Week D - If a preview update falls in the woods and no one downloads it, did it really happen? Plus, what is going on with AI for free? Isn't this stuff expensive?

Windows

• 23H2/24H2: Taskbar share, Spotlight updates, Windows Backup snooze in File Explorer, etc.
• Dev and Beta - Semantic search adds OneDrive photo search to Search (was in File Explorer previously), plus the Recall reboot no one is explaining. And Trim comes to Snipping Tool (Canary and Dev)
• Beta (23H2) - Share gets a drag tray and Start All apps gets new Grid and Category views
• Lenovo revenues surge 20 percent
• Framework announces Ryzen AI-based Laptop 13, plus Laptop 12 and Desktop
• Opera adds Bluesky, Discord, and Slack to the sidebar

Microsoft 365

• Microsoft confuses us with a test of a free, ad-supported core Office suite for Windows
• Amazon kills Chime, will use Zoom, Teams, and more
• Amazon kills Appstore for Android
• Google to drop SMS-based 2FA, move to QR codes
• Paul continues with his SSO removals, an update on whether this impacts account availability

AI/Dev

• Following up the previous discussion with an interesting way to use an AI chatbot
• Alexa enters the AI era
• OpenAI now has 400 million weekly active users
• Microsoft cancels some AI datacenter leases, but it's not done spending billions on AI
• Anthropic releases first reasoning model, with a twist
• Gemini Code Assist is now free for individuals!
• ThinkDeeper and Voice in Copilot no longer have usage restrictions
• OpenAI makes Deep Research available to all paid customers
• Apple delays biggest Siri advances past iOS 18.4 - Math is hard, but AI is even harder
• Spotify expands into AI-narrated audiobooks
• NVIDIA partners to bring free ASL training to everyone
• .NET 10 Preview 1 arrives with the promise of LTS and not much else

Xbox

• Xbox Cloud Gaming gets its first update in a while, and it's a big one
• Microsoft delays Fable reboot to 2026

Tips and Picks

• Tip of the week: You can view the source code for the oldest machine-readable version of Unix
• App pick of the week: Adobe Photoshop for iPhone
• RunAs Radio this week: Exchange Server in 2025 with Michel de Rooij
• Brown liquor pick of the week: Glenrothes 15

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Paul Thurrott, and Richard Campbell

Download or subscribe to Windows Weekly at https://twit.tv/shows/windows-weekly

Check out Paul's blog at thurrott.com

The Windows Weekly theme music is courtesy of Carl Franklin.

Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts!
Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit

Sponsors:

• 1password.com/windowsweekly
• cachefly.com/twit

On this episode, Paul Thurrott, Leo Laporte, and Richard Campbell explore the Windows KB5052086 update, the new Linux kernel drama, quantum computing, and more. Microsoft has announced the very first QPU, powered by topological qubits! Can the hosts possibly comprehend how this works? Later, Paul strongly emphasizes how AI can save users lots of time. Finally, Richard features a whisky that was recently brought to his 30th wedding anniversary!

Windows

• Dev channel: "Important" update because of the coming change to Recall soon, so here's an update that will wipe out all your data. One guess about what that means. Plus, a nice change to the Recall pop-up
• Release Preview (24H2): A preview of the preview that we'll preview next time
• Release Preview (23H2): Basically the same features as above, keeping the two aligned
• Microsoft deprecates location history in Windows 11 - depreciation junction, what's your function?
• Microsoft Edge gets more WebUI 2-based performance improvements
• Clipchamp just keeps getting better

Microsoft 365

• Microsoft: Just kidding about that MSA and Entra ID sign-in experience change
• Outlook mobile is getting a new font picker, a recall email feature (finally), and a minimize email message feature.
• ExpressVPN (TWiT sponsor) rewrote its VPN protocol in Rust

AI

• Microsoft announces a Quantum computing breakthrough, first quantum processor
• Flareup in Linux kernel management maps directly to what we see with AI - Two extremes but a clear middle ground
• Long story short, AI is all about saving you time - this is the "many small things, not one big thing" argument
• Copilot gets new voice capabilities
• In case you were worried, OpenAI formally rejects buyout offer
• OpenAI will also simplify its model offerings
• Google Gemini now remembers what you said, unlike your husband
• xAI launches Grok3 model but only for X Premium subscribers

Xbox

• Avowed launches, with many other Game Pass titles coming through the end of February
• Microsoft announced a generative AI model for video games
• Sony just had its best-ever PS5 sales quarter

Tips and Picks

• Tip of the week: Find your AI "ah-ha" moment
• App pick of the week: Notion. And iA Writer 2 for Windows is here
• RunAs Radio this week: Managed DevOps Pools with Eliza Tarasila
• Brown liquor pick of the week: Signal Hill

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Paul Thurrott, and Richard Campbell

Download or subscribe to Windows Weekly at https://twit.tv/shows/windows-weekly

Check out Paul's blog at thurrott.com

The Windows Weekly theme music is courtesy of Carl Franklin.

Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts!
Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit

Sponsors:

• uscloud.com
• zscaler.com/security
• 1password.com/windowsweekly

Patch Tuesday has arrived and Windows 11 23H2/24H2 gets those preview updates we talked about two weeks ago: Taskbar preview improvements, Windows Studio Effects on taskbar, File Explorer improvements, Mouse improvements, Time Zone changes without admin privileges, OneDrive continuity (23H2 only), Windows Share improvements (23H2 only), new keyboard shortcut for Magnifier. While Windows 10 gets the new Outlook, you lucky dogs!

Windows

• Beta (yesterday) - Beta/Dev window is open, Beta will move to 24H2 soon, this new build was for 23H2, new Paint app
• MIDI IS BACK BABY! MIDI Services 2.0 now in public preview
• Photos app OCR capabilities are back - feature was in testing but disabled in November, supports 160 languages
• HoloLens is finally dead: Microsoft partners with tech bro to offload US Army contract

AI/Dev

• Microsoft schedules Build 2025 for May 19-22. And then Google schedules I/O 2025 for May 20-21
• Elon Musk and investors supposedly make bid for OpenAI - hilarity ensues
• OpenAI is working on its own AI chip because everyone else is
• OpenAI is working on its own AI chip because everyone else is
• You don't have to sign in to OpenAI to use ChatGPT Search now
• Google Gemini 2.0 family is now (mostly) generally available
• GitHub Copilot is getting agentic features this year
• Remember the so-called Windows Copilot Runtime? It's finally happening. Paul noticed that the Windows App SDK 1.7 Experimental 3 release finally had WCR bits, was quietly released last week
• Coding hands-on: Building text rewrite and summarize requires just a few lines of code

More Earnings/Corporate

• Qualcomm - $11.7 billion in revenues, up 17 percent
• It's over! Arm Holdings drops Qualcomm complaint, will not terminate license
• Amazon: $188 billion in revenues, up 9.5 percent - AWS was $29 billion in revenues, up 16 percent. Amazon to spend $75 billion this fiscal year on AI infrastructure build-out, similar to MSFT, that figure was $28 billion in the previous quarter
• Here comes Conversational Alexa - Amazon devices and services event February 26
• Sonos continues its downward spiral - Before earnings, restructuring and layoffs

Xbox

• Good news/bad news on Xbox console sales - Better than expected, honestly
• Candy Crush Solitaire is first new King game under Xbox - Perfect King/Microsoft mashup

Tips and Picks

• Tip of the week: A few steps forward (and back) for the 2025 online accounts push
• Tip of the week #2: Get the Bill Gates book Source Code
• App pick of the week: Notion is nearly perfect
• RunAs Radio this week: Upgrading to Windows Server 2025 with Robert Smit
• Brown liquor pick of the week: Mackmyra Brukswhisky

Hosts: Paul Thurrott, Richard Campbell, and Mikah Sargent

Download or subscribe to Windows Weekly at https://twit.tv/shows/windows-weekly

Check out Paul's blog at thurrott.com

The Windows Weekly theme music is courtesy of Carl Franklin.

Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts!
Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit