Microsoft today released a new Windows 10 preview for PCs with Edge, shell, and input improvements. This build is part of the RS4 branch, which represents the next Windows 10 update the company has yet to announce.
Windows 10 is a service, meaning it was built in a very different way from its predecessors so it can be regularly updated with not just fixes, but new features, too. Microsoft has released four major updates so far: November Update, Anniversary Update, Creators Update, and Fall Creators Update.
Edge can now save and automatically fill your preferred information in web forms. When you fill in address or other contact information, Edge will prompt to save it. In the future, you can select from a drop-down menu to complete all the related fields (saved formed data is roamed between your Windows 10 devices, and you can manually add or remove entries in Advanced Settings). Separately, Edge now lets you adjust the text spacing when you’re in Reading View.
In Start, there’s a new way to get to advanced options: right-click a UWP app or UWP app tile, choose More, and then Settings. You can then repair, manage app add-ons, and see startup tasks (if available).
As for input, more emoji options will appear as you type with the touch keyboard. New and updated emoji data has been added for over 150 languages. You can also now use the Emoji Panel to insert a bunch of emoji at once. Lastly, there’s a new keyboard for Tamil called Tamil 99, as well as updated Sinhala, Myanmar, and Amharic keyboards.
This desktop build also includes the following general bug fixes and improvements:
- Added settings that let you view and manage your activity history, which Cortana uses to let you pick up where you left off. Find these settings in Settings > Privacy > Activity history.
- Fixed an issue where the Properties dialog for This PC in File Explorer wasn’t working in the last two builds.
- Fixed an issue resulting in Insiders with certain third party antiviruses and OneDrive Files on Demand enabled seeing an error in recent builds citing “OneDrive cannot connect to Windows”.
- Fixed an issue that could result in delays during logoff and shutdown when a UWP app was open and in suspended state.
- Fixed a community reported issue where display colors became distorted after upgrading on some TV’s and monitors that incorrectly advertised support for 10/12 bit wire formats.
- Fixed an issue from the previous flight that could cause heavily-threaded DirectX 12 apps to crash on launch after the first launch.
- We’ve adjusted the application of acrylic in the touch keyboard to better align with the fluent design standards.
- Fixed an issue where keys might remain highlighted when typing on the wide touch keyboard layout.
- Fixed an issue where keys might be dropped when typing with the Chinese (Simplified) touch keyboard.
- Fixed an issue where when writing a long sentence in the handwriting panel it might scroll while your pen was writing, resulting in an ink stroke across the panel.
- Fixed an issue resulting in the hardware keyboard text suggestions potentially not working until the touch keyboard had been launched once.
- Fixed an issue resulting in the mouse noticeably flickering between + and the mouse pointer icon when moving across cells in Excel 2016.
- Fixed an issue resulting in some Insiders seeing their Start menu layout being reset after upgrading to the previous flight.
- Fixed an issue resulting in miniview windows (for example in Movies & TV or Skype) flying offscreen when attempting to be resized in the last few flights.
- Fixed an issue where clicking search results for settings in Settings in the last few flights would always take you to the top level category in the last few flights, rather than the actual category you searched for (for example, Display Settings instead of Storage Settings).
Today’s update bumps the Windows 10 build number for PCs from 17040 (made available to testers on November 16) to build 17046.
This build has seven known issues:
- If you are experiencing broken functionality in Mail, Cortana, Narrator, or missing some features like Windows Media Player, see this Feedback Hub post.
- Popular Tencent games like League of Legends and NBA2k Online may cause 64-bit PCs to bugcheck (GSOD).
- VPNs which use custom pop-up windows during connection attempts may fail to connect with error 720.
- Due to a bug that was introduced on this build, you may not receive all of your notifications from Cortana. Reminders are unaffected by this bug, but you may not receive other Cortana notifications that you are expecting. The fix for this should be in the next flight.
- [DEVELOPERS] Deploying an x86 app to a x64 PC remotely result in “FileNotFound” deployment failures if the target PC is running Build 17040. Deploying an x64 app to a x64 PC remotely or a x86 app to a x86 PC will work fine.
- All types of dynamic volumes listed here will not mount properly or be accessible from Windows. The data remains intact on the volume, it is just not accessible from this OS build. If you need access to the data you can roll back to an earlier build. A fix for this issue will be released in the next build.
- After upgrading to build 17035 or later you may lose certain dictionary files, resulting in not being able to input Japanese or Traditional Chinese via IME, Touch Keyboard, or Handwriting if you are using a non-Japanese or non-Traditional Chinese language-based OS (like an English-based OS).
As always, don’t install this on your production machine.
