Microsoft Lets Windows 10 Users Hit Pause Button On Updates For Up To 35 Days
Microsoft is pushing out a new Windows 10 Insider Preview Build (15002) for Windows Insiders in the Fast ring. It is a "BIG update," to use Microsoft's own words, though one of the more interesting additions comes near the very end of a lengthy blog post describing the various new features. With this latest build, Microsoft has added an option that enables users to pause updates for up to 35 days.
The latest Preview build for Windows 10 also allows users to decide whether or not to include driver updates when updating Windows. Both update options are only available on the Professional, Education, and Enterprise editions. That is unfortunate for Home users, though anyone looking for a reason to splurge on Windows 10 Professional may have found justification here.
While a relatively minor feature update, Microsoft is addressing one of the biggest criticisms with Windows 10, which is that it is overly aggressive in rolling out updates whether users want them or not. Giving users the ability to hit pause for up to 35 days means they can avoid potentially buggy updates and drivers, some of which have borked systems in the past and caused major headaches for users.
Source: Microsoft
With the latest update Microsoft is also running power experiments on a "small set" of Windows 10 devices to evaluate an upcoming Windows 10 Creators Update feature designed to improve battery life. The various experiments may throttle one or more applications, which will be reported as "throttled" in the Task Manager. Microsoft does not expect there to be any noticeable impact on the "user experience" but will collect feedback to see if its assumption is correct.
Microsoft spent some time improving its Edge browser as well. The latest Insider build introduces a Tab preview bar to help power surfers keep track of all their open tabs. This can be especially useful when having many tabs open from the same website, with similar titles and icons. The Tab preview feature allows users to scroll through the list of tabs using touch, a mouse wheel, or a touchpad.
Underneath the hood of Edge is a component UI upgrade with a new UWP architecture for the browser's multi-process model. The changes should help make Edge more stable and improve input responsiveness, while also making the browser UI more resilient to slow or hung web page content.
These are just some of the boatload of new features Microsoft squeezed into its latest preview build for Windows 10. Hit the source link to see the rest.
The latest Preview build for Windows 10 also allows users to decide whether or not to include driver updates when updating Windows. Both update options are only available on the Professional, Education, and Enterprise editions. That is unfortunate for Home users, though anyone looking for a reason to splurge on Windows 10 Professional may have found justification here.
While a relatively minor feature update, Microsoft is addressing one of the biggest criticisms with Windows 10, which is that it is overly aggressive in rolling out updates whether users want them or not. Giving users the ability to hit pause for up to 35 days means they can avoid potentially buggy updates and drivers, some of which have borked systems in the past and caused major headaches for users.
Source: Microsoft
With the latest update Microsoft is also running power experiments on a "small set" of Windows 10 devices to evaluate an upcoming Windows 10 Creators Update feature designed to improve battery life. The various experiments may throttle one or more applications, which will be reported as "throttled" in the Task Manager. Microsoft does not expect there to be any noticeable impact on the "user experience" but will collect feedback to see if its assumption is correct.
Microsoft spent some time improving its Edge browser as well. The latest Insider build introduces a Tab preview bar to help power surfers keep track of all their open tabs. This can be especially useful when having many tabs open from the same website, with similar titles and icons. The Tab preview feature allows users to scroll through the list of tabs using touch, a mouse wheel, or a touchpad.
Underneath the hood of Edge is a component UI upgrade with a new UWP architecture for the browser's multi-process model. The changes should help make Edge more stable and improve input responsiveness, while also making the browser UI more resilient to slow or hung web page content.
These are just some of the boatload of new features Microsoft squeezed into its latest preview build for Windows 10. Hit the source link to see the rest.
