Sofia Elizabella Wyciślik-Wilson

Continuing its AI push, Microsoft has announced Bing Image Creator. Powered by OpenAI's DALL-E, the tool can be used to generate images using artificial intelligence.

Microsoft says that Bing Image Creator will form part of Bing chat, and it will accept natural language prompts to create (just about) any sort of image you might want. The tool will also be made available in Microsoft Edge, making it -- the company is quick to highlight -- the first and only browser with an integrated AI-powered image generator.

Continue reading →

While there was much interest and excitement surrounding the release of the Moment 2 update for Windows 11, seasoned users were bracing themselves for the inevitable problems to emerge. And emerge they have.

There are a growing number of complaints from people who have installed the update that their system boot times have massively increased. There are also serious issues with severely reduced SSD performance, leading to slow file transfers and poor overall performance.

Continue reading →

Microsoft is working on a new option for Windows 11 that will give users the ability to receive updates for the operating system faster. With the option enabled, there will be no need to wait until Patch Tuesday each month in order to get the latest bug fixes, or even new features.

It also means that there will be no need to manually hunt down the preview versions of updates Microsoft makes available. If this sounds interesting, it is possible to get on board and try out the early access feature right now.

Continue reading →

Microsoft is working to bring a cryptocurrency wallet feature to its Edge browser.

Known simply as "Crypto wallet" the feature is currently undergoing development and is being trialed on a test group of unknown size. Microsoft highlights the benefits of having the non-custodial wallet embedded in Edge, eliminating the need for a browser extension.

Continue reading →

Microsoft has unveiled plans for what it is referring to as "a principled approach to app pinning and app defaults in Windows". The company has outlined sweeping changes that are coming to Windows 11 that will give users greater control over their computers.

The updates mean that the pinning of apps to the Start menu, desktop and taskbar will respect user choices, and adjusting the default apps used to open specific file types will be much easier. Microsoft says that the changes -- which are due to hit the Dev Channel soon before making their way to everyone else -- will also benefit developers.

Continue reading →

Ahead of next week's Patch Tuesday, Microsoft has released a preview of the upcoming KB5023774 update for Windows 11.

This is a non-security update, but it addresses a wide range of issues with Windows 11, including problems with Notepad, USB printer abnormalities, and bugs that were sending PowerPoint awry.

Continue reading →

For fans of statistics, or anyone who has an idle curiosity, Twitter has introduced a new bookmark count feature. As well as making it possible for anyone to judge the interest an individual tweet has generated, the new analytics are useful for companies and individuals looking for a more accessible way to track interactions.

While there will be privacy concerns associated with this, Twitter assures users that "your Bookmarks are still private", promising that "we'll never display which accounts have added a Tweet to their Bookmarks".

Continue reading →

Microsoft has published details of PowerShell scripts which the company has designed to help automate updating the Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) to address a BitLocker security vulnerability.

The security feature bypass vulnerability affects both Windows 10 and Windows 11, and sample scripts are available for different editions of both versions of the operating system.

Continue reading →

Earlier this month, Microsoft made significant changes to the Windows 11 Insider program including introducing a new Canary Channel. While this caused much excitement for those keen to try out the very latest features as soon as possible, the fact that a clean installation of Windows was needed put off some users.

Now Microsoft has decided to make things a little easier for people, notably those lacking a way to create installation media. The company is sending out free USB drives so Insiders can perform a clean installation of Windows 11 and get started with the Canary builds.

Continue reading →

A couple of recent entries on the Microsoft 365 roadmap shed light on what is in store for Outlook. Over the coming weeks, Microsoft has big plans for both the mobile and desktop versions of its email client.

Starting this month, Outlook security is being boosted thanks to the arrival of built-in multi-factor authentication (MFA). And next month, a larger number of Windows users will have access to a preview version of a completely new Outlook app.

Continue reading →

Microsoft has announced the general availability of video filters in its meeting software, Teams.

The arrival of filters complements the existing AI-powered options to change backgrounds and improve the appearance of videos. To deliver the new filters, Microsoft has created a dedicated app called Custom Filters which can be used to add animated frames to video, tweak appearance, and more.

Continue reading →

A few days ago, news started to spread that Microsoft appeared to be working on a much-requested feature for Windows 11 -- the ability to move the taskbar to somewhere other than the bottom of the screen.

But it seems that this is not actually the case. The very same source that served as a catalyst for excitement has now poured water on the flames of anticipation. What appears to have happened is that Microsoft accidentally left code in place in a recent build of Windows 11 that made the taskbar movable; there remains no evidence that the option to reposition the taskbar will ever arrive.

Continue reading →

A few days ago, Microsoft announced sweeping changes to the Windows Insider program, introducing the new Canary channel for those wanting to live right on the cutting edge.

Now the company has pushed a new build to this channel in the form of Cumulative Update Build 25314.1010. Also known at the KB5025135 update, this build is possibly the least exciting Windows 11 release yet -- but that does not mean that it isn't important.

Continue reading →

Microsoft has revealed that the company is about to launch GPT-4 and this time it is about more than just text and chat. The next iteration of the AI technology is described as multi-modal, meaning there is support for much more -- including video.

The news came at an event in Germany called KI im Fokus (AI in Focus) on Thursday. Here, Microsoft Germany's CTO and Lead Data & AI STU, Andreas Braun, said: "We will introduce GPT-4 next week, there we will have multimodal models that will offer completely different possibilities -- for example videos".

Continue reading →

When Twitter announced that it was ending free access to its API, it said nothing about what the new pricing structure would look like. But now the company has finally revealed the price tags for different tiers of access -- and it is worse than anyone predicted.

In all, there are now three tiers to choose from, each allowing for different numbers of tweets and giving varying levels of access. The cheapest, the Small Package tier, costs a staggering $42,000 per month (or just over $0.5 million per year), while the Large Package costs an eye-watering $210,000 per month (or a shade over $2.5 million per year).

Continue reading →