The Canary builds of Windows 11 are very much the cutting edge of Microsoft’s operating system development, and the latest release includes numerous welcome changes and additions, as well as fixing problems.
Not only does Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27871 see Phone companion for the Start menu rolling out once again, but it is rolling out in an improved form with new features. There are also tweaks to the Taskbar, and new energy saving options in Microsoft InTune.
See also:
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- Microsoft releases emergency fix for Windows 11 startup problems
- Quick Machine Recovery is Microsoft’s latest tool for fixing Windows 11 boot problems
The improved Phone Link seems to be getting closer to the sort of thing Microsoft first suggested it would be. There’s now single-click Android screen mirroring, and better options for iPhone users with iCloud photos and memory accessible from the Start menu. Notifications are now better grouped together by app to make them more useful.
For the Taskbar, Microsoft has tweaked the “needy state pill” under apps on the taskbar that need attention to be wider and more visible.
In this build, Microsoft has also made Energy saver available in Microsoft Intune:
We are bringing the ability to manage energy saver in Windows 11 to Microsoft Intune to allow IT administrators to control the energy saver settings on Windows 11 PCs through group policies and Mobile Device Management (MDM) configurations.
This feature, when enabled, intelligently balances your battery use, so it can last longer between charges. It extends battery life by managing power usage efficiently. It limits background activity and reduces screen brightness, ensuring that devices consume less power while maintaining optimal performance. By automatically managing system processes and power usage, the energy saver group policy helps reduce overall energy consumption. This not only saves costs but also contributes to environmental sustainability.
New features and options are all well and good, but this build also sees various issues being addressed:
[General]
- We have mitigated the issue where if Virtualization Based Security is enabled, applications dependent on virtualization, such as VMware Workstation, would lose the ability to run unless the “Windows Hypervisor Platform” Windows optional component is installed on the system.
[File Explorer]
- Fixed an issue where if you had disconnected network drives when doing a search from Home it might prevent searches from executing and you’d remain on Home.
- Fixed an issue where tapping the View button in File Explorer with touch would crash File Explorer.
[Taskbar]
- Fixed an issue where WIN + CTRL + Number wasn’t working anymore for switching windows in the taskbar.
- Fixed an underlying issue which was causing keyboard focus to get set to widgets in the taskbar on login, which could make widgets unexpectedly invoke.
- Fixed an issue when using Tab and Shift + Tab to move keyboard focus around the taskbar, where if keyboard focus went backwards at least once you could get keyboard focus stuck on the taskbar frame, causing some screen readers to just say “pane”.
[Settings]
- Fixed an issue where hovering over the cards at the top of Settings > System > About wasn’t showing the correct corner radius.
- Fixed an issue where the storage card in Settings > System > About showed a garbage character instead of the proper disk size.
[Administrator Protection]
- Fixed an issue where when using Administrator Protection, some apps might not follow your preference if it was set to dark mode.
[Task Manager]
- Fixed the issue causing search and other options such as filtering in Task Manager to not work.
[Audio]
- Fixed an issue in the last few Canary flights where audio devices with high sampling (like 192Hz) and multiple channels weren’t producing sound.
- Fixed an issue which could cause the startup sound not to play, though it was enabled.
[Input]
- Fixed an issue where voice typing wouldn’t start from the touch keyboard when using the Chinese (Simplified) narrow layout.
- Fixed an issue where when using the Symbols section of the touch keyboard, pressing the key to change pages might unexpectedly insert a character into password fields.
[Graphics]
- Fixed an issue which could cause unexpected scaling and window position changes after sleep/resume for some devices.
[Voice access]
- Fixed an issue which could voice access to freeze with error “working on it” when dictating.
[Other]
- Fixed an issue causing an Administrative Templates error message when opening Group Policy Editor.
- Fixed an issue where some of the commands when using xml to setup were unexpectedly not being run.
- Fixed an issue when installing Windows from installation media, where if you changed your keyboard layout from the default, it may still use the default when entering the product key.
- Fixed an issue when installing Windows from installation media, where certain partitions may show an extremely large erroneous size.
Full details about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27871 are available here.
