer pop back up after using Esc to dismiss them.
  • We made a fix to address an issue where explorer.exe might crash after hovering over the Task View icon in the Taskbar.
  • We fixed an issue where the selected date in the calendar flyout was out of sync with the date in the Taskbar.
  • We made an update to address a scenario resulting in some Insiders not seeing the lunar calendar text in the calendar flyout when enabled in Settings.
  • This flight addressed an issue that could unexpectedly make the Taskbar background transparent.
  • Right-clicking the focus assist icon in the taskbar should now show a context menu.
  • The issue from the previous flight where icons in the taskbar corner were getting crushed against the top of the Taskbar has been addressed.
  • The tooltip for the location in use icon in the Taskbar should no longer appear blank sometimes.
• Settings:
  • We fixed an issue making Settings crash on launch periodically.
  • Using the volume mixer sliders in Sound Settings should be more responsive now, as well as the page responsiveness as a whole.
  • We fixed an issue resulting in Disk and Volumes Settings’ change size option being clipped.
  • There was a non-functional verify link under Backup Settings – this has been fixed.
  • The Power and Battery Settings page should no longer be reporting that battery saver is engaged in it’s not.
  • The Power and Battery Settings page should also now not crash when launched from Quick Settings.
  • We fixed a grammatical error in the Sign-in Settings text.
  • The “I forgot my PIN” link was unexpectedly missing in Sign-in Settings when a PIN was set up and has now been returned.
  • The issue where the Move option under Apps & Features in Settings wasn’t working reliably should be addressed in this build.
  • We’ve mitigated a problem where some of the colors in Settings weren’t updating after switching between dark and light mode, leaving unreadable text.
  • We’ve done some work to help improve the performance of Settings when switching between light and dark mode.
  • We addressed an issue where some of the elements of the Themes page in Settings would end up crowded together when the window size was small.
  • We resolved an issue where the Pen menu toggle under Taskbar Settings was not in sync with the actual state of the feature.
  • Changes made to “Dismiss notification after this amount of time” in Accessibility Settings should now persist.
  • Some of the icons you could enable in Taskbar Settings were erroneously labeled Windows Explorer even though that’s not what they were – this should now be fixed.
  • The Connect text in Quick Settings has been updated to say Cast.
• File Explorer:
  • Clicking the command bar button twice should now close any dropdown that appeared.
  • The new command bar should now appear when “Open folders in a separate process” is enabled under File Explorer Options > View.
  • This build addresses an issue where right clicking a file and selecting Open With > Choose another app might launch the file in the default app rather than opening the Open With dialog.
  • Fixed an issue the desktop and File Explorer context menu would stop launching.
• Search:
  • We fixed an issue where the option to verify your account in Search wasn’t working.
  • Hovering over the Search icon on a secondary monitor will now show the flyout on the correct monitor.
  • Search should now work if you open Start and start typing after having gone to the apps list and back.
• Widgets:
  • When using the Outlook client with a Microsoft account, Calendar, and To Do updates should sync faster down to the widgets.
  • We addressed an issue where if you added multiple widgets quickly from the widgets settings, it could result in some of the widgets not being visible on the board.
  • We fixed a bug where widgets could all become stuck in a loading state (blank squares in the window).
  • The traffic widget should now follow the Windows mode (light or dark).
  • The title of the sports widget should no longer mismatch with the content of the widget.
• Other:
  • This build addresses an issue where ALT + Tab was getting stuck open sometimes after you released the keys and had to be manually dismissed.
  • We made a fix for an issue where Narrator focus wasn’t ending up on the emoji panel after using the keyboard shortcut to open it.
  • Magnifier’s lens view has been updated so the lens now has rounded corners.
  • We found an issue that was noticeably impacting Start launch reliability for some Insiders, and have addressed it with this flight.
  • We’ve updated the “Most Used” text in the Start menu’s app list so it should no longer be getting clipped.
  • Using the semantic zoom in Start’s app list should no longer result in the list being pushed down and to the right off the edge of the window.
  • We fixed an issue where if you pressed WIN + Z you would need to press Tab before you could use the arrow key to navigate through the snap layouts.
  • We addressed an issue where an acrylic area could get left on the screen after repeatedly snapping and unsnapping a window with touch.
  • We’ve done some work to mitigate an unexpected flash when moving a snapped window with touch.
  • We made a change to help window borders have a little more contrast when “Show accent color on title bars and windows borders” was turned off.

There are also a bunch of known issues that the firm has listed - ones that users must be aware of when installing the build. Here are all the known issues:

• [REMINDER] When upgrading to Windows 11 from Windows 10 or when installing an update to Windows 11, some features may be deprecated or removed. See details here.
• Start:
  • In some cases, you might be unable to enter text when using Search from Start or the Taskbar. If you experience the issue, press WIN + R on the keyboard to launch the Run dialog box, then close it.
  • Based on feedback, we are working on adding access keys to WIN + X so that you can do things like “WIN + X M” to launch Device Manager. Insiders may see this functionality in this build, however we are currently investigating an issue in which sometimes the option is unexpectedly unavailable.
• Taskbar:
  • There is an issue in this build where Explorer.exe will crash when the date and time button on the Taskbar is clicked to access new notifications with Focus Assist turned off. The workaround for this is to enable Focus assist to priority or alarms mode. Note that when focus assist is turned on, notification popups won’t appear, but they will be in the notification center when opened.
  • The Taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.
  • Taskbar previews may draw partially offscreen.
• Settings:
  • When launching the Settings app, a brief green flash may appear.
  • When using Quick Settings to modify Accessibility settings, the settings UI may not save the selected state.
  • The button to rename your PC doesn’t work in this build. If needed, this can be done using sysdm.cpl.
  • Settings will crash when clicking “Facial recognition (Windows Hello)” under Sign-in Settings if Windows Hello is already set up.
  • Reset this PC and Go back buttons in Settings > System > Recovery do not function. Reset and roll back can be accessed from the Windows Recovery Environment by selecting System > Recovery > Advanced startup, and pressing Restart now. Once in Windows Recovery, choose Troubleshoot.
    • Choose Reset this PC to perform a reset.
    • Choose Advanced options > Uninstall Updates > Uninstall latest feature update to perform a rollback.
• File Explorer:
  • Explorer.exe crashes in a loop for Insiders using the Turkish display language when battery charge is at 100%.
  • When right clicking the desktop or File Explorer, the resulting context menu and submenus may appear partially off screen.
  • Clicking a desktop icon or context menu entry may result in the wrong item being selected.
• Search:
  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.
  • When you hover your mouse over the Search icon on the Taskbar, recent searches may not be displayed. To work around the issue, restart your PC.
  • Search panel might appear as black and not display any content below the search box.
• Widgets:
  • Widgets board may appear empty. To work around the issue, you can sign out and then sign back in again.
  • Launching links from the widgets board may not invoke apps to the foreground.
  • Widgets may be displayed in the wrong size on external monitors. If you encounter this, you can launch the widgets via touch or WIN + W shortcut on your actual PC display first and then launch on your secondary monitors.
• Store:
  • The install button might not be functional yet in some limited scenarios.
  • Rating and reviews are not available for some apps.
• Windows Security:
  • Device Security is unexpectedly saying “Standard hardware security not supported” for Insiders with supported hardware.
  • “Automatic sample submission” is unexpectedly turned off when you restart your PC.
• Localization:
  • There is an issue where some Insiders may be some missing translations from their user experience for a small subset of languages running the latest Insider Preview builds. To confirm if you have been impacted, please visit this Answers forum post and follow the steps for remediation.

As usual, these builds will be made available to users running Dev channel builds via Windows Update. The firm is yet to release any ISOs yet, so those who want to perform a clean install of Windows 11 might have to wait longer. As for Beta channel users that want to test the next generation of Windows, the wait might be a bit longer.

Microsoft’s Claire Anderson, Art Director & Emojiologist at the company’s design team today penned a post on Medium to talk about the work the Redmond firm has been doing to revamp the look of emoji for Windows and the various Microsoft services – which the firm says are over 1,800 in total. Anderson says that the team has been working to “dramatically refresh” these emojis to create something that is “innately Fluent” by option for 3D designs and animations, moving away for 2D.

The post is a lengthy one and dives into the discussion of professionalism when using emoji and how these characters are evolving communication at work. It also cites research articles pointing to the benefits of using expressive that “encourages innovation” and creativity. The post also mentions the impact of the pandemic and the resulting adoption of hybrid work.

The company says that the new emojis feature “bright, saturated colors and bold forms” and that the designs adhere to the connected icon system that the firm talked about last year. An interesting addition is the new Clippy emoji in place of the paper clip, which the firm was teasing on its social media platforms yesterday. There are examples of a bunch of other designs that the company is working on and is asking feedback for. There are also five brand new emojis that were inspired by the new remote work paradigm.

These new emoji characters are now live on Flipgrid and will make it to Windows and Teams this holiday. The emoji will also roll out to Outlook, Yammer, and other Microsoft 365 suite of apps through the course of the next year. The company adds that it will bring its “Fluent aesthetic to life” to the productivity suit with not just emoji but also themes, backgrounds, and illustrations, and more.

Windows 11 preview build 22000.71 is now live in the Dev Channel of the Windows Insider program and it comes with visual improvements for the context menu and various right-click menus.

As part of the latest update, Microsoft is refreshing the right-click menu within File Explorer and other apps with Fluent Design acrylic effect. For those unaware, acrylic is a Fluent Design System component that adds physical texture and depth (i.e blur effect) to the operating system.

Microsoft is also enabling rounded corners for taskbar previews (the preview that appears when you mouse-over open apps on the taskbar). These changes have been implemented to reflect the new visual design of Windows 11.

Windows widgets pane gets a new "Entertainment" widget

Microsoft is adding a new entertainment widget to the Windows widgets menu.

The entertainment widget, which can be downloaded via Microsoft Store, allows you to see new and featured movie titles available in the Microsoft Store. If you click on a movie in the widget, it will direct you to the Microsoft Store so you see more information about that movie.

To download the preview update, you need to check for updates after joining the Windows Insider Program's Dev Channel.

Intel quietly released its latest DCH graphics driver version 30.0.100.9684 yesterday. The new update is significant as it adds support for the shiny new Windows 11 OS, which is available now as an Insider Preview. Since this is a Windows 11 compatible driver, it is WDDM 3.0-compliant and also brings support for HLSL Shader Model 6.6. The driver also features DirectML enhancements and optimizations, and is compatible with Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL).

Alongside that, the driver brings game optimizations, this time for EA's racing sim F1 2021. The update also fixes problems with stuttering and reduces load times on MMORPG Moonlight Blade and popular shooter Call of Duty: Warzone. In terms of feature addition, the driver adds Microsoft's Auto HDR support on Iris Plus graphics on 10th gen processors.

A detailed list of all the bug fixes has been provided below:

• Intel® Iris® Xe MAX graphics: Minor graphic anomalies seen in Fortnite*, Balan: Wonderworld*.
• Intel® Iris® Xe MAX graphics: Intermittent crash or hang seen in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla* (DX12), Marvel’s Avengers* (DX12).
• Blank Display observed with 5120x2160 resolution at 50Hz setting.
• Intermittent crash or hang seen in Shadowman Remastered*(Vulkan), Dark Souls III*, Gangstar New Orleans*, Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus* (Vulkan), World of Tanks* (DX12).
• Minor graphic anomalies seen in Dirt 5* (DX12), Watch Dogs: Legion* (DX12), Control* (DX12), Far Cry: New Dawn* (when starting from a saved file), 3DMark: FireStrike*.
• HDMI 2.0 monitor cannot light up after resume from sleep or standby.
• Display abnormal when 4K monitor connected and switched to duplicate displays.
• Visual anomalies seen on internal panel during .wmv movie playback in Movies & TV app under high CPU usage on 11th Generation Intel® Core™ H-Series mobile Processors.

There are also several problems that remain unresolved:

• Intermittent crash or hang may be seen in Burnout Paradise Remastered*, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War* (DX12), Detroit: Become Human* (Vulkan), Doom Eternal* (Vulkan), Metro Exodus* (DX12) when changing graphics settings, Moonlight Blade* (DX12), Necromunda: Hired gun* (DX12) (when choosing Shadow option other than low), Need for Speed Payback*, NBA 2K21* (DX12) (when switching resolution from 1920 x 1080 to 1600 x 900 and 1280 x 720), Red Dead Redemption 2* (DX12) while running benchmark, Redout: Enhanced Edition*, Resident Evil Village* (DX12), Scarlet Nexus*, Shadow of the Tomb Raider* (after switching to DX12 and SMAA 4x and playing for 10 minutes), Spyro: Reignited Trilogy*, The Dark Pictures: Man of Medan* (in online mode), Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint*, War Thunder*.
• Minor graphic anomalies may be observed in Adobe Premiere Pro 2020* while playing video, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla* (DX12), Crysis Remastered, Cyberpunk 2077* (DX12), Dark Souls 3, Death Stranding* (DX12), Deus Ex Mankind Divided* (DX12), Doom Eternal* (Vulkan) (in-game menu), Elex*, Forza Horizon 4* (DX12), Gears of War Ultimate Edition* (DX12), Hitman 2* (DX12), Horizon Zero Dawn* (DX12), Just Cause 4*, Microsoft Flight Simulator*, Minecraft VR* (DX12 when launched with audio enabled), Monster Jam Steel Titans 2*, Red Dead Redemption 2* (DX12), Shadow of the Tomb Raider* (DX12), Starcraft 2*, Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege* (Vulkan), 3DMark Fire Strike*.
• Intel® Iris® Xe MAX graphics: Intermittent crash or hang may be seen in Rage 2* (Vulkan) (when entering main menu), Sid Meier’s Civilization VI* (during ALT + ENTER), SMITE*, The Witcher 3*, Warframe* (DX12).
• Intel® Iris® Xe MAX graphics: Minor graphic anomalies may be observed in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare* (DX12), Forza Motorsport 6* (DX12), GRID 2019* (DX12), Marvel’s Avengers (DX12), Metro Exodus* (DX12), Rocket League* (when CMAA Enabled), Serious Sam 4* (Vulkan).

As usual, the new driver is compatible with all Intel integrated as well as dedicated graphics starting from the 6th gen Core processors onwards. The 500 series Pentium and Celeron processors are also supported. In terms of OS support, all Windows versions starting from version 1809 and newer are supported.

To download the new 30.0.100.9684 driver, head over to Intel's official support page here where you can opt for either the .exe or the .zip version of the driver package.

Microsoft has addressed the Windows 10 printing issues caused by changes introduced in the June 2021 cumulative update preview with an update issued during this month's Patch Tuesday.

After releasing the KB5004760 and KB5004945 security updates on July 7 to fix the actively exploited PrintNightmare vulnerability, Microsoft acknowledged user reports saying they could no longer use their USB Zebra and Dymo label and receipt printers.

While users pinned the issues on the PrintNightmare patch, Microsoft announced that the problems are "not related to CVE-2021-34527 or CVE-2021-1675," and were the result of June 2021 cumulative update preview changes.

To resolve the printing issues, Microsoft released an emergency fix for Windows 10 2004, Windows 10 20H2, and Windows 10 21H1 on July 9, rolling it out via the Known Issue Rollback (KIR) feature.

Redmond also added that "for enterprise-managed devices that have installed an affected update and encountered this issue, it can be resolved by installing and configuring a special Group Policy."

Separate update pushed to fix printing problems

To provide a fix for customers who do not want or can't use KIR to resolve these printing problems, Microsoft also released the KB5004237 update as part of the July 2021 Patch Tuesday.

"This issue was resolved in  KB5004237, released July 13, 2021. If you are using an update released before July 13, 2021, you can resolve this issue using Known Issue Rollback (KIR)," Microsoft said in a new update to the Windows release health dashboard

"This issue affects various brands and models, but primarily receipt or label printers that connect using a USB port. After installing this update, you do not need to use a Known Issue Rollback (KIR) or a special Group Policy to resolve this issue."

Customers also encountered printing issues in March after installing the March 2021 Patch Tuesday updates. Users reported that Windows 10 would crash when printing or print jobs would be missing graphics elements, blank pages, or other issues.

To resolve these issues, Microsoft released two out-of-band emergency updates for Windows 10 one week later: KB5001567 on March 15 to fix the crashes and KB5001649 on March 18 to fix the printing issues.

Microsoft released Windows Terminal Preview v1.10 today, and it comes with numerous handy improvements, including bold text support, Quake mode on the taskbar, easier access to the Command Palette, improved settings, and more.

Microsoft released Windows Terminal 1.10 today, and with it comes some handy new features and shortcuts for an optimal experience. 

With today's release, Windows Terminal is being promoted to version 1.9, and Windows Terminal Preview becomes version 1.10.

As we have already tested the 1.9 version in preview since May, we will focus on the new features coming to Windows Terminal Preview, which continue improving the console app.

Quake mode is now minimized to the taskbar

In Windows Terminal 1.9, Microsoft introduced a new feature called 'Quake mode' that allows you to open a new Windows Terminal window while in any other application.

To do this, you would use the Windows+` keyboard combination, which causes a Windows Terminal window to open and take up the top half of your screen.

You can easily dismiss this new window by using the Windows+` shortcut again.

While this is not a revolutionary feature, when your in the middle of coding or managing devices, it provides a quick method to launch a new Terminal Windows.

With Windows Terminal 1.10, Microsoft has enhanced this feature by causing a closed Quake mode window to minimize to the taskbar instead.

To open the window again, you simply need to double-click on the icon in your taskbar.

Replacing Feedback button with Command Palette

Windows Terminal 1.10 also got rid of the Feedback button, which was not commonly used, and replaced it with a button that opens the Command Palette.

"We noticed that the Feedback button inside the dropdown menu was hardly used and we figured this was highly valuable real estate. We decided to change this button to a command palette button to make the command palette more discoverable (because who doesn’t love the command palette?)," Microsoft said in the Windows Terminal 1.0 release notes.

For those not familiar with the Windows Terminal Command Palette, it is an overlay that can be opened using Ctrl+Shift+P an

With this change, the Command Palette becomes much more accessible by simply opening the Windows Terminal dropdown menu and clicking on its button.

Be bold!

With the help of Chester Liu, Microsoft has added bold text support to the Windows Terminal console.

You can test this feature now with a command like:

echo -e 'Normal, \x1b[1mbold\x1b[22m, \x1b[3mitalic\x1b[23m, \x1b[1;3mbold italic\x1b[22;23m'

As you can see below, it looks really nice.

This feature is not fully integrated, and Microsoft says they will add further configuration options in the settings in the future.

Settings UI improvements

Microsoft has added back the "Defaults" section of the Settings UI that allows you to configure the default settings for all profiles in Windows Terminal.

When you make changes to the default settings, they will apply to all existing and future profiles without their own customized settings.

For example, as you can see below, I added the Bubbles.ico icon as the default icon, and all profiles that did not have a specific icon configured now use it.

Microsoft says this feature is still a work-in-progress, and users can provide feedback on the project's GitHub issues page.

A feature that will likely be very popular is the new ability to add custom actions for various commands in Windows Terminal. Under the Settings > Actions page, you can add your own custom keyboard shortcuts for actions without removing existing shortcuts for the same command.

Other changes

In addition to the above most significant changes in Windows Terminal 1.10, numerous other bug fixes and improvements are listed below.

Miscellaneous improvements

•  You can now explicitly set your language preference for the terminal. This setting can be found on the Appearance page of the settings UI.
• The percentage sign is now added to all opacity slider values (Thanks @chingucoding!).
• You can now close tabs by index (Thanks @ianjoneill!).
• Font settings can now be represented as an object in your settings.json file.

Bug fixes

• There should be many fewer crashes (hopefully none) when opening the settings UI.
• Closing tabs should no longer crash in the terminal.
• You can now open a new tab using the command line without the terminal dismissing.
• Default terminal in version 1.10 is much more reliable in 22000.65. Default terminal in 1.10 is not compatible with 22000.51 and 1.9 is not compatible with 22000.65.
• Performance and reliability improvements.

For the complete list of changes, you can read the Windows Terminal 1.10 release notes.

Rumors about a new cloud-powered Windows by Microsoft circulated for quite some time. Microsoft put an end to the rumors with today's announcement of Windows 365 Cloud PC, a "hybrid personalized computing" experience.

The core difference between regular versions of Windows and Windows 365 is that the latter is streamed from the cloud, in this case using Microsoft Azure. Personal settings, files, programs and content is streamed from the cloud to any device that supports Windows 365 Cloud-PC.

Since it is cloud-based, Windows 365 supports different device types and operating systems. Windows desktop systems are best suited but users may also use Windows 365 from Android and iOS devices, Mac OS devices, and web browsers.

Here is the full feature matrix of Windows 365

Microsoft highlights advantages of Windows 365 over regular installations of Windows on local systems. Among the advantages are decreased costs, less environment complexity, personalized desktop experiences regardless of device used by a worker, scaling, fast provisioning and deployment (in minutes)

Windows 365 will be available on August 2, 2021. Different packages are available that range from single virtual CPU systems with 2 Gigabytes of RAM and 64 Gigabytes of storage space to 8 virtual CPUs with 32 Gigabytes of RAM and 512 Gigabytes of storage space. No information on graphics processing units are provided at this point.

A test base for Microsoft 365 is now in public preview.

Check out the table below to see which packages are available. Microsoft lists example scenarios and recommended applications for each.

Pricing, per-user, has not been revealed yet by Microsoft.

Windows 365 is designed for Enterprise customers only at this point. The technical requirements are listed below:

• Microsoft Azure subscription (subscription owner)
• Microsoft Azure Virtual Network (vNET) subscription.
• Windows 10 Enterprise E3 + EMS E3 or Microsoft 365 F3/E3/E5/BP for users with Windows Pro endpoints.
• Windows VDA E3 + EMS E3 or Microsoft 365 F3/E3/F5/BP for users with non-Windows Pro endpoints.
• AD must be in sync with Azure AD to provide hybrid identity in Azure AD.
• Microsoft Intune supported licenses: Intune Service Admin.

Microsoft published an introductory video in which it provides detailed information on Windows 365:

Closing Words

Several questions remain unanswered at this point. Besides pricing, Microsoft did not reveal information about the service's availability or backups.

Windows 365 is a cloud-based operating system that is designed for the Enterprise. Office 365 started as an Enterprise service at first as well before it was rebranded to Microsoft 365 and opened for small business customers and consumers. Microsoft could have similar plans for Windows 365, but marketing would highlight different advantages if launched for small businesses and end users.

After close to a year of rumors, Microsoft today officially announced Cloud PC, which is part of a new Windows 365 cloud offering from the Redmond firm, at its Inspire conference. The company says that Cloud PC is a “hybrid personal computing category” which “uses both the power of the cloud and the capabilities of the device to provide a full, personalized Windows experience”, remotely delivering Windows 10 and – eventually – Windows 11 to users across platforms from the cloud.

Microsoft says Windows 365 Cloud PC offers an “instant-on boot experience” that delivers the desired apps, settings, tools, and data from any device thanks to the cloud. This means that users will be able to access their desktops from remote locations without having to carry physical hardware, further helping the “hybrid” form of work that the firm says is becoming ubiquitous. Other benefits that the firm cites include the ability for businesses to scale up easily based on seasonality or “busy periods” without having to procure physical hardware, security benefits of deploying virtually, and more.

The service is built on Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD), but offers per-user, per-month pricing, and “simplifies the virtualization experience”, says the company. It provides flexibility for businesses to also scale depending on their needs and leverage other Microsoft offerings, such as the Microsoft 365 suite of apps, Dynamics 365, Power Platform, and more from the cloud. Organizations have the option to choose between two editions – Windows 365 Business or Windows 365 Enterprise, based on the configuration requirement. The service allows businesses to tweak performance quickly to cater to users’ needs.

Additionally, Windows 365 integrates with management tools such as Microsoft Endpoint Manager and can be managed just like physical devices, right from the dashboard. Cloud PCs are listed along with the physical devices and include analytics and diagnostics options for real-time monitoring. As for security, Windows 365 supports multi-factor authentication (MFA) and Azure Active Directory (AAD) sign-in, allowing “conditional access policies” and permission delegation based on user roles, where necessary. Cloud PCs are also encrypted “across the board”.

Windows 365 Cloud PC will become available to organizations starting August 2, bringing Windows 10 and Windows 11, when available, via the cloud. You can learn more about the offering here.

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Mozilla has announced the launch of Firefox 90 today, bringing with it improvements to Firefox on Windows, software WebRender, and SmartBlock’s handling of Facebook trackers. Those on Windows also receive a new Firefox menu that helps identify compatibility issues being caused by third-party applications which could help boost Firefox’s reliability on your system.

Perhaps the feature which will affect most users is the introduction of SmartBlock 2.0 which enhances private browsing. In this update, Facebook scripts are blocked to stop tracking you around the web but if you decide to log in with Facebook on any website the scripts are loaded in a just-in-time fashion to make your browsing experience smoother.

People on Windows will also gain some nice features in this update. From now on, Firefox doesn’t need to be running to download new browser updates, instead, they can be applied in the background while Firefox is closed. Firefox for Windows also includes about:third-party (accessible from the URL bar) which helps identify any compatibility issues caused by third-party programs which could be causing issues in Firefox.

Since Firefox 67, Mozilla has been rolling out WebRender to more and more Firefox installs. With Firefox 90, users without hardware-accelerated WebRender will now be switched to software WebRender which has seen improved performance in this update. With software WebRender, even browsing with Firefox on a less powerful computer should be better.

Firefox should automatically update on Windows and macOS systems but you can force the update by going to Menu > About Firefox > Help. Those on Linux will have to wait for their package manager to update before being allowed to download the update. If you do not have Firefox, you can download it from the Firefox website.

Just like clockwork, Microsoft is today releasing cumulative updates to all supported Windows versions as part of its Patch Tuesday updates. These include Windows 10 versions that are fully supported – such as the three latest versions, and other SKUs that are supported for certain types of customers, along with Windows 8.1 and users that have opted for Windows 7 Extended Security Updates (ESUs).

While Windows 8.1 and 7 usually receive a single update a month, the firm released emergency updates for the PrintNightmare vulnerability earlier this month, which will also be bundled into these packages.

As is always the case with updates for Windows 8.1 and Windows 7, there are two types of updates. They are monthly rollup packages and security-only updates. While monthly rollups are automatically served through Windows Updates, security-only updates can be manually acquired from the Update Catalog and installed on systems.

For Windows 8.1 and the corresponding Windows Server release, the update is KB5004298, which can also be downloaded from the Update Catalog here. The improvements and fixes made in this update are as follows:

• Addresses an issue in which 16-bit applications fail with an error message that states a general fault in VBRUN300.DLL.
• Addresses an issue in which some EMFs built by using third-party applications that use ExtCreatePen and ExtCreateFontIndirect render incorrectly.
• Adds Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) encryption protections for CVE-2021-33757. For more information, see KB5004605.
• Removes support for the PerformTicketSignature setting and permanently enables Enforcement mode. For more information and additional steps to enable protection on domain controller servers, see Managing deployment of Kerberos S4U changes for CVE-2020-17049.
• Security updates to Windows Apps, Windows Fundamentals, Windows Authentication, Windows Operating System Security, Windows Graphics, Microsoft Scripting Engine, Windows HTML Platforms, and Windows MSHTML Platform.

The security-only update for Windows 8.1 is served by KB5004285, which can be downloaded manually from here. The changelog is similar to that of the monthly rollup, bringing fixes for CVE-2021-33757 and removing the PerformTicketSignature setting. It also contains the single known issue found in the rollup.

The firm has listed one known issue that is common across both updates, which has been present for a long time. It is not clear when the renaming issue will be fixed. Here is the explanation of that issue provided by the company:

Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 users that have opted for ESUs will receive monthly rollup via KB5004289 that can be found for manual download here. The security-only update is KB5004307 which can be manually downloaded from here. The changelogs for both the monthly rollup and security-only update are identical to that of Windows 8.1, which is listed above.

The updates for Windows 7, however, have an additional known issue that might cause the update to fail. The rename bug in Cluster Shared Volume (CSV) folders affects this OS as well. Here is the changelog that details the additional issue:

As usual, the monthly rollups will be served through Windows Update for supported devices. The security-only updates are to be manually pulled from the Update Catalog links.

Today is the second Tuesday of the month, which means it time for Patch Tuesday, the day that all supported versions of Windows receive cumulative updates. This past month, however, has been a busy one for Windows with multiple updates rolling out to all supported versions, with some of them being mandatory ones to address the PrintNightmare vulnerability. Those fixes are rolled into these cumulative updates, for those that haven’t installed them yet. There have also been updates to address gaming performance and PDF issues.

The Redmond firm also released the first Windows 11 Insider Preview build late last month, which has already begun being serviced with cumulative updates. However, there are no new updates being served for the Dev channel today as those releases might – for now – be tied to the usual Wednesday cadence.

As for Windows 10, the three most recent – and fully supported – versions, 2004, 20H2, and 21H1 are receiving KB5004237, bumping the builds up to 19041.1110, 19042.1110, and 19043.1110, respectively. This is because the three versions are built on the same codebase, with the October 2020 Update and May 2021 Update being just enablement packages. The updates bring fixes for issues with certain printer types, such as Zebra printers, that were introduced as part of the PrintNightmare fixes.

As usual, these updates will be offered to users via Windows Update. However, they can also be manually downloaded from the Update Catalog here.

Here are the highlights of the update for the three fully supported Windows versions:

• Updates for verifying usernames and passwords.
• Updates to improve security when Windows performs basic operations.
• Updates an issue that might make printing to certain printers difficult. This issue affects various brands and models, but primarily receipt or label printers that connect using a USB port.

And the complete list of fixes brought by this update are as follows:

• Addresses an issue that might make printing to certain printers difficult. This issue affects various brands and models, but primarily receipt or label printers that connect using a USB port.
• Removes support for the PerformTicketSignature setting and permanently enables Enforcement mode for CVE-2020-17049. For more information and steps to enable full protection on domain controller servers, see Managing deployment of Kerberos S4U changes for CVE-2020-17049.
• Adds Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) encryption protections for CVE-2021-33757. For more information, see KB5004605.
• Addresses a vulnerability in which Primary Refresh Tokens are not strongly encrypted. This issue might allow the tokens to be reused until the token expires or is renewed. For more information about this issue, see CVE-2021-33779.
• Security updates to Windows Apps, Windows Management, Windows Fundamentals, Windows Authentication, Windows User Account Control (UAC), Operating System Security, Windows Virtualization, Windows Linux, the Windows Kernel, the Microsoft Scripting Engine, the Windows HTML Platforms, the Windows MSHTML Platform, and Windows Graphics.

As is the case with these updates, the firm has listed the known issues in the build that users and admins must be aware of. Here is the complete list:

However, if you are running older Windows 10 versions such as 1909, 1809, or others, you will also receive updates for the duration that your SKU is supported. Here is a summary of the Windows 10 versions that are still supported, the SKUs they are supported for, and the updates that are rolling out for them.

As usual, supported versions will receive mandatory updates via Windows Updates. They should be installed in the background. However, you can also head into Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update to check if these have been downloaded and are awaiting an install. Along with Windows 10, Microsoft is also releasing updates for Windows 8.1 users and those who have opted for Extended Security Updates for Windows 7.

On its 'What's Next' section on the Edge Insider website, Microsoft has published today all the upcoming and currently rolling out features that the browser will receive. There are plenty of changes in store starting from changes in PDF handling to Tab Groups, as well as certain policy changes and much more. Since the feature roadmap has been updated just today, none of the changes are currently in the stable channel yet.With that said, here are all the upcoming features in Edge:

• Free form text boxes added to PDF documents
  • Starting with version 94, we are support for adding free form text boxes to PDF documents that you can use to fill in forms and add visible notes.
• Free form highlighting on PDFs
  • Starting in Microsoft Edge version 94, the PDF viewing and markup experience will be improved with the addition of freeform highlighters. This will allow you to highlight sections on PDFs that you may not have access to comment on as well as scanned documents.
• Launch PWA instead of browser with URL links
  • Starting in Microsoft Edge version 97, you can opt into launching the browser in a PWA rather than the full native browser.
• Notification from web apps show as coming from the PWA
  • Beginning with Microsoft Edge version 94, notifications from progressive web applications PWAs will no longer show as coming from Microsoft Edge, but rather will display the name of the web app instead
• Improved handoff between IE mode and the modern browser
  • Starting with Microsoft Edge version 95, the transition between the modern browser experience and the IE mode experience will improve. Referrer headers, post data, forms data and request methods will now be forwarded properly across the two experiences.
• Video Picture in Picture (PiP) from hover toolbar
  • Beginning in Edge version 93, it will become even easier to enter Picture in Picture (PiP) mode. When you hover over a supported video, a toolbar will appear that allows you to view that video in a PiP window.
• Default for autoplay will be set to Limited
  • To help you maintain your focus online, we have changed the default for autoplaying media to Limit from Allow, beginning with Microsoft Edge version 92.
• Family Safety: Improved protection on sites such as youtube.com
  • Families using Microsoft Family Safety will soon see improvements to Content filters. Parents will also have more peace of mind knowing filtering settings for Allowed sites and Blocked sites will be improved for sites such as youtube.com to prevent children from navigating to videos that aren’t allowed.
• Family Safety: Allow many EDU sites with a single click.
  • Families using Microsoft Family Safety will soon see improvements to Content filters. When using “Only use allowed websites” mode, parents will see an option to add a list of educational sites to the allow list with one click.
• Tab Groups
  • The ability to categorize tabs into user-defined groups helps you more effectively find, switch and manage tabs across multiple workstreams. To enable this, we are turning on tab grouping beginning with Microsoft Edge version 93.
• Hide the title bar while using Vertical Tabs
  • Get the extra few pixels back by hiding the browser's title bar, while in Vertical Tabs. Starting with Microsoft Edge version 93, you can go to edge://settings/appearance and under the Customize Toolbar section select the option to hide the title bar while in Vertical Tab mode.
• Automatic translation for unknown languages.
  • Starting in Microsoft Edge version 94, when you navigate to a page that displays in a language that is not one that you have set up as known, Microsoft Edge will automatically translate the content of the page to your primary language. We will then give you the option to return to the original page or disable further automatic translations.
• Price history in shopping experience
  • Price History helps you decide whether now is the best time to purchase a product. You can now see price changes on products of your interest on Amazon.com and 9 other retailers, allowing you to have a quick, stress free shopping experience.
• Citation support added to Collections
  • Starting with Microsoft Edge version 95, we have improved the Collections experience, especially for students and researchers. Collections will start supporting citations and reading lists.
• New policy to support more flexibility in Microsoft Edge startup
  • Beginning with Microsoft Edge version 94, enterprise administrators will have more flexibility in the options they choose in their startup policy. This will include the ability to specify the start page, add/remove additional pages, and Continue where you left off", while ensuring that the set of pages specified by policy are also opened.
• Initial Preferences in Microsoft Edge
  • Deploying Microsoft Edge to your enterprise will become easier starting in version 93, with the addition of Initial Preferences.

These changes will be gradually rolling out in due course alongside features that were added previously to the roadmap. You can view the official Edge Insider feature roadmap here.

Microsoft will roll out a fix for a known issue causing Outlook for Microsoft 365 to crash on systems where users attempted using the Search bar or Search Suggestions features.

Starting February, users have reported encountering this bug on various online platforms, including Microsoft's community website and Tech Community, as well as Reddit.

As Microsoft describes the issue, "if you attempt to use the “Search” bar within Outlook, the application will shut down."

Redmond says that a fix has already been developed for this issue, with a fix being planned to roll out worldwide to all impacted users on Tuesday, July 13.

To install the Outlook update addressing this known bug, you have to follow the instructions available on the Install Office updates support document.

Unofficial workarounds

While no official workarounds are available yet for Outlook customers affected by these crash issues, users reported that clearing out the local folder and recreating your profile should eliminate the bug.

To do so, you will have to go through the following steps:

1. Open the Run dialog using Windows + R.
2. Open %appdata%\local\microsoft\outlook and delete everything in the folder.
3. Go to Control Panel > Mail > Show Profiles and delete the old Outlook profile.
4. Create a new Profile and start Outlook.

Others successfully mitigated the issue by rolling back to a previous Outlook version (the one released in May), not affected by this bug.

The only step required for this is to run the following command from the Command Prompt:

"C:\Program Files\Common Files\microsoft shared\ClickToRun\OfficeC2RClient.exe" /update user updatetoversion=16.0.14026.20246

In June, Microsoft fixed another issue causing Microsoft 365 users to experience authentication issues when logging into desktop client apps like Microsoft Teams, OneDrive for Business, and Microsoft Outlook.

The company also addressed an Outlook bug that blocked users from forwarding or replying to emails bundling embedded hyperlinks pointing to long URLs.

Redmond is currently also investigating an Outlook crash when using the 'Find Related' search feature in the Tasks Module and an issue where the follow-up flag status is displayed in sent messages incorrectly.