Tag: Windows 11

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Microsoft says some Windows 11 features aren’t working due to expired certificate

Microsoft is warning Windows 11 users that some of the operating system’s features are failing due to an expired certificate.

Following the expiration on October 31st, Windows 11 is currently preventing apps like the touch keyboard, Snipping Tool and emoji panel from opening.

It’s unclear exactly how many users are affected by these issues, but for now, Microsoft has a patch (‘KB4006746‘) available in preview, which needs to be installed manually. However, while this fixes most issues, like the touch keyboard and emoji panel, Microsoft notes that the Snipping Tool app remains dysfunctional.

“To mitigate the issue with Snipping Tool, use the Print Screen key on your keyboard and paste the screenshot into your document,” says Microsoft. “You can also paste it into Paint to select and copy the section you want.”

The company says this is its suggestion in the meantime until it rolls out a formal resolution, which it will provide an update [on] when more information is available.”

Source: Microsoft

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Microphone mute switch coming to Windows 11 taskbar soon

As promised, Microsoft is close to rolling out a microphone mute switch to Windows 11. The latest dev channel build for the recently released operating system has finally added the mic switch to the Taskbar.

This suggests that the button will soon ship to all versions of Windows 11. If you can’t wait for the update, Microsoft also offers a tool app called PowerToys with a similar feature and other cool extras.

How the new button works

Once the actual button does roll out, it will be located next to the Wi-Fi and volume icons in the bottom right of the Taskbar.

You can click on it to mute/unmute your mic or see what apps are accessing your microphone currently. That said, the beta version only works with Microsoft Teams currently and it looks like it’s going to be up to individual developers to add support for the feature. With this in mind, I wouldn’t expect it to work in Google Meet or Zoom at launch.

This is similar to how macOS, iOS and Android all handle microphone access now. If an app is using your mic, you’ll see a small orange or green dot along the top of your screen on these platforms. The other major platforms also display a notification of some kind of they’re using your camera too. As it stands right now, Windows doesn’t offer a similar feature.

Source: Digital Trends

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Microsoft updates PowerToys with Windows 11 theme and more

Microsoft’s best app, PowerToys, has received a UI update to match the overall theme of Windows 11, and it includes several new features packed in it.

One of the new features allows users to disable their microphone and webcam globally across Windows 11. The other feature is called ‘Find My Mouse,’ and it enables users to doubt tap the CTRL key to shine a spotlight on the mouse.

What’s interesting about the webcam and mic mute functionality is that Windows 11 was supposed to launch with a microphone mute button, but that feature has been delayed and now Microsoft is pushing out a similar feature through the PowerToys utility pack. You can also turn the silent/video disable button into a keyboard shortcut, set it to open up a small control bar whenever an app starts using your webcam.

If you’re unfamiliar with PowerToys, it’s a package of Windows features that Microsoft releases separately through GitHub that adds a suite of subtle features to the operating system. I find PowerToys useful because I like the larger System Search function and the keyboard remapping tool.

However, other features include ‘Fancy Zones’ that let you snap windows to specific sizes more efficiently and a shortcut to help show you what shortcuts you can use in Windows 10 and 11. You can read a little more about it in our prior coverage and download PowerToys from Microsoft here.

Via: The Verge

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Microsoft says its increasing availability of Windows 11 to more devices

Microsoft will start pushing the Windows 11 update out to more devices.

The newest version of Windows became available to a limited number of mostly new devices on October 4th. At least, that was the case for those wanting to take the easy route and simply click an ‘Install’ button — there were (and still are) several ways to manually update your PC if you want to get Windows 11 as soon as possible.

Microsoft chose to roll out Windows 11 slowly to devices to make sure that those updating had a good experience. Now, the company says it has “increased” the availability of Windows 11. Further, it’s “leveraging our latest generation machine learning model to offer the upgrade to an expanded set of eligible devices.”

All that means is if you want to update to Windows 11 but haven’t yet, you might be able to get the update now by heading to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update and checking for an update.

If the update doesn’t become available for you in the coming days and you’re sick of waiting, you can also take matters into your own hands and start the process manually if your computer hardware is compatible with the update. You can read more about that here.

Source: Microsoft Via: The Verge

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Microsoft is beta testing Android apps on Windows 11

A new preview build of Windows 11 currently making its way to beta testers finally allows users to try out Android apps in Windows 11.

If you’re running the latest Windows 11 beta software, you can download apps from the new Microsoft Store app. However, these apps are actually sourced from Amazon’s App Store. Android apps reportedly function well in Windows 11 and integrate with ‘Alt+Tab’ and ‘Task View.’

The report also mentions that Windows has added 50 apps to the beta for people to try out. Amazon’s App Store features 600,000 apps in total. It’s unclear if Microsoft plans to bring all of the store’s apps to Windows 11 once the feature officially launches.

Being able to run Android apps is one of the highlights of Windows 11 that Microsoft has yet to deliver on. Hopefully, the feature rolls out soon.

Via: The Verge

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How to change the default browser in Windows 11

If you’re among the lucky ones who successfully updated their PC to Windows 11, great! We hope you’re enjoying it. However, some things have changed from Windows 10, like how to set a default browser. That’s why we put together this handy guide.

Also, if some of this sounds familiar, that’s because when we wrote about default browser settings in Windows 11 back during the preview period. Not much has changed, which is good news if you already learned how to change the default browser in Windows 11 and bad news if you’d prefer a simple process for setting defaults. Anyway, let’s get into it.

To set a default browser in Windows 11, you need to open Settings > Apps > Default apps. Unfortunately, this is where things get… weird.

Microsoft now requires Windows 11 users pick the app that they want to make default (in the case of a browser, you’d pick Chrome, Firefox, Brave or another browser of your choice from the list of apps). In the next screen, users should see a list of related file types (for example, ‘.html’ files).

You’ll need to go through this list and click on each file type, then select the app from the pop-up. For example, click ‘.htm’ and then click Chrome, Firefox, etc. from the pop-up list. In some cases, you may see a ‘Before you switch’ pop-up that will try and encourage you to stick with Edge — you can click ‘Switch anyway’ to bypass it.

Once that’s done, you should be good to go. It is worth noting, however, that some apps have built-in default switchers that can help users avoid doing this. Firefox Nightly, for example, let me click a button in Firefox’s settings menu to change my default browser — I didn’t have to open the Windows 11 settings menu. While more apps might do this in time, for now, it’s hit-and-miss which apps will support it.

Edge has considerable staying power

Additionally, some apps might not switch over every file type, which could mean opening certain things will throw you back into Edge (or another default) instead. Moreover, some parts of Windows 11 completely ignore the default browser setting.

In particular, the fancy new widget pane (accessible by clicking the blue square icon on the taskbar, not to be confused with the Start icon with four blue squares). Some items in the widgets pane will still open in Edge. The Verge points out that an app called ‘EdgeDeflector‘ can help redirect links that will always open in Edge to open in the default browser instead.

You’ll need to grab the latest version (1.2.3.0), which supports Windows 11. Still, the app isn’t perfect and some items might still open in Microsoft Edge. Maybe that will change in time with future updates.

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Some AMD Ryzen CPUs seeing up to 15% performance hit on Windows 11

Source: https://www.amd.com/en/corporate/newsroom-media

Windows users with AMD Ryzen chips may want to hold off on updating to Windows 11 for the time being — Microsoft and AMD have uncovered at least two issues causing performance issues for Ryzen chips.

According to AMD support (via The Verge), Microsoft’s fancy new operating system can cause performance drops up to 15 percent in some cases.

The first of the two issues is that Windows 11 can cause L3 cache latency to triple. According to AMD, that could cause a three to five percent degradation in performance in most applications. Games (AMD specifically mentions “games commonly used for eSports”) can see a 10-15 percent performance hit.

The second issue is with AMD’s ‘preferred core’ tech, which shifts threads to the fastest core on a processor. AMD says that users may see performance issues with tasks that are heavily reliant on the CPU, especially if they have a processor with more than eight cores and above 65W TDP.

AMD and Microsoft are looking into the issues, with AMD noting on its support page that a Windows update is “in development” and should arrive later this month. For now, however, AMD users may want to hold off on the Windows 11 update.

Image credit: AMD

Source: AMD Via: The Verge

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How to install Windows 11 on your Windows 10 PC

Microsoft finally dropped Windows 11 this week after several months of confusion around which the new operating system would support.

Although the OS is available now, some of that confusion still remains. That said, people are actually able to download and try Windows 11 now, so hopefully people smarter than me will figure out all the details soon.

For the time being, if you have supported hardware and want to install Windows 11, there are two main ways to go about it — the safe way and the fast way. And for those who aren’t sure if they can install Windows 11 on their device, Microsoft recently re-released its upgrade compatibility check tool that shows if Windows 11 supports your PC. You can download that here (it’s at the bottom of the page).

If your hardware is compatible with Windows 11, here’s how to install it:

The Safe Way

The safest, easiest way to install Windows 11 on your Windows 10 PC is through your computer’s built-in ‘Windows Update’ tool. To access it, press the ‘Windows’ and ‘I’ keys, or tap the Windows key and search ‘Settings.’ Then, click ‘Update & Security.’

If you’re lucky, you’ll see a big blue block that says something like “Upgrade to Windows 11 is ready.” From there, just click the ‘Download and install’ button to start the process.

If you don’t see the update banner, it’s likely because Microsoft hasn’t started rolling out the update to your device yet. The company is taking its time with the rollout and it may take a few days, weeks or even months for the upgrade banner to appear in Windows Update. However, when it does show up, it should mean Microsoft is confident your PC is ready for Windows 11.

Another reason why the Windows 11 upgrade banner won’t show up is your PC’s hardware isn’t compatible. Again, you should use the compatibility check tool mentioned up top to verify that your PC is good to go before starting this process.

The Fast Way

For those with less patience and, ideally, the technical know-how to troubleshoot any issues that pop up, there is a faster way to upgrade to Windows 11.

Microsoft’s ‘Download Windows 11‘ website offers several options for getting the update. The first, and the one I’d recommend for most people, is the ‘Installation Assistant.’ It’s just a bit of software the effectively lets users bypass the Windows Upgrade wait and install Windows 11 right away. The main caveat is, of course, that you may encounter more bugs and issues if Microsoft hasn’t deemed your PC ready.

It’s the route I went with on my desktop since my hardware was compatible, but I didn’t have the update option in Windows Update. All you need to do is download the Windows 11 Installation Assistant, run it and follow the steps (which mainly involves waiting for it to download and install Windows 11).

Microsoft lists a few things people should be aware of before starting the Windows 11 update process, including that you need a Windows 10 licence, your PC must be on Windows 10 version 2004 or higher, it needs at least 9GB of free space and it must meet the Windows 11 hardware requirements.

As for bugs, I’ve only had Windows 11 running on my desktop for about an hour or two now but I haven’t experienced anything truly problematic. That said, I didn’t expect to — I tested the Windows 11 preview on a laptop and didn’t run into any significant issues there. Still, if you want to avoid bugs as much as possible, wait for the upgrade to hit the Windows Update menu on your PC. And, worst case scenario, if you do encounter bugs, you have 10 days to go back to Windows 10 — you can read more on downgrading here.

The other options on Microsoft’s ‘Download Windows 11‘ website are more involved tools for edge cases. There are options for creating Windows 11 Installation Media or Disk Images (ISO) for doing clean Windows 11 installs. Most people likely won’t need to use these tools, but it’s good to know that they’re there if you need them.

Overall, the Windows 11 upgrade process is relatively simple if you have officially supported hardware. Unfortunately for those who don’t, the process is a little more complicated (but the tools offered on Microsoft’s ‘Download Windows 11’ website should be able to help). Either way, if you’re not prepared to deal with bugs and issues of new software, you may want to hold off on upgrading to Windows 11 for the time being.

Besides, Microsoft will support Windows 10 until October 2025, so there isn’t a huge rush to upgrade.

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Windows 11 is now available to download

Microsoft has finally started rolling out the next version of its desktop operating system, Windows 11.

According to The Verge, the update will begin appearing for users gradually, but people with newer pre-built computers and laptops are more likely to get the update first. Microsoft says that it expects all eligible PCs to get the update by the middle of next year.

Since Windows 11 went live in New Zealand, anyone can technically download it now. However, not anyone can install it. Specifically, custom-built computers may need to be updated or include features like secure boot enabled in their BIOS before they’re eligible for the new update.

The update includes a striking new look, a centred taskbar, better touch screen support and several other improvements over Windows 10. You can learn more about it in our prior coverage of the operating system.

You can also try to download the update here, but it may not work on all Windows 10 machines.

Source: The Verge 

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Microsoft’s updated PC Health Check app now available to all

Ahead of Microsoft’s Surface event on September 22nd, the company finally rolled out its upgraded PC Health Check app.

If you’ve been following the ongoing Windows 11 upgrade debacle, you’re likely familiar with the PC Health Check app. For those who aren’t, Microsoft released the app alongside the initial Windows 11 announcement for people to scan their PC and check if it’s compatible with the new OS.

Unfortunately, the app didn’t offer an explanation when a PC failed the check. Since Microsoft’s seemingly arbitrary security and CPU requirements caused many capable, custom-built PCs to fail, Windows users were left scrambling, trying to figure out why and what they could do about it. At the time, the most logical explanation was that the new TPM requirement caused PCs to fail the check, which resulted in prices for TPMs spiking as people rushed to buy them. Additionally, tons of coverage detailed how some CPUs had built-in TPM capabilities and explained how users could enable that functionality.

Ultimately, Microsoft pulled the PC Health Check app and promised to bring it back with more clarity and detail. The new version rolled out to Windows Insiders in August and is now generally available. You can download it from the bottom of Microsoft’s Windows 11 website.

PC Health Check now says why your computer isn’t compatible with Windows 11

However, a lot has changed since the initial PC Health Check app. For one, Microsoft has made an effort to better explain the strict hardware requirements for Windows 11. While some would argue that the company hasn’t been successful, I’d say at least we have a better understanding of which CPUs Windows 11 doesn’t support, if not why Microsoft chose not to support them.

This is made worse by the fact that many people have been able to run Windows 11 just fine on hardware that supposedly wouldn’t be supported by the new OS. A great example of this is The Verge’s Tom Warren, who wrote that he ran the new PC Health Check app on his desktop PC and received a message that the PC isn’t compatible, despite that the PC was running Windows 11 when he performed the test.

Moreover, that seems to back up information Microsoft provided in August — the company said it wouldn’t block PCs with older CPUs from installing Windows 11. However, Microsoft also followed up that announcement by saying it might withhold future updates, including security updates, from PCs with unsupported hardware.

New installer message warns of compatibility issues on unsupported hardware

Windows 11 installer message (Credit: The Verge)

Additionally, Warren reports that the Windows 11 installer now pops up with a new message that basically warns your PC isn’t supported, that there may be compatibility issues because of it, and that running Windows 11 may void your warranty. The warning doesn’t exactly inspire confidence, although it may also simply be a way for Microsoft to cover its ass should something go really wrong.

All this is to say that the Windows 11 upgrade remains confusing and frustrating, especially for people with custom-built PCs or older, but still capable, hardware. Even my Windows 10 desktop with a 10th Gen Intel CPU was listed as incompatible with Windows 11 until I dug into the BIOS and changed several settings. The refreshed PC Health Check app should help identify cases where Windows users can get away with just that — changing some settings to get their PC in order. But for those who don’t have a CPU on Microsoft’s special list, you’re still out of luck.

Source: The Verge