Software & Apps - Page 13

If you've been worrying about what you're going to do in a year, when support runs out for Windows 10 - and you really don't want to upgrade to Windows 11 (or hardware requirements mean that you can't) - then Microsoft has thrown you a lifeline.

Albeit a lifeline with a cost attached, but this is the first time that Microsoft has actually made the scheme to pay for extended support available to the average consumer - with a charge of $30.

Previously, Microsoft has enacted ESU (Extended Security Update) programs for enterprise and education users, with subscriptions per user, but this personal individual option is new.

Microsoft's new super resolution ability - which was recently applied (in preview) to the Photos app in Windows 11 - has suffered from a seemingly botched rollout by the software giant.

This is a new AI ability - one for Copilot+ PCs, as it requires a beefy NPU for acceleration - and it allows for enhancing or enlarging images, by a factor of up to 8x. The idea is you can blow up a photo for a large print, or improve very low quality photos to something a bit sharper and more palatable.

This was supposed to be in testing for Windows Insiders, but as leaker PhantomOfEarth reports, super resolution was appearing on some devices that it wasn't supposed to be on. Presumably, that means non-Copilot+ PCs, rather than the feature coming to users outside of the Windows Insider programme.

It's officially less than a year until the world's most popular operating system loses support from Microsoft, in an event that is being described as "The biggest Ctrl-Alt-Delete" in history.

That operating system is none other than Windows 10, which, according to data from Statcounter, currently holds approximately 65% of the operating system market, with Windows 11 only recently bumping up past the 30% market. Notably, Windows 11 is being adopted at a rate much slower than previous operating system generations, and with Microsoft announcing the end-of-support date for October 2025, it's a real possibility that millions of Windows 10 users will have an increased security risk following the official end of support date.

Each PC no longer receiving security updates from Microsoft will be exponentially vulnerable to breaches or be rendered obsolete if it doesn't meet the hardware requirements for Windows 11. Microsoft has stated users with Long Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) editions of Windows 10, Windows 10 IoT Enterprise LTSC, and Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC will all have extended support durations. However, any other version of Windows 10 will no longer receive support from Microsoft post-October 14, 2025.

Microsoft has recently published a paper and patent for a new form of video streaming called 'Gaze Based Video Stream Processing.' It's a simple but impressive software tool powered by AI that would bring the concept of foveated rendering to video meeting and chat applications like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and Discord.

It's technology based on how we see as humans where objects within 5-10 degrees of our main focus are viewed with the most detail, with that quickly falling off by 20% outside of this 10 degrees.

Foveated rendering for VR gaming involves using eye-tracking to ensure that the areas or objects you're directly looking at are rendered at the highest quality with all the effects and detail settings cranked. At the same time, areas or objects not being looked at have reduced quality to boost performance. With its new patent, Microsoft is bringing this concept to video streaming.

If you own certain models of Western Digital SSDs then the company is 'highly recommending' that you install a new firmware update that resolves a bug in Windows 11 24H2.

As you may have seen yesterday, the issue pertains to the Host Memory Buffer feature (for more details, read our previous article), and the resulting bug means that some SSDs are affected by repeated crashing (with some ending up in a boot loop of BSoDs, in fact - really nasty).

WD tells us that the affected models are as follows:

When Windows 11 arrived, it received a rather lukewarm reception - something that continues up until today, in some respects (as evidenced by the OS adoption figures) - and some of that reaction was bound up in the interface.

Granted, most of the grimacing was around mysterious and baffling UI changes (getting rid of 'never combine', taskbar options and so on), but there were folks who didn't take to the new look (and especially the Start menu).

Of course, if you want to tinker and customize Windows 11, you have a raft of options and software to help you, and one intrepid modder has illustrated how radical a change it's possible to make - in reskinning Windows 11 to look like Windows 95.

Microsoft has announced it's releasing a new build of the world's most popular operating system despite its scheduled appearance on the proverbial chopping block next year.

That operating system is Windows 10, and according to a new Windows blog post, the operating system has gotten Windows 10 22H2 19045.5070 (KB5045594) in both the Beta Channel and Release Preview Channel for Insiders. For those who don't know, Microsoft will end support with Windows 10 in October 2025, which will cause millions of PCs around the world to become exponentially vulnerable to security breaches - not to mention obsolete if they don't meet the hardware requirements for a Windows 11 upgrade.

Beta and Release Preview channel users for Windows 10 may begin to notice new changes to the account manager and the Star Menu. One user described the changes as unnecessary and the equivalent of a supermarket reorganizing its shelves just because management believe it's the right thing to do. Notably, when Microsoft severs support with Windows 10 in October next year the operating system will continue to function, but it will no longer receive security updates.

Windows 11 users are getting the 24H2 update, but as this upgrade is being gradually rolled out, some folks are encountering problems - one of which is 24H2 seemingly eating some of their drive space.

You may recall that we previously reported on this issue, whereby after the 24H2 update has been installed, the user will see 8.6GB of cached files for the upgrade, which can be removed by Disk Cleanup. However, when that cleanup is actioned, Windows 11 still reports that the 8.6GB of files remain.

This has left many people scratching their heads, but now Microsoft has come forth with an explanation. Essentially, the cleanup operation actually works fine, the bug is in the figure reported by Windows 11. So, your drive has actually had said space freed, it's just that the OS still says the files are present.

Windows 10 will run out of support in less than a year now, but Microsoft is still developing the older OS - despite mulling a feature-freeze at one point - and drafting over features from Windows 11.

In a new Windows 10 preview - build 19045 in the Beta and Release Preview channels - there's a backported feature as highlighted by regular Windows leaker PhantomOfEarth on X.

This is the 'Copy' button in the Share menu which was brought into Windows 11 a few months back (plus you get a preview of the file's icon and its size), though we should note this isn't live in preview yet. It's hidden behind the scenes, and you need to use ViVeTool to enable the functionality.

Microsoft has rolled out the Windows 11 24H2 update and according to some reports it contains a collection of data that users are unable to delete.

It's not uncommon for Microsoft to include what many users would find unnecessary content within their updates, which are typically removed by those who are so inclined to purge their system of any unwanted Microsoft software. File remnants in various forms has been recognized by Microsoft who stated Windows keeps multiple copies of all installed updates from Windows Update, "even after installing newer versions of updates."

However, for those wanting to remove these unwanted files to free up storage, Microsoft provides the Disk Cleanup tool or the Windows Setting application. However, it appears that 8.63 GB of data cannot be removed from the system after downloading the Windows 11 24H2 update. The Register reports that regardless of how much a user deletes it or restarts Windows 11, it will still remain.