With system breaches coming thick and fast these days, it makes sense to take additional steps to protect your online accounts. One of the best ways to do this is with a YubiKey, a USB device which provides hardware-based two-factor authentication.

It’s a great -- and affordable -- way to protect your online accounts, and while you can also use it to log into a local account in Windows with the right software, you can’t use a Yubikey to log you into a Microsoft account (although the key can boost its security). That’s about to change. Today, at Microsoft Ignite, Yubico previewed its first ever security key with fingerprint recognition -- YubiKey Bio.

Continue reading →

Over the weekend we wrote about Microsoft revealing a new logo for the Chromium-based version of Edge; now there is bigger news.

Today, after various beta builds, the company is launching the release candidate of the new Microsoft Edge for both Windows and macOS. It has also revealed that the date for general availability is January 15.

Continue reading →

Microsoft Edge is getting a new logo. Having embraced the Chromium engine, Microsoft has decided that it is time to ditch the familiar "e" icon -- which undeniably similar to the Internet Explorer icon -- and opt for a swirly redesign.

Actually, even with the new icon, the "e" has not been completely dropped, rather it has been stylized into a green and blue wave that could still be interpreted as the same letter. Microsoft revealed the icon as an Easter egg after leading fans on a labyrinthine quest, following clues posted online by company employees.

Continue reading →

Black Friday 2019 may still be more then three weeks away, but Microsoft is already teasing some of the discounts and deals that it is going to be offering. You can expect to make big savings not only on the Surface Pro 7 and Surface Laptop 3, but also to pick up an HP laptop with 10th Gen Intel Core i3 for under $300.

The official date for Black Friday is November 29 this year, but Microsoft has a number of deals that start before this. In fact, you can start making savings as early as November 21! Here's what's on offer.

Continue reading →

Microsoft launched a preview of Microsoft Q&A, a "global, community-driven platform for timely, high-quality technical answers" this week.

Microsoft Q&A will replace the MDSN and TechNet forums which IT professionals and developers used in the past to ask and answer questions.

Continue reading →

Microsoft rolls out two feature updates a year for Windows 10, although this year the second of the updates -- the November 2019 Update -- is actually more of a service pack.

The trouble with this twice-yearly update schedule is most people don’t upgrade to the new version right away. In fact, due to compatibility issues, most people don’t even get offered it for months after its initial rollout. As a result, the majority end up running an older version of Windows 10.

Continue reading →

With October coming to a close it won’t be long until the Windows 10 November 2019 Update -- 19H2 -- starts to roll out to users. That’s more of a service pack than a feature update however.

If you want new features, it’s builds on the 20H1 branch that you’ll likely be more interested in. This week’s new flight, Build 19013, comes with more kaomoji and a welcome update to Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) 2.

Continue reading →

It has been a couple of months since Microsoft unleashed the first build of the Windows 10 version of PowerToys with the promise of more to come.

Now this day has arrived. Today, Microsoft has released PowerToys v0.12 which includes not only improvements to the existing utilities, but also a brand new tool in the form of PowerRename.

Continue reading →

The Start menu is at the heart of Windows 10, so any problems with it have serious repercussions. Included in Microsoft's recent batch of bug-riddled updates, however, there have been two --  KB4515384 and KB4524147 -- which have broken the Start menu in various ways.

Last week Microsoft released KB4522355 proclaiming that it fixed issues with both the Start menu and search. Only it didn't fix problems for everyone. Start menu problems remain, and some users are still unable to use the search facility.

Continue reading →

Microsoft has beaten Amazon to win the controversial $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud contract from the US Department of Defense.

A year ago, Microsoft employees were trying to discourage the company from bidding for the contract over concerns that the technology is develops could "be used for waging war". The DoD confirmation that the "contract will address critical and urgent unmet warfighter requirements for modern cloud infrastructure" will do nothing to calm these fears.

Continue reading →

When Microsoft revealed the Surface Laptop 3, Surface Pro 7 and Surface Pro X recently, it also revealed Windows 10X, a version of Windows 10 optimized for dual-screen devices. At the time, details were not extensive, but now a major leak sheds some light on what we can expect to see.

Documentation for Windows 10X (or Santorini OS) has appeared online, revealing that Microsoft will also allow the operating system to be run on more traditional laptops. There are also some intriguing screenshots that give us a glimpse into the future.

Continue reading →

Three-hundred-and-fifty-eight in a series. Welcome to this week's overview of the best apps, games and extensions released for Windows 10 on the Microsoft Store in the past seven days.

Microsoft is rolling out a Store update that features a new layout. The update is rolled out over time and features a new set of categories and sections. Apps are now found under Productivity in the Store.

Continue reading →

Microsoft launched Windows XP 18 years ago today. Despite support ending for it back in 2014, the OS is still to be found on just under 3 percent of the world's PCs, according to NetMarketShare. Many people still look back fondly on it, and for good reason. It was a huge step up from the gray, bland Windows versions that proceeded it.

Although Microsoft does issue the very occasional update for XP, in the main it's now viewed as a relic from days gone by, and lacking many of the modern features we take for granted in Windows 10. But what if Microsoft updated it? To celebrate the operating system's big 18th birthday, we thought it would be fun to repost this story from a couple of months ago.

Continue reading →

Microsoft has released a series of problematic updates in recent months. The company seems to be playing catch-up, pushing out patches for bugs caused by the last update, in turn introducing new problems.

With the newly released KB4522355 update, Microsoft says that it has fixed a number of issues -- including problems with the Start menu, the Cortana Search bar, Tray icons and Microsoft Edge -- that were caused by other recent updates.

Continue reading →

A new Microsoft Store layout featuring a new look and categories is rolling out now.

Windows 10 users who open the Microsoft Store on their devices may see the new layout already. It includes a new set of categories and reorganizes entire sections of the store.

Continue reading →