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These are the headlines from Microsoft's annual developer conference.
 
Microsoft's annual Build developer conference has started! Day one has just wrapped up, and while we do expect there to be more keynotes and sessions tomorrow, we wanted to round up all of the biggest news coming out of Build 2023 so far.
 
The company has published an online "Book of News" that rounds up all the announcements, but it's a super long list. We've riddled it down to just the biggest announcements coming out of Redmond, focused on Windows, Microsoft 365, and you guessed it, AI. 

Microsoft has announced the Windows 11 22H2 'Moment 3' update, bringing many new and long-awaited features to the operating system.
 
This is the third-moment update for Windows 11, and it will begin rolling out to users via May 24th's optional update. The Moment 3 changes will be turned off by default, but you can enable the features by turning on a toggle in Windows Update settings. The Moment 3 features will be enabled by default in June's optional update and July's Patch Tuesday.

Windows 11 and Windows 10 have a bug that can prevent the Start menu, Windows Search, and UWP apps from opening. The issue can affect apps that use Microsoft Office APIs to integrate with the Office suite, your Outlook calendar, or Windows itself. ClickShare is one app that can run into problems because of the bug, though several other applications could be affected.
 
The bug is outlined in a document from Microsoft. Issues like this appear occasionally, and we often cover them. People should know what could cause problems on their PC after all. But sometimes, outlets add confusion and conjure fear when covering reports of bugs. That appears to be the case with a recent piece by TechRadar titled "Windows 11 is so broken that even Microsoft can't fix it."

Microsoft's Windows 11 operating system comes with dozens of stock applications for all sorts of tasks. Some apps are used a lot, others occasionally, and then there are apps that may not be used at all.
 
Some Windows 11 apps can be removed from Settings > Apps or the classic Control Panel, but others are locked and can't be uninstalled. Third-party tools as well as PowerShell commands may be used to remove these from the operating system.
 
PowerShell works well, but it requires expertise, especially since the removal of apps may have unintended consequences at times.  Third-party tools, like O&O AppBuster, take care of that.

The open source application JunkCtrl is another option. It is a new program that is developed by the creator of programs like BloatyNosy and ThisIsWin11. The app BloatyNosy includes uninstallation functionality as well.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'The Super Mario Bros. Movie' tops the chart, followed by 'Sisu'. ‘Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves' completes the top three.
 
The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.
 
These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into the piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

Another week has whizzed by. That means more Microsoft news to catch up on. This week the EU approved Microsoft's purchase of Activision Blizzard, Bing Chat got some major upgrades, and Windows 11 users gained access to iMessages through the Phone Link app. We also saw the announcement of Mortal Kombat 1 and Overwatch 2's co-op PvE mode get canceled.
 
Here are all of this week's biggest stories, plus a collection of our reviews, editorials we covered.

Another weekend—another issue of Microsoft Weekly, your regular seven-day recap of everything that happened in the world of Microsoft. This week was relatively tame and quiet, something you can call the calm before the storm Build, Microsoft's annual developer conference. It is kicking off next week, and we expect many announcements from the software giant. But before that, time to look back at this week full of Windows bugs, apps, updates, Bing, and other news.

With the 64-bit only CPU proposal, Intel says that it will lead to faster CPUs by removal of legacy functions which are not in use anymore.

Almost 3 decades ago, Intel and HP started working on a 64-bit micro-architecture for the Intel CPUs. After years of work, Intel finally announced IA-64, which was a 64-bit CPU architecture. The first CPU to launch in with this architecture was Intel Itanium (Merced) processor.

ASUS has apologized to its customers for a server-side security maintenance error that has caused a wide range of impacted router models to lose network connectivity.
 
The problem has been extensively reported on social media and discussion platforms since May 16, 2023, with people appearing puzzled by the simultaneous connectivity issues on multiple ASUS routers and others complaining about the lack of communication from the vendor's side.
 
As the Taiwanese hardware maker explained in a statement published today and via a security bulletin, the problem was introduced by an error in the configuration of a server settings file.

Microsoft released Patch Tuesday updates for the month of May 2023 earlier this week on Windows 10, Windows 11, and Server. The company patched the BlackLotus UEFI security flaw which has been known to bypass measures like Secure Boot, VBS, BitLocker, Defender.
 
Microsoft had previously already published a guide on how to detect a system compromised by BlackLotus UEFI bootkit. A bootkit is essentially a malicious Windows Boot Manager. The issue is being tracked under CVE-2023-24932, and Microsoft stated that Patch Tuesday marked the initial deployment phase of the security fix under KB5025885.

When Windows 10 and 11 boot up, Microsoft Edge also loads into memory using a feature called startup boost. This way when you go to open it, it's already in memory and loads much faster.
 
If you do not use Microsoft Edge or wish it wouldn't load with Windows, here is how to disable it.

Back in February of this year, the popular third-party Windows 11 tweaking and customization tool, ThisIsWin11 (TIW11) received an update to version 1.4.1. While this update carried a few minor bug fixes, the major change was the complete repackaging of the tool into "Debloos". The developer of the utility, 'builtbybel', pitched Debloos or Debloat OS as the "Universal Debloater and PC Manager for Windows 11". However, it did not stop there as the application underwent another round of renaming as the developer of the tool finally settled for "BloatyNosy".
 
Unfortunately for the dev, Microsoft banned the app from the Store due to some policy violations. Although it made a short-lived re-entry after workarounds, BloatyNosy was once again removed and it seems this time the ban may be permanent.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'The Covenant' tops the chart, followed by 'Air'. ‘Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves' completes the top three.
 
The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.
 
These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into the piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

Everyone uses their PC in a different way, and yet, there are applications every PC should have. Because they speed up your computer, keep your data safe, or simply make life a little easier.

It is time for another Windows 11 feature drop with new capabilities, changes, and fixes. After releasing the "Moment 2" update in late February 2023, Microsoft is about to ship the next release, unofficially called "Moment 3." Here is everything you need to know about it.

The Windows 11 Moment 3 update is now on its final stretch to public release. Microsoft has started rolling out the update to insiders in the Release Preview Channel, and it will soon become available to all Windows 11 users. Still, even after downloading the latest build (22621.1776), you might not have access to the new features as Microsoft is gradually rolling out the update to test the waters.

Microsoft today has issued a re-reminder about the impending end of support (EOS) date for Windows 10 version 21H2. The feature update was released back in 2021 on November 16th and it's reaching end of servicing exactly a month from now on June 13. This means Windows 10 21H2 will no longer receive quality updates or critical security updates like Patch Tuesday.
 
Microsoft will now force-push Windows 10 version 22H2 feature update on Windows 11 21H2 systems. The company has also reminded users about upgrading to Windows 11 if your system is eligible.

Microsoft has released the May Patch Tuesday update KB5026372 for Windows 11 users, taking it up to build 22621.1702. It comes with several highlights and improvements and brings all the updates made available in the KB5025305 released towards the end of April.

It's the second Tuesday of the month, which means it's Patch Tuesday time again. As such, today Microsoft is rolling out the monthly security update (also called "B release") for May 2023 on Windows Server 20H2, and Windows 10 for the latest versions, 21H1, 21H2, and 22H2. The new updates are being distributed under KB5026361, bumping up the builds to 19042.2965, 19044.2965, and 19045.2965.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves' tops the chart, followed by 'Renfield'. ‘The Pope's Exorcist' completes the top three.
 
The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.
 
These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into the piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

Here is your weekly recap of Microsoft news published on Neowin between April 30 and May 6, 2023. We had a lot of interesting stories, controversies, neat Windows concepts, app updates, and fresh insider builds for Windows and Xbox Insiders.

Recently, Google had decided to inject ads between emails in Gmail which rightly so, had annoyed the entire of the email service's user base.
 
Luckily, there is a simple way to dodge the ads if you are one of the Gmail users suffering from in-line ads. Currently, Google is serving these ads to users who have turned on tabs which lets Gmail segregate incoming emails into different categories like Promotion and Social and Forums.

It is probably not unfair to say that Microsoft really wants people to use its Edge web browser. The company has often adopted somewhat desperate means to coax more users into trying Edge and choosing it as their default browser.
 
Just considering the Windows 11 era, the company first came under fire due to the way it set up the default app options as it was seemingly quite tedious to go through the process. There have been aggressive ads and promotions as well, like the time Microsoft called Google Chrome "so 2008" and suggested that Edge was more secure than Chrome. This kind of ad once again appeared when trying to download Chrome, only this time it took up the full screen instead of being just a tiny prompt in the corner up top, which kind of showed how much it wants users to notice it exists. And of course, from time to time Edge also wants you to choose it as the default browser.

If you’re comfortable working with regedit, you can tweak your menu so that it works the way you want it.

The right-click menu in Windows 11 is an essential shortcut to a host of features and tools, adapting to the context of what you’re clicking on along the way. You can use it to copy and paste files, edit images, interact with the clipboard, pull up the properties of a file, print documents, share files with other people, and lots more besides.

What you might not know is you can customize this right-click menu for yourself, bringing in the applications and the shortcuts you use the most and getting rid of those you don’t need. It makes the menu more useful than ever, with the potential to ramp up your computing productivity even further.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania' tops the chart, followed by 'Scream VI'. ‘Avatar: The Way of Water' completes the top three.
 
The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.
 
These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into the piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.