1 844.742.7448

Email Us

Remote Support

Contact

Posts tagged "running"

  1. Home
  2. Posts tagged running

Microsoft could add yet another advert into Windows 11 – and users are running out of patience
  • No Comments

Microsoft could test its customers' tolerance for ads in Windows 11 once again, as Windows Insiders have spotted yet another advert in an early version of the operating system that's currently being tested. This means the feature is still technically in progress with Microsoft monitoring its reception, and it could decide to roll the new ads out to all users in a future Windows update.

Windows 11 Insider Build 22635.3500, which features the advert, was released in the Beta Channel of the Windows Insider Program, and comes shortly after Microsoft started testing ads in the Start Menu of Windows 11 as well. The new ad appears in the Settings app and suggests users sign up for Xbox Game Pass. 

The update also includes other new features that will probably be more popular with users such as a new account manager in the Start menu and introducing support for Gmail in Windows Share (which lets Windows devices easily share files and folders with other devices over a network that they’re a part of). However, these new features were overshadowed by the deployment of the ad in Settings. 

Microsoft has put out a Windows Insider Blog post detailing the changes and features that make up the new build, and it mentions the ad’s inclusion, which it calls a ‘recommendation,’ on the Settings home page. It suggests that the Game Pass recommendation card will only be shown to users who actively play games on their PCs. It also adds that this advert will only show in the Settings homepage if you’re running the Home and Pro editions of Windows 11 and you’re signed into your Microsoft account on your device. 

Microsoft's continuing dedication to 'recommendations'

This development isn’t completely out of the blue as Microsoft has been experimenting with where it can get away with sticking ads for a while now. Alongside testing ads on the Settings page, it’s also trying out placing adverts in the Start menu’s ‘Recommended’ section. Microsoft is really trying to blur the line between what’s an ad and what it claims are just friendly ‘recommendations’, with pinned apps that look like ads for its other products appearing in a clean install of Windows 11. 

Some people say that even if these sorts of ads appear, they might be acceptable as it’s often advertising products and services, like OneDrive, that could enhance the Windows 11 user experience. Some users are okay with this as long as the adverts show Microsoft’s products that could improve using their Windows 11 device. 

However, many other people aren’t so hot on the idea, even if the products are Microsoft’s own, and are especially opposed to adverts for third-party apps. It can feel like the space that’s supposed to be your own personal or work digital space is turned into something resembling a billboard, as Windows Central describes it. To some, it’s particularly egregious when showing third-party app ads that may not add to the core Windows 11 experience, which feels like a cash grab by Microsoft. 

Those who are annoyed by these ads are probably feeling even more antagonistic because the ads are integrated into key parts of the operating system (OS) that you have to navigate to operate your device, so if you want to use the OS, you don’t have a choice but to see the adverts that appear in these key locations. Also, the Settings home page is kind of a strange place for an advert for Game Pass – generally, the two aren’t directly tied together.

Unfortunately, Microsoft seems set on this strategy, and according to Windows Central’s Senior Editor Zac Bowden, if you’re a Windows 11 user who’s not keen on the persistent flow of new AI features or more ads, you’re “in for a terrible next four months.” Many people are calling the approach straight-up aggressive, and I can’t disagree. We’re already bombarded by advertisements almost everywhere we turn, and it’s frustrating that our devices, which are necessary for many people for work and leisure, are increasingly becoming one more ad-saturated place we can’t entirely escape. 

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Still running Windows 7 or 8? Prepare for an Epic fail – Epic Games Store follows Steam and drops support for older operating systems
  • No Comments

The Epic Games Store has followed in the footsteps of Steam in dropping support for Microsoft’s desktop operating systems which are older than Windows 10 – although this hasn’t happened quite yet.

Epic gave notice in an announcement that support for Windows 7 and Windows 8 (or 8.1) will cease from June 2024, so just over two months’ time. Note that Windows 10 32-bit will also be dropped, but not the 64-bit version of the OS that the vast majority of folks run. There's no 32-bit version of Windows 11, of course.

So, support from June will be limited to Windows 10 64-bit and Windows 11 – and for macOS, version 10.13 or newer of Apple’s OS.

As mentioned, Epic is a bit later than Valve in closing down support for these older operating systems, because Steam enacted this measure at the start of 2024. As you might expect, there weren’t many PC gamers that were affected, going by Valve’s stats – fewer than 1% of Steam users had Windows 7/8 installed at the time. And the same is likely true for the Epic Games Store.

Analysis: Time to upgrade?

For the small niche of gamers who will be hit by this move, this will obviously be somewhat disappointing. Mind you, when June rolls around, this doesn’t mean you won’t be able to use the Epic Games Store at all. It’ll still work, it just won’t get any updates going forward, or be supported in any way. This means that after a while, bits of functionality might fail and the launcher will eventually probably start to misfire or stop working entirely.

Naturally, without updates, you’ll also be open to any vulnerabilities in Epic’s client, but then if you’re still running Windows 7 or 8, that’ll be the least of your worries – the exploits open to leverage in those systems will be far more worrying in nature, of course.

And that’s exactly why you shouldn’t be running Windows 7 or 8 any longer, anyway. It’s time to upgrade, one way or another – by which we mean make the move to Windows 10 (or Windows 11, if your PC spec is up to it), or take the obvious alternate route, a Linux distro (there are some solid Windows-like choices out there, after all).

What about Windows 10 32-bit users? Well, Microsoft does still support them, but there are very few of these folks out there now (certainly in the gaming world – Steam’s hardware survey doesn’t even list Windows 10 32-bit anymore, and hasn’t for a long time).

Via Neowin

You might also like

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Apple’s Studio Display is found to be running iOS 15.4 – is this the 27-inch iMac?
  • No Comments

It's been discovered that Apple's Studio Display runs on iOS 15.4, making us wonder if the display may see some additional improvements in the future.

According to Daring Fireball, if you go to Applications > Utilities > System Information and find your Studio Display, you'll see the software version as 15.4.

This isn't groundbreaking information, as the display is powered by an A13 chip, the same that powered the iPhone 11 series and iPad (ninth generation). But it's telling that instead of a software driver that's usually present in monitors, it's an operating system that powers Apple's iOS devices.

It makes us wonder whether we already have a 27-inch modular iMac running on Apple Silicon, and what this could mean for the iPad going forward.

Analysis: A display that also rivals Apple TV

The first SoC (System on a Chip) by Apple first debuted with the iPhone 4 back in 2010, called the A4. Since then, we've seen different types of Apple chips on wearables, tablets, Macs, and now displays.

But it's an interesting prospect that we're now seeing another version of iOS loaded onto the Studio Display. A tweet over the weekend also spotted that it has 64GB of storage loaded on.

See more

Even though we already have an iMac with an Apple Silicon chip, it's the first time that we've seen iOS 15.4 appear on a new Apple product that doesn't run iOS, or the Apple TV, where the latest model runs on an older A12 chip.

Software updates for the display could improve its features, especially with its camera which had a polarizing opinion in terms of its image quality.

We're at a point where we're already seeing a 27-inch iMac running on Apple Silicon, but not with macOS. It blurs the line as to what we could see from Apple in the coming years in more shapes and sizes than what the Mac Studio offers.

Instead of a bigger iPad Pro, we could see a monitor solely running iPadOS, tailored to a 27-inch display. An 'iPad Studio' suddenly doesn't seem too outside the realms of possibility.

As there's a good chance we'll see iPadOS 16 at WWDC this year, Apple's yearly developer conference, users have been clamoring for better external display support for the iPad.

It seems as though it's the perfect time for both products to see an improvement in how the iPad is perceived, especially for pros. But while I'm happy with my MacBook Pro 14-inch (2021), the potential of iPadOS is there, it just needs a push. And with the Studio Display running on iOS 15.4, it seems as though worlds are about to collide.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Apple’s Studio Display is found to be running iOS 15.4 – is this the 27-inch iMac?
  • No Comments

It's been discovered that Apple's Studio Display runs on iOS 15.4, making us wonder if the display may see some additional improvements in the future.

According to Daring Fireball, if you go to Applications > Utilities > System Information and find your Studio Display, you'll see the software version as 15.4.

This isn't groundbreaking information, as the display is powered by an A13 chip, the same that powered the iPhone 11 series and iPad (ninth generation). But it's telling that instead of a software driver that's usually present in monitors, it's an operating system that powers Apple's iOS devices.

It makes us wonder whether we already have a 27-inch modular iMac running on Apple Silicon, and what this could mean for the iPad going forward.

Analysis: A display that also rivals Apple TV

The first SoC (System on a Chip) by Apple first debuted with the iPhone 4 back in 2010, called the A4. Since then, we've seen different types of Apple chips on wearables, tablets, Macs, and now displays.

But it's an interesting prospect that we're now seeing another version of iOS loaded onto the Studio Display. A tweet over the weekend also spotted that it has 64GB of storage loaded on.

See more

Even though we already have an iMac with an Apple Silicon chip, it's the first time that we've seen iOS 15.4 appear on a new Apple product that doesn't run iOS, or the Apple TV, where the latest model runs on an older A12 chip.

Software updates for the display could improve its features, especially with its camera which had a polarizing opinion in terms of its image quality.

We're at a point where we're already seeing a 27-inch iMac running on Apple Silicon, but not with macOS. It blurs the line as to what we could see from Apple in the coming years in more shapes and sizes than what the Mac Studio offers.

Instead of a bigger iPad Pro, we could see a monitor solely running iPadOS, tailored to a 27-inch display. An 'iPad Studio' suddenly doesn't seem too outside the realms of possibility.

As there's a good chance we'll see iPadOS 16 at WWDC this year, Apple's yearly developer conference, users have been clamoring for better external display support for the iPad.

It seems as though it's the perfect time for both products to see an improvement in how the iPad is perceived, especially for pros. But while I'm happy with my MacBook Pro 14-inch (2021), the potential of iPadOS is there, it just needs a push. And with the Studio Display running on iOS 15.4, it seems as though worlds are about to collide.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Windows 11 set to warn users if their PC shouldn’t be running the OS
  • No Comments

Windows 11 can currently be installed on PCs which don’t meet the official system requirements, but Microsoft doesn’t recommend this course of action – and has taken fresh action in a preview build to add a further warning against doing so.

To recap, Windows 11 can be run on a system which doesn’t officially support the OS, but Microsoft has previously cautioned about possible ‘damage’ to a system in this scenario, and noted that vital security updates may not be provided to such PCs either – even though said updates are still delivered to these devices.

But now, Microsoft appears to be getting more serious about letting folks know that their PC shouldn’t be running Windows 11 if it’s not up to scratch regarding the OS requirements. Windows Latest spotted that Albacore, a well-known Twitter leaker and reliable source for Microsoft spillage, tweeted about a new reminder which is in testing for Windows 11.

See more

As you can see, it’s in System Settings, and imparted with the details at the top of the panel. The message lets the user know that the requirements haven’t been met by their PC, with a link to find out more about why this is the case.

Analysis: A hint of stricter enforcement to come?

The appearance of a warning for those actually running Windows 11 on an unsupported machine in this manner – as opposed to during installation – indicates that Microsoft may be tightening loopholes concerning PCs which have been pushed onto the new OS without having the hardware goods to do so officially.

As Microsoft takes more steps like this, it makes us believe that eventually, further moves will be made to ensure PCs that aren’t officially up to spec can’t run the OS fully. The software giant has always said that updates won’t come to these devices, and even though they have been provided up to now – and still are – this is another signal that this will eventually change.

In other words, at some point down the line, security updates will no longer be served to unsupported PCs, which would be a big problem, potentially leaving these systems open to exploit. Or at the very least, more prominent and intrusive warnings may be introduced to ensure that folks running Windows 11 in this way know they shouldn’t be pursuing such a route for the long-term with their device.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

This Microsoft Edge update will help you spot why your browser is running so slowly
  • No Comments

Spotting potential browser slowdowns in Microsoft Edge could soon be a lot easier thanks to a new tool that will allow users to debug memory leaks.

Memory leaks occur when an application's JavaScript code retains more and more objects in memory that it no longer needs instead of releasing them for garbage collect (GC).

For apps that run for a long time without being closed, small memory leaks of only a few kilobytes can add up to noticeably degrade performance over time according to a new blog post from Microsoft.

Detached

React, the open source JavaScript library for building front end user interfaces, maintains a virtualized copy of the DOM (Document Object Model). However, failing to properly unmount components can lead to an application leaking large parts of the virtual DOM.

For this reason, the Microsoft Edge team worked together with Microsoft Teams to build the browser's new Detached Elements tool that allows users to investigate and resolve DOM memory leaks.

Although there are valid reasons for detaching elements, DOM memory leaks occur when an application keeps references to more and more detached elements without actually reusing them later. As the code used in applications grows in size and complexity, it becomes easier to make mistakes and forget to clean things up which could unknowingly lead to keeping DOM elements in memory. 

This is particularly a problem for long running applications. For instance, if an email client detaches DOM elements every time an email is opened and closed and a user keeps the app running for a whole week, it could amount to really high memory usage and slow down a user's business laptop or workstation over time.

While Microsoft's new Detached Elements tool has been available in Edge Canary since version 93, it will roll out to the stable channel of Microsoft Edge when version 97 of the browser launches this month.

To access this new tool early though, you'll first need to open DevTools in Edge by pressing F12 and click on the gear icon to open the DevTools Settings. From here, navigate to Experiments on the left side of the Settings pane, type in Detached Elements and click on the tool to enable it.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Windows 11 running slow? Microsoft’s ongoing SSD problems could be to blame
  • No Comments

Windows 11 continues to suffer from a problem where some NVMe SSDs are running more than 50% slower, and Microsoft still hasn’t fixed it. The issue has been plaguing some Windows 11 users since the operating system was in beta earlier this year, so the fact that several months later the problem persists has led many people to wonder when Microsoft will release a fix.

As MSPoweruser reports, a user ran CrystalDiskMark benchmark tests for the Samsung 980 Pro SSD and found that random write speeds are drastically cut.

So, if your Windows 11 PC appears to be running slowly and you are using an NVMe SSD, this could be the culprit.

Analysis: Where’s the fix?

When this issue was first identified in the Windows 11 beta, Microsoft acknowledged the problem. However, no fix has been released, and it’s not entirely clear what’s causing the problem, though some people suggest it’s the virtualization-based security of Windows 11 that’s to blame.

Whatever the cause, this is one of the more serious Windows 11 problem we’ve seen, and the fact that there has yet to be a fix around three months after it was discovered is concerning. It could mean that a fix is harder to implement. This won’t be welcome news for anyone affected by this problem.

It’s not a good look for Windows 11, either. Microsoft wants more people to upgrade to the new operating system, but ongoing problems like this are just going to put people off. Microsoft will need to come up with a fix, and fast.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Need some running earbuds? Beats Powerbeats 3 deal sees price cut by over 50%
  • No Comments

If you're on the hunt for some new running headphones, the Beats Powerbeats 3 are a great choice – and they're currently reduced by over 50% in both the US and the UK. 

In the US, you can get these workout-friendly wireless earbuds for just $ 89, representing a huge saving of $ 111; meanwhile, UK buyers can save £92 on the Powerbeats 3.

Today's best Beats Powerbeats 3 deals

The PowerBeats 3 are well-made and long-lasting, with great audio for fitness headphones; with this deal, they're easy on the wallet, too.

With 12 hours of battery life, and ear hooks to ensure a secure fit, they should stay switched on and comfortable no matter how long or how vigorous your workouts are.

An inline remote means you can click to change the volume of your music, skip tracks, and take calls without reaching for your phone.

These buds have a great bass response, though audiophiles may find the lowest frequencies a little overwhelming; either way you'll enjoy a good level of detail in your music, and that powerful bass is ideal for pushing you through even the toughest workout. 

What about the Powerbeats 4?

That's why we awarded them 3.5 out of 5 stars in our Powerbeats 3 review – they're not perfect, but these buds are brilliant for runners.

We saw similar price drops over Black Friday and the early Christmas sales; they're a little long in the tooth now, which is likely why more retailers are dropping their Powerbeats 3 prices. If you're looking for something a little more contemporary, check out the Beats Powerbeats Pro, which launched last year and come with Apple's most recent headphone chip.

Furthermore, with rumors of a Powerbeats 4 launch on the horizon, it's little wonder that prices for the Powerbeats 3 are starting to drop – we're not expecting these prices to fall much lower in the near future though (unless we see them return to their all-time low of $ 79 in the US), so we'd recommend snapping up this fantastic deal in the meantime.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More