One of the most widely-used Zoom apps is closing as the company looks to modernize some of its offerings for users around the world.
The video conferencing giant has announced it is shutting its app for Chromebooks, the low-cost machines running Google's ChromeOS that have become incredibly popular among schools and universities.
Users shouldn't fear the loss of Zoom forever though, as the company says it is only making the change in order to build something better.
Zoom on Chromebook
“This app will no longer be officially supported after August 2022. Please use the new Zoom for Chrome PWA to join meetings on ChromeOS,” said a notice in the Zoom app for Chromebooks that has recently begun appearing.
The app is set to close by August 2022, meaning users have a few more weeks of the original offering, which was released during Zoom's heyday in the early weeks and months of the pandemic.
9to5Google, which first spotted the alert, notes that the Zoom app for Chromebooks is pretty basic, only offering standard access to video calls and meetings without any of the added functionality that has been added to other versions of Zoom over the years.
Google had announced back in August 2020 that it would be phasing out Chrome apps on all platforms, with support on Windows, Mac and Linux ending in June 2021. This was later extended to all Chrome apps on ChromeOS for June 2022, with the company no longer accepting new apps, and existing apps no longer being listed or made available to download on the Chrome Web Store.
Zoom had shown off a Progressive Web App (PWA) for Chromebooks in 2021, offering much of the standard functionality familiar to users on other platforms, as well as up to date UI and apps.
In its most recent financial results, the company said that the number of customers contributing more than $ 100,000 was up 46% year-over-year, as it now has around 198,900 enterprise customers, up 24% from the same quarter in its last fiscal year.
Apple’s iOS has come a long way from its iPhoneOS starting point, and all of the best iPhones have built on the operating system’s initial promise. Steve Jobs demonstrated the power of the iPhone in 2007 with a huge on-stage Starbucks order, and the platform has grown year after year with each update adding new features.
Multitasking, the notification and Control Center, and even the App Store, were all added to the iPhone after its first iteration, and that rapid pace of innovation can make it hard to keep up with new features.
With that in mind, we’ve put together this list of useful features you may have missed. Some are accessibility options, some need to be enabled, and others are just waiting to be used. All of them, though, will make your iPhone experience better.
1. Use a cursor to select text
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
Texting is a way of life, but it’s still surprisingly cumbersome even at the best of times. If you’ve ever had an errant word added by autocorrect but not spotted it until you’ve written a few dozen words more, this tip is for you.
Sure, you can hold your finger to the text to jump to it, but this can occasionally lead to highlighting an entire word or sentence. For more granular control, we’d recommend the following:
Hold your finger or thumb at the bottom of your screen, underneath the keyboard.
This will grey out the keyboard, and turn it into a trackpad until you raise your finger or thumb.
Hey presto, easy text selection!
2. Create text snippets
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
Text snippets are popular for macOS power users, but you can achieve the same result with your iPhone. Better yet, it doesn’t require any third-party software.
Text snippets are ideal shortcuts for copying in certain phrases you’ve pre-registered. If you’re dealing with a client via iMessage, for example, you may want to send a standardized response. With text replacement, you can create a block of text to be posted whenever you type a phrase.
Open Settings, then head to General, then Keyboard.
Pick Text Replacement and you’ll be able to create new replacements, and the words required to trigger them.
In our example, you can see that typing 'omw' brings up 'On my way!', but there are plenty of places where this would be useful. You can also set emoji to appear when you type, which feels pleasantly nostalgic in a way you just don’t get from the emoji picker.
3. Enable the scientific calculator
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
The iPad may not feature a calculator, but the iPhone does. The trouble is, it can feel a tad limiting outside of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division – at least until you find a new perspective.
Turning your iPhone to the side with the calculator app open will enable the scientific calculator. This adds brackets, square roots, cos/sin/tan options, and the ever-handy π command, among plenty of others.
4. Enable an additional ‘button’
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
While intended as an accessibility feature, the iPhone’s ‘back tap’ button is handy for power users looking for additional input for their device.
Go to Settings, then Accessibility, then Touch.
Select Back Tap and you’ll be presented with plenty of options.
You can use this in a number of ways, such as triggering the App Switcher, snapping a quick screenshot, or opening Spotlight search from anywhere on your device. There are also double and triple tap options, meaning you can set multiple functions for it.
5. Use your camera’s 'Burst Mode'
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
Your iPhone’s camera is plenty powerful enough, but there’s one trick you may have missed: Burst Mode. Burst mode, as the name suggests, takes a series of rapid-fire images in one press which means your iPhone can capture a series of action shots.
It’s ideal for pets and excitable toddlers, letting you go back and look at your pictures after the event and pick out the best ones. It’s easy to access, too. Just slide the Shutter button (the one you use to take photos) to the left when you’re in the Camera app.
You can also head into Settings, then Camera, and toggle Use Volume Up for Burst to allow your volume rocker to trigger Burst mode – just hold it when you’re taking an image.
6. Scan documents using the camera
Your iPhone’s camera can double as a very respectable document scanner, and while Live Text means you can extract text from images, it’s entirely possible to digitize an entire document. Because it’s buried in the Notes app, though, you may not have spotted how to do it.
Open Notes, then tap the camera icon, then Scan Documents.
Highlight your document and it should automatically save. You can also manually take a scan with the shutter button.
Once the scan is saved, you can sign it, too, or just share it via any email or messaging app. It’s not got the same level of quality as a bespoke scanner, but it’s not far off, and will certainly do in a pinch.
One final camera trick, which is a little different. As an accessibility feature, you can trigger your iPhone’s camera flash to go off when you receive a notification, providing a more visual way of knowing someone is calling or messaging.
Head into Settings, then Accessibility.
In the Audio/Visual section there’s an option for ‘LED Flash for Alerts’.
You can also trigger it to only work when your phone is on silent, which is ideal if you’d prefer your phone not to vibrate on a desk.
8. Master Control Center
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
Introduced as part of iOS 7 all the way back in 2013, Control Center has moved from the bottom of the screen to the top as the years have gone by, and it has a lot more utility than you may be aware of.
While Apple doesn’t offer Force Touch these days, you can long-press on Control Center icons to get additional options.
Through this, you can enable Spatial Audio with compatible earphones, pick a Focus mode, get a better look at what’s playing on your audio app, or even go two layers deep – the quadrant with Airplane Mode, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and mobile signal can be expanded to allow you to easily select a Wi-Fi access point, for example.
9. Recognize any song with Shazam in the Control Center
(Image credit: Apple / TechRadar)
Remember Shazam? The music recognition service was purchased by Apple in 2018 and remains a great way to identify whatever song is playing – whether you’re in a store, at a party, or just missed the name on the radio.
While Shazam has an app, you can also add it to your iPhone’s Control Center for easy access.
Open Settings, then enter Control Center and tap the Plus button next to Music Recognition to add it.
Now, whenever you hear a great song playing, you can pull down from Control Center and hit the Shazam icon to find out what’s playing. If you’re on Apple Music, it’ll even give you the option to add the track to your library.
Nothing in life really comes for free, and Windows 11 is a great example of that. While Microsoft’s latest operating system is offered as a free upgrade for many users (previous moves from older versions of Windows to newer ones would require you to pay for the privilege), behind the scenes, there are plenty of ways you end up ‘paying’ to use Windows 11.
This includes sharing increasing amounts of data with Microsoft – something that the company was forced to make clear during the setup process. Microsoft is also using Windows 11 to push you towards its own services. For example, you’re now asked to have a Microsoft account, which usually involves signing up for a Microsoft-owned email account. You’re also encouraged to use Microsoft’s OneDrive cloud storage, rather than alternatives like Google Drive or iCloud.
And this is all before you even use Windows 11 for the first time. Once you actually boot into the operating system, things get worse. Microsoft’s Edge browser is installed by default, and while it’s come a long way since it first debuted in 2015 with Windows 10, many people (myself included) prefer to use other web browsers.
However, searching for and installing a different browser in Windows 11 using Edge results in numerous popups and messages from Microsoft pleading with you to give Edge a try. It’s annoying, and a little bit cringey, to be honest.
Still, you can at least ignore those, install your web browser of choice, and make it the default – which Microsoft has at least made easier to do after pressure from users.
While annoying, it was something I didn’t mind putting up with to use Windows 11, which is ‘free’, after all. However, Microsoft has been getting increasingly desperate – and even greedy – when it comes to trying to force its services on me, and it’s making me start to dislike the operating system.
Helping itself before it helps you
A particularly egregious example of this happened the other day. I’m one of those cool kids who still prefers to use a desktop PC, and I noticed that all of a sudden, my computer was losing internet access every 20 seconds or so.
Now, as a tech journalist, this led to me overthinking the problem. My PC is connected to my modem via an Ethernet cable and powerline adapters, so my first step was to restart and reconnect the adapters, which had caused a similar issue in the past.
When the problem persisted, I looked to disable then re-enable my network adapter in Windows 11. In previous versions of Windows, this was a pretty straightforward process, but Microsoft has now buried the option under several different settings screens – another annoying feature of Windows 11.
I then decided to try the built-in network troubleshooting tool. Again, in previous versions of Windows, this was easy to find, and as part of the troubleshooting process the operating system would disable then enable the network adapter, which has fixed similar issues in the past.
Using the Settings app, I found what I thought was something similar called ‘Troubleshooting network connection issues’. However, on clicking it, I discovered what was possibly the nadir of Microsoft’s greed when it comes to forcing its products and services on Windows 11 users.
Instead of launching the troubleshooting application like I’d hoped, Edge opened – despite not being my default web browser. This has been an annoyance of mine for a while now, as even if you set a different web browser as your default, Microsoft will regularly ignore that and use Edge instead.
Edge then loaded up Bing – Microsoft’s pretty much unloved search engine – and searched for ‘Troubleshooting network connection issues’, which brought up a Microsoft webpage.
Now, there’s a pretty glaring issue with forcing people to search the internet for solutions to their network connection issues, and that became apparent when I tried to click the link. Rather than showing the page, Edge told me I was offline, as it coincided with a time when my PC had lost connection.
Most people who are suffering from network connection issues cannot access the internet because of those very connection issues they are trying to fix, so making them have to go online to search for an answer is pretty ridiculous.
Because my network issues were intermittent, I was able to wait until my internet connection came back, then refresh the page to see what Microsoft suggested. If my network connection issues were severe enough to prevent me from connecting to the internet at all, I’d have never got to see the page.
As it turns out, that wouldn’t have been an issue, really, as the webpage was pretty useless, offering just vague suggestions that mainly centered around Wi-Fi connection problems – so nothing that applied to my situation.
In the end, I figured it out myself: I got down on my hands and knees and checked behind my PC. The Ethernet cable had been pulled out slightly. Pushing it back in solved the problem.
However, this little escapade didn’t just prove that I am an overthinking idiot, but also that it feels like Microsoft cares more about helping its services and products then it does its users. The only reason for getting people to go to a Bing search via Edge for network connection troubleshooting is to make people use those products. It doesn’t help fix any issue that the user may have with their network connection.
It left me feeling annoyed by Microsoft, and far less fond of Windows 11 and the general direction the operating system is going in. Microsoft’s desire to get more people to use its services is understandable, and in some ways is the price we pay to get Windows 11 for free, but the heavy-handed way it’s going about doing this smacks of greed and a disregard for its users’ needs.
This has got to change, otherwise even when free, Windows 11 will not be worth it.
Nothing in life really comes for free, and Windows 11 is a great example of that. While Microsoft’s latest operating system is offered as a free upgrade for many users (previous moves from older versions of Windows to newer ones would require you to pay for the privilege), behind the scenes, there are plenty of ways you end up ‘paying’ to use Windows 11.
This includes sharing increasing amounts of data with Microsoft – something that the company was forced to make clear during the setup process. Microsoft is also using Windows 11 to push you towards its own services. For example, you’re now asked to have a Microsoft account, which usually involves signing up for a Microsoft-owned email account. You’re also encouraged to use Microsoft’s OneDrive cloud storage, rather than alternatives like Google Drive or iCloud.
And this is all before you even use Windows 11 for the first time. Once you actually boot into the operating system, things get worse. Microsoft’s Edge browser is installed by default, and while it’s come a long way since it first debuted in 2015 with Windows 10, many people (myself included) prefer to use other web browsers.
However, searching for and installing a different browser in Windows 11 using Edge results in numerous popups and messages from Microsoft pleading with you to give Edge a try. It’s annoying, and a little bit cringey, to be honest.
Still, you can at least ignore those, install your web browser of choice, and make it the default – which Microsoft has at least made easier to do after pressure from users.
While annoying, it was something I didn’t mind putting up with to use Windows 11, which is ‘free’, after all. However, Microsoft has been getting increasingly desperate – and even greedy – when it comes to trying to force its services on me, and it’s making me start to dislike the operating system.
Helping itself before it helps you
A particularly egregious example of this happened the other day. I’m one of those cool kids who still prefers to use a desktop PC, and I noticed that all of a sudden, my computer was losing internet access every 20 seconds or so.
Now, as a tech journalist, this led to me overthinking the problem. My PC is connected to my modem via an Ethernet cable and powerline adapters, so my first step was to restart and reconnect the adapters, which had caused a similar issue in the past.
When the problem persisted, I looked to disable then re-enable my network adapter in Windows 11. In previous versions of Windows, this was a pretty straightforward process, but Microsoft has now buried the option under several different settings screens – another annoying feature of Windows 11.
I then decided to try the built-in network troubleshooting tool. Again, in previous versions of Windows, this was easy to find, and as part of the troubleshooting process the operating system would disable then enable the network adapter, which has fixed similar issues in the past.
Using the Settings app, I found what I thought was something similar called ‘Troubleshooting network connection issues’. However, on clicking it, I discovered what was possibly the nadir of Microsoft’s greed when it comes to forcing its products and services on Windows 11 users.
Instead of launching the troubleshooting application like I’d hoped, Edge opened – despite not being my default web browser. This has been an annoyance of mine for a while now, as even if you set a different web browser as your default, Microsoft will regularly ignore that and use Edge instead.
Edge then loaded up Bing – Microsoft’s pretty much unloved search engine – and searched for ‘Troubleshooting network connection issues’, which brought up a Microsoft webpage.
Now, there’s a pretty glaring issue with forcing people to search the internet for solutions to their network connection issues, and that became apparent when I tried to click the link. Rather than showing the page, Edge told me I was offline, as it coincided with a time when my PC had lost connection.
Most people who are suffering from network connection issues cannot access the internet because of those very connection issues they are trying to fix, so making them have to go online to search for an answer is pretty ridiculous.
Because my network issues were intermittent, I was able to wait until my internet connection came back, then refresh the page to see what Microsoft suggested. If my network connection issues were severe enough to prevent me from connecting to the internet at all, I’d have never got to see the page.
As it turns out, that wouldn’t have been an issue, really, as the webpage was pretty useless, offering just vague suggestions that mainly centered around Wi-Fi connection problems – so nothing that applied to my situation.
In the end, I figured it out myself: I got down on my hands and knees and checked behind my PC. The Ethernet cable had been pulled out slightly. Pushing it back in solved the problem.
However, this little escapade didn’t just prove that I am an overthinking idiot, but also that it feels like Microsoft cares more about helping its services and products then it does its users. The only reason for getting people to go to a Bing search via Edge for network connection troubleshooting is to make people use those products. It doesn’t help fix any issue that the user may have with their network connection.
It left me feeling annoyed by Microsoft, and far less fond of Windows 11 and the general direction the operating system is going in. Microsoft’s desire to get more people to use its services is understandable, and in some ways is the price we pay to get Windows 11 for free, but the heavy-handed way it’s going about doing this smacks of greed and a disregard for its users’ needs.
This has got to change, otherwise even when free, Windows 11 will not be worth it.
Brave has announced that its web browser will now allow users to bypass AMP pages hosted by Google, which it claims are harmful to both privacy and the state of the web.
The new De-AMP feature will instead funnel web users to content hosted directly on the publisher’s website, minimizing the opportunity for additional tracking and meddling to take place.
Not to be outdone, rival privacy software company DuckDuckGo rushed to Twitter to reveal that its apps and extensions now offer similar functionality, but the specifics of the implementation are not yet clear.
Google’s AMP troubles
Rolled out in 2015, AMP (short for accelerated mobile pages) is a system whereby stripped-back versions of trending web pages are preloaded and served up via Google servers.
When AMP was first announced, Google said it beleived the system would help ensure rich web content such as video and animation would load rapidly and behave consistently across all platforms, thereby improving the web experience.
However, the scheme has come under criticism from publishers and privacy advocates alike, who say AMP gives Google yet more signals to gobble up in support of its digital advertising business, creates confusion as to the source of information and forces publishers to build their websites to Google’s desired spec.
“AMP harms users’ privacy, security and internet experience, and just as bad, AMP helps Google further monopolize and control the direction of the web,” wrote Brave, in a blog post.
And in a Twitter thread, DuckDuckGo presented a similar justification for its decision to move against the initiative.
“AMP technology is bad for privacy because it enables Google to track users even more,” said the firm. “And Google uses AMP to further entrench its monopoly, forcing the technology on publishers by prioritizing AMP links in search and favoring Google ads on AMP pages.”
Since the launch of AMP, a number of publishers (including Future plc., parent to TechRadar Pro) have abandoned the system. And now, browser vendors like Brave and DuckDuckGo are coming out with their own tools to help web users bypass AMP altogether.
“Where possible, De-AMP will rewrite links and URLs to prevent users from visiting AMP pages altogether,” explained Brave. “And in cases where that is not possible, Brave will watch as pages are being fetched and redirect users away from AMP pages before the page is even rendered, preventing AMP/Google code from being loaded and executed.”
Brave’s De-AMP feature is now available in both Nightly and Beta versions of its browser and will be enabled by default in the next full public release. TechRadar Pro is awaiting further specifics about DuckDuckGo’s efforts.
Brave has announced that its web browser will now allow users to bypass AMP pages hosted by Google, which it claims are harmful to both privacy and the state of the web.
The new De-AMP feature will instead funnel web users to content hosted directly on the publisher’s website, minimizing the opportunity for additional tracking and meddling to take place.
Not to be outdone, rival privacy software company DuckDuckGo rushed to Twitter to reveal that its apps and extensions now offer similar functionality, but the specifics of the implementation are not yet clear.
Google’s AMP troubles
Rolled out in 2015, AMP (short for accelerated mobile pages) is a system whereby stripped-back versions of trending web pages are preloaded and served up via Google servers.
When AMP was first announced, Google said it beleived the system would help ensure rich web content such as video and animation would load rapidly and behave consistently across all platforms, thereby improving the web experience.
However, the scheme has come under criticism from publishers and privacy advocates alike, who say AMP gives Google yet more signals to gobble up in support of its digital advertising business, creates confusion as to the source of information and forces publishers to build their websites to Google’s desired spec.
“AMP harms users’ privacy, security and internet experience, and just as bad, AMP helps Google further monopolize and control the direction of the web,” wrote Brave, in a blog post.
And in a Twitter thread, DuckDuckGo presented a similar justification for its decision to move against the initiative.
“AMP technology is bad for privacy because it enables Google to track users even more,” said the firm. “And Google uses AMP to further entrench its monopoly, forcing the technology on publishers by prioritizing AMP links in search and favoring Google ads on AMP pages.”
Since the launch of AMP, a number of publishers (including Future plc., parent to TechRadar Pro) have abandoned the system. And now, browser vendors like Brave and DuckDuckGo are coming out with their own tools to help web users bypass AMP altogether.
“Where possible, De-AMP will rewrite links and URLs to prevent users from visiting AMP pages altogether,” explained Brave. “And in cases where that is not possible, Brave will watch as pages are being fetched and redirect users away from AMP pages before the page is even rendered, preventing AMP/Google code from being loaded and executed.”
Brave’s De-AMP feature is now available in both Nightly and Beta versions of its browser and will be enabled by default in the next full public release. TechRadar Pro is awaiting further specifics about DuckDuckGo’s efforts.
Some of the world's top TV and film editors are not happy with Apple’s handling of Final Cut Pro – and they’re letting the company know about it.
In an open letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, over 100 production professionals are calling on the company to publicly commit to building the video editing software into an industry-standard tool.
The frustrated filmmakers praise Final Cut Pro (FCP) as “the biggest leap forward in editing technology since the move to digital” – before lambasting the company for failing to support the tool’s integration into professional film and TV production. Effectively, the authors believe FCP is strong enough to compete with the likes of Avid, but isn’t living up to its full potential.
Oscar-worthy?
Published on GoPetition, the letter states :“If Apple renewed its public commitment to the professional filmmaking industry and its visionary product, we believe an increasing number of editors would discover the joys of using Final Cut Pro.”
Ending with a pointed coda, the group bitterly notes that despite Apple TV+ recently becoming the first streaming platform to win the Best Picture Oscar, it’s unlikely the crew behind CODA would’ve chosen to edit the hit film with Final Cut Pro.
In a supporting statement, Galliano Olivier, editor on the French drama Marianne, explains: “In France, it is extremely difficult to get permission to edit TV with Final Cut Pro. You can’t use it without fighting producers, directors, post-production supervisors, sound editors.”
Knut Hake, editor for Netflix exclusive Bloody Red Sky, agrees, suggesting a public beta program for the video editing tool “would make a big difference for workflow consultants, systems integrators and third-party developers… it would make it much easier for people to fit Final Cut into their plans for the future.”
In a bid to increase platform adoption and tempt new editors over to FCP, the co-signatories also request the introduction of industry-specific features that have long been missing from the NLE software.
However, Apple may need to do more than release a few patches to make Final Cut Pro the professional editing software of choice. Steve Sanders, editor-in-chief for Fox’s War of the Worlds, highlights another major problem: lack of collaboration. He said, “editing big productions needs collaboration. Different users have to be able to access the same library at the same time. There is no way around this. Avid Media Composer does it and even DaVinci Resolve does it. Apple still targets the single user. They have to change that.”
The editors’ open letter comes just days after Apple released its latest version of Final Cut Pro. But it’ll take more than voice isolation, duplicate detection, and Mac Studio optimization to legitimize FCP in the eyes of the industry.
Google is nothing if not helpful: the search giant has built its reputation on making the internet more accessible and easier to navigate. But not all of its innovations are either clever or welcome.
Take the latest change to Google Docs, which aims to highlight examples of non-inclusive language through pop-up warnings.
You might think this is a good idea, helping to avoid “chairman” or “fireman” and other gendered language – and you'd be right. But Google has taken things a step further than it really needed to, leading to some pretty hilarious results.
Inclusive?
A viral tweet was the first warning sign that perhaps, just perhaps, this feature was a little overeager to correct common word usages. After all, is “landlord” really an example of of “words that may not be inclusive to all readers”?
As Vice has ably demonstrated, Google's latest update to Docs – while undoubtedly well-intentioned – is annoying and broken, jumping in to suggest corrections to some things while blatantly ignoring others.
The idea behind the feature is well-meaning and will likely help in certain cases. The execution, on the other hand, is poor.
Vice found that Docs suggested more inclusive language in a range of scenarios, such as for “annoyed” or “Motherboard”, but failed to suggest anything when a speech from neo-Nazi Klan leader David Duke was pasted in, containing the N-word.
In fact, Valerie Solanas’ SCUM Manifesto – a legendary piece of literature – got more edits than Duke's speech, including suggesting “police officers” instead of “policemen”.
All in all, it's the latest example of an AI-powered feature that seems like a good idea but in practice has more holes than a Swiss cheese.
Helping people write in a more inclusive way is a lofty goal, but the implementation leaves a lot to be desired and, ultimately, makes the process of writing harder.
Windows 11 is set to get one of Microsoft Team’s best features, thanks to “Voice Clarity”, which will use artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to make your voice in calls and recordings much clearer.
Microsoft Teams, an app that many people use for video calls, has a very similar feature that does an excellent job at minimizing and eliminating background noises for people in noisy environments, ensuring they can be heard clearly.
With the feature being so acclaimed, it’s little surprise to see Microsoft bring it to the wider Windows 11 operating system, which would allow the feature to work with other video calling apps. Voice Clarity was announced at Microsoft’s recent ‘Hybrid Work’ event as one of the ways the company is making its products better for people who are now spending their time working from home, as well as in an office.
While the noise-canceling features in Microsoft Teams have proved popular, there’s not a huge amount of love for the application itself, so bringing it to Windows 11 itself could prove a popular move.
Analysis: There’s always a catch
(Image credit: Future)
While the idea of making Voice Clarity available to more apps and users, the catch is that at the moment, the feature will only work on the Surface Laptop Studio, a relatively niche product from Microsoft.
That’s certainly a shame, as it means that the vast majority of Windows 11 users still won’t be able to make use of the feature.
It’s a bit of a puzzling decision, and we’ve contacted Microsoft to ask why this is the case. It may be due to some hardware-specific requirements that only the Surface Laptop Studio has. Or, Microsoft could just be limiting the availability of the feature to help boost interest in the Surface Laptop Studio.
But, with an increasing number of us relying on video calls for keeping in contact with friends, family and co-workers, any tools that can help make those calls better is certainly welcome, and we’d love to see Microsoft make the Voice Clarity feature more widely available.
Windows 11 is set to get one of Microsoft Team’s best features, thanks to “Voice Clarity”, which will use artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to make your voice in calls and recordings much clearer.
Microsoft Teams, an app that many people use for video calls, has a very similar feature that does an excellent job at minimizing and eliminating background noises for people in noisy environments, ensuring they can be heard clearly.
With the feature being so acclaimed, it’s little surprise to see Microsoft bring it to the wider Windows 11 operating system, which would allow the feature to work with other video calling apps. Voice Clarity was announced at Microsoft’s recent ‘Hybrid Work’ event as one of the ways the company is making its products better for people who are now spending their time working from home, as well as in an office.
While the noise-canceling features in Microsoft Teams have proved popular, there’s not a huge amount of love for the application itself, so bringing it to Windows 11 itself could prove a popular move.
Analysis: There’s always a catch
(Image credit: Future)
While the idea of making Voice Clarity available to more apps and users, the catch is that at the moment, the feature will only work on the Surface Laptop Studio, a relatively niche product from Microsoft.
That’s certainly a shame, as it means that the vast majority of Windows 11 users still won’t be able to make use of the feature.
It’s a bit of a puzzling decision, and we’ve contacted Microsoft to ask why this is the case. It may be due to some hardware-specific requirements that only the Surface Laptop Studio has. Or, Microsoft could just be limiting the availability of the feature to help boost interest in the Surface Laptop Studio.
But, with an increasing number of us relying on video calls for keeping in contact with friends, family and co-workers, any tools that can help make those calls better is certainly welcome, and we’d love to see Microsoft make the Voice Clarity feature more widely available.
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