Microsoft releases Windows 10 20H1 Build 18936 with passwordless sign-ins

Even though the next major feature update for Windows 10 isn’t due for a year, Microsoft is rolling out weekly new builds for it.

Windows 10 20H1 Build 18936 offers a number of new features, including the ability to go passwordless on your device, and create calendar events directly from the taskbar.

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The first new change is for the Your Phone app and sees the availability of the phone screen feature expand to Surface Laptop, Surface Laptop 2, Surface Pro 4, Surface Pro 5, Surface Pro 6, Surface Book, and Surface Book 2.

You can also now quickly create events directly from the taskbar. Just open the clock and calendar flyout and you’ll see the option there.

The big change in this build is that you can enable passwordless sign-ins for Microsoft accounts by going to Settings > Accounts > Sign-in options, and selecting On under Make your device passwordless.

Doing this will switch all Microsoft accounts on your Windows 10 device to modern authentication methods like Windows Hello Face, Fingerprint, or PIN.

The feature is currently only being rolled out to a small portion of Insiders. If you don’t have it yet, be patient.

General changes, improvements, and fixes in this build include:

• Fixed an issue that was causing failures when installing games via the Xbox app in the previous flight.
• Fixed an issue resulting in the Photos live tile potentially drawing outside the bounds of the tile.
• Fixed an issue where the emoji panel would crash when high contrast was enabled.
• Updated the disk type text in Task Manager’s Performance tab to now match the size of the other subtext on that tab.
• Fixed an issue resulting in items not launching in the foreground when selected from the taskbar jump list of certain apps.
• Fixed an issue that could result in the virtual desktop thumbnail in task view not updating after moving a window to a different desktop.
• Running Windows Sandbox no longer requires Administrator privilege.
• Fixed an issue resulting in the composition string not being shown in certain apps when typing with the Japanese IME.
• Fixed an issue resulting in certain apps crashing when typing with the Chinese Pinyin IME.
• Fixed an issue resulting in certain games unexpectedly just showing a black screen when run in full screen mode on some devices recently.

Known Issues in this build are:

• A limited number Insiders attempting to install Build 18936 may experience install failures with error code c1900101 due to a compatibility bug with a storage driver on their device. The device will attempt to install, fail, and successfully roll back to the currently installed build on the device. Attempted re-tries to install the build, either manual or automatic, will not bypass this issue. A fix is forthcoming, but there are no known workarounds currently. Note: By default, the update will attempt to install (3) times. Users may pause updates if they experience this issue and want to bypass the re-try attempts.
• Insiders may notice some changes in Magnifier with today’s build. These aren’t quite ready yet for you to try, but Microsoft will let you know once they are in an upcoming flight.
• There has been an issue with older versions of anti-cheat software used with games where after updating to the latest 19H1 Insider Preview builds may cause PCs to experience crashes. Microsoft is working with partners on getting their software updated with a fix, and most games have released patches to prevent PCs from experiencing this issue. To minimize the chance of running into this issue, please make sure you are running the latest version of your games before attempting to update the operating system. Microsoft is also working with anti-cheat and game developers to resolve similar issues that may arise with the 20H1 Insider Preview builds and will work to minimize the likelihood of these issues in the future.
• Some Realtek SD card readers are not functioning properly.
• Tamper Protection may be turned off in Windows Security after updating to this build. You can turn it back on. In August, Tamper Protection will return to being on by default for all Insiders.

Photo credit: charnsitr / Shutterstock