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We are at the end of the last week of January 2023 and it's time yet again to revisit all the important Microsoft stories from the past few days in the latest edition of Microsoft Weekly. This time, we have news regarding the Redmond tech giant's financial numbers, some more Windows 11 updates and bugs, and a bunch of upgrades to other software. For all this and more, join us in our Microsoft Weekly digest covering January 22 - January 27!

Microsoft has released its latest optional non-security cumulative update for Windows 11 (KB5022360) which bumps Windows 11 22H2 to build 22621.1194. The new update addresses an issue that affects searchindexer.exe, and also fixes a resource conflict issue between two or more threads (known as a deadlock). The update also fixes an issue that affects picture files you find using search on the taskbar. There are also the usual bug fixes and known issues to consider.

Windows 11 version 21H2 is the original release of Windows 11 that began rolling out globally on October 4, 2021. Although this version of the OS still has about nine months of support left, Microsoft has announced today that it has begun the process to update devices running this version to the latest feature update automatically.
 
In an update on its webpage displaying the status of known issues in Windows 11 version 21H2, Microsoft has stated that it has kicked off the process to automatically update consumer and non-managed business devices running Windows 11 version 21H2 to version 22H2 - which became available in September 2022 with the name "Windows 11 2022 Update".

Today, Microsoft released builds 22621.1245 and 22623.1245 (KB5022358) to the Beta Channel for Windows 11 Insiders. The company writes in its blog post:
 
Hello Windows Insiders, today we are releasing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22621.1245 and Build 22623.1245 (KB5022358) to the Beta Channel.

Different Windows users reported experiencing an issue with Microsoft Edge that causes it to repeatedly reappear on their desktops despite removing the browser icon manually. The Redmond company said it is aware of the problem, but many believe it might be just one of the giant’s desperate tactics to push Edge to Windows users. (via Windows Central)

Every few years, Microsoft is making it more difficult to create a local account during setup of the Windows operating system.
 
The company announced in February 2022 that new setups and first runs of Pro versions of Windows 11 would require a Microsoft account. Previously, one Home editions of Windows 11 required that customers signed-in to or created a Microsoft account on first run of the system.
 
It did not take long for workarounds to become available, but many users may be unaware of these bypass options. It is important to realize that both account type offers certain benefits.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'Puss in Boots: The Last Wish' tops the chart, followed by 'The Menu'. ‘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.

Continuing a long-standing annual tradition, today we publish our list of the most popular torrent sites at the start of 2023. Measured by traffic, we see that YTS takes the top spot, closely followed by 1337x. Anime torrent site NYAA, meanwhile, has entered the top three.

Welcome to the latest edition of Microsoft Weekly where we recap all the important stuff that happened in the world of Microsoft within the past few days. This time we have updates regarding Windows 11, the future of Windows as a whole, and some enhancements for IT admins and developers.

If you're looking to buy a Windows 10 license online, you might want to hurry up — by the end of this month, Microsoft will officially stop offering Windows 10 licenses on its website.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'Puss in Boots: The Last Wish' tops the chart, followed by 'The Menu'. ‘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.

Welcome to a new edition of Microsoft Weekly where we recap everything important that happened in the Microsoft-verse in the past seven days. Finally, we have a jampacked week full of interesting news items related to Windows updates, some upcoming Windows features, as well as Microsoft 365 enhancements. Without further ado, let's dive into our latest digest covering January 8 - January 13!

It hasn’t taken long. Following its launch on November 30th last year, a little over a month and a half ago, official reports are coming in from cybersecurity researchers that are seeing malware and ransomware that has either been created from scratch or augmented by ChatGPT.

I’ve written about AI and ChatGPT ad nauseum of late, but we’ve yet to cover all the amazing uses for this product. Without too much of a lengthy intro, here are 10 incredible things you likely didn’t know you could do with ChatGPT. 
 
The list below is all thanks to @thesyedhuq on Twitter, who recently went on a ChatGPT deep dive, exploring every facet of its capabilities. With the appropriate credit given, let’s get into it, shall we?

It is probably fair to say that this holiday season hasn't been the best time for AMD. First, the company had to acknowledge that its recently released Made By AMD (MBA) reference 7900 XTX cards were indeed affected by vapor chamber issue that was leading to very high hotspot temperatures of around 110°C. And now there may be more trouble brewing as Radeon RX 6000 series GPUs are said to be bricking when using the latest WHQL signed 22.11.2 driver.s

Microsoft today released the first Patch Tuesday updates for the year. And while for Windows 10 and Windows 11, these will be the first of many, for Windows 7 and 8.1, it was the final release as Extended Security Support (ESU) ended today. While Patch Tuesday updates are mostly security patches, today's release on Windows 11 has a couple of hidden features inside.
 
Spotted by Windows enthusiast and detective PhantomOcean3, the new build has the new Taskbar search that was introduced in Beta channel build 2262x.1037.

Google Chrome version 108 arrived well over a month ago, and now it's time for Chrome 109 to be rolled out to consumers. Although Chrome releases are generally separated by a four-week gap, the break was longer this time around due to the holiday season. Regardless, Chrome 109 is now rolling out, it's a significant release because it's the last version of the browser to support Windows 7 and 8.1. Microsoft itself dropped support for both the operating systems quite recently.
 
Interestingly, the latest release of Chrome also packs Cookies Having Independent Partitioned State (CHIPS), which is Google's alternative to third-party cookies, something that it is deprecating within a couple of years. This implementation has an opt-in mechanism for developers to subscribe to the top-level site, which Google claims should enable "non-tracking-related" use-cases and won't be restricted to cross-site cookie blocking.

Microsoft has released a new update for Windows Subsystem for Android - a software engine that makes it possible to run Android apps on modern Windows 11-based computers - in the Windows Insider program. Version 2211.40000.11.0 is available for download in all Windows Insider channels, delivering customers a new Android version and multiple improvements, such as faster boot, better mouse clicks input, improved clipboard and app resizing, etc.

Today is Microsoft's January 2023 Patch Tuesday, and with it comes fixes for an actively exploited zero-day vulnerability and a total of 98 flaws.
 
This is the first Patch Tuesday of 2023, and it fixes a whopping 98 vulnerabilities, with eleven of them classified as 'Critical.'

It’s the second Tuesday of the month, so that can mean only one thing: it’s Patch Tuesday. The update you’re looking out for this month is KB5022303, once it’s installed on your computer, your OS Build should be 22621.1105. Given that much of the last month has included holidays, it’s not too surprising that the highlights in this update are a bit scarce.

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 January 2023 on Windows Server 20H2, and Windows 10 for the latest versions, 21H1, 21H2, and 22H2. The new updates are being distributed under KB5022282, bumping up the builds to 19042.2486, 19044.2486, and 19045.2486.

Microsoft has released the final Windows 7 (KB5022338) and Windows 8.1 (KB5022352) Patch Tuesday updates. Both include improvements but unfortunately also some known issues which will now never be addressed.

Every week we take a close look at the most pirated movies on torrent sites. What are pirates downloading? 'The Menu' tops the chart, followed by 'Puss in Boots: The Last Wish'. ‘Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery' 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.

Some users think 2022 was not the best year for Microsoft's desktop operating system. It took a while for Windows 11 to surpass the now-dead Windows 7, and the significantly steeper hardware requirements surely do not help the OS crank up its rollout speed. Another stumbling block is questionable feature changes (with even more questionable excuses from Microsoft) that make Windows 11 less attractive for those with eligible hardware. You can also add to the list Microsoft's failed promise to deliver a single update per year—no one knows when and how many updates Windows 11 will receive.

Welcome to the first edition of Microsoft Weekly for 2023. As most of our readers may be aware, Microsoft Weekly is a digest where we recap every important news related to the tech giant from the past seven days. This time, we have some updates related to Windows 11 builds, as well as a bunch of enhancements for Teams and Outlook. Let's dive into the latest Microsoft Weekly edition covering January 1 - January 6!