Windows Weekly 928: The Rice is Done

Paul, Leo, and Richard get into new Windows features (thanks to the Feature Tracker), hardware shifts for Microsoft/Intel/Apple, AI moves from OpenAI/Apple/Adobe, Notion Mail, a Hawaiian drink, the National Recording Registry, rice cookers, and electronic timer tunes!

Windows 11

• Feature Tracker. Since we last talked, Microsoft has announced the following new features for Windows 11:
• Semantic search can now search for Windows settings using natural language - Dev and Beta (24H2) channels, no clear stable date but guessing June
• Narrator can more accurately describe images by detailing the people, objects, colours, text, and numbers in them, Snapdragon X only, same builds as above
• Snipping Tool with "Text extraction" in the capture bar - This in Canary now, but it was in at least Dev previously, this could ship in stable at any time, it's an app
• Recall (preview) and Click to Do (preview) head to the Release Preview channel (24H2) - Expect this in May Patch Tuesday
• Narrator speech recap, Phone Link/Start integration, File Explorer Home updates, Windows Share with Edit all head to Release Preview (23H2) - Expect these in May Patch Tuesday - They were added to Beta channel (23H2) a few days earlier
• Plus, Microsoft Edge is up to 9 percent faster at web rendering and we're having a fiesta
• Also, the Windows 95 startup/logout chime has been inducted into the National Recording Registry

Hardware

• Surface Hub OG hits EOL this year just like Windows 10
• First major change under new Intel CEO
• What's a computer? The iPad, supposedly, but we'll see
• Everything's fine, but Google laid off hundreds in Pixel/Android group

AI

• Apple is making big changes so that Apple Intelligence will actually be intelligent
• Adobe is going agentic too
• OpenAI is creating its own social network because the world needs another social network
• OpenAI announces three GPT-4.1 models - may retire GPT-4 soon - plus now o3 and o4-mini models
• ChapGPT gets an image library and a memory
• Claude gets Research and Google Workspace integration
• Meta will start training its AI models with EU data, wink wink

Xbox and games

• Xbox app on mobile will soon let you buy games (!) and add-on content, join Game Pass, and redeem perks. Did Microsoft get a concession from Apple/Google??
• COD: Modern Warfare II (OG) and more are coming to Game Pass in the next few weeks
• Xbox announces Doom: The Dark Ages limited edition accessories
• Sea of Thieves is coming to Battle.net
• Sony forced to raise the price of PS5 in three locales

Tips and Picks

• Tip of the week: Think like an individual, not an enterprise
• App pick of the week: Notion Mail
• RunAs Radio this week: How to Not Hate PowerShell with Barbara Forbes
• Brown liquor pick of the week: 12th Hawaii Distiller's Reserve

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.

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