Category Archives: Windows 10

Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Microsoft PC Manager Makes Store Debut

2 Comments

They used to call it Microsoft PC Manager (Beta). Now, not only is the beta designation gone, Microsoft PC Manager Makes Store debut. And when you install it from the download, the program flashes this screen to confirm that change of status:

What do YOU think? Official it is!

Easy Pickings As Microsoft PC Manager Makes Store Debut

I’ve written a couple of prior stories about the Beta version so I’m fairly familiar with this program:

I can say this much right away: with its release into the MS Store, installing MSPCM (as I like to abbreviate Microsoft PC Manager) has become a LOT easier. If you didn’t realize how the download button worked in the beta version you could easily be fooled into thinking installation didn’t work. Happened to me, anyway. And of course, installing via the Store means you can skip all the steps I depict in the afore-linked TekkiGurus story (as well as the ones I just skip over).

OK, Then: What’s Changed?

Other than dropping the (Beta) from the end of its name and popping up in the Store, I haven’t found that much different about the program just yet. Looks like I need to spend more time noodling around. Good thing that’s one of my favorite ways to spend time with Windows.

On the plus side, MSPCM is losing a lot of its rough edges. It still shows some signs that non-native English speakers put the text together, but it’s getting better, e.g.:

PC Manager will automatically boost your PC when high usage of RAM or there are 1GB of temporary files

Cleanup your system and free up spaces.

Built-in a variety of Windows tools.

The first of these items comes from the UI itself, the latter two from the PC Manager web pages. Still a bit of Chinglish in there, but they’ve come a long way since I started playing with this tool last fall. Check it: search for Microsoft PC Manager at the Microsoft Store, or follow its Store Link. Cheers!

Note: here’s a shout-out to Abishek Misra at WindowsLatest, whose February 6 story clued me into this new step in MSPCM evolution.

 

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Device drivers, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Updates, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

NVIDIA Drops New Driver Batch

Leave a comment

As I work through the Windows news each morning, I check X (Twitter), LinkedIn, Facebook and Mastodon by way of social media. I also check in on WinAero, WindowsLatest, MSPowerUser, Ghacks, Thurott and Windows Central as well. Today, most of them told me something like NVIDIA drops new driver batch 551.23. And indeed, I found Game-ready and Studio versions for consumer grade GPUs, as well as Quadro (551.23 aka Release 550) among the pro lines. You can see the Studio version from GeForce Experience in the lead-in graphic above.

Fast facts on this latest version:
1. Target Directory: C:\ProgramData\NVIDIA Corporation\
Downloader…
2. Filename: 551.23-desktop-win10-win11-64bit-
international-nsd-dch-whql-g.exe
3. Download size: 519KB (downloader only)
4. On-disk file size: 1.93 GB (all files downloaded & expanded)
5. Download & install time: ~3:30 (average across 5 PCs)

Why NVIDIA Drops New Driver Batch 551.23

Most often updates follow close on the heels of new games (or game features). Sometimes, they pop up to support new NVIDIA GPU offerings. It’s the latter this time, with the release of the game- and AI-ready RTX 4080 SUPER at CES on January 8, 2024 (also includes 4070 Ti SUPER and 4070 SUPER in that mix).

Heh! I’m not sure I’m ready to fork over the long green needed to buy into the latest NVIDIA generation, but it’s nice to know they’re out there when I build my next desktop. I usually buy either a 4070 or 4070 Ti model because I can’t really justify the price/performance tax that a top-of-the-line model adds to my build costs. But gamers everywhere will probably be fighting off a new case of techno-lust.

Drivers Downloaded and Updated

Amidst my modest fleet of about one dozen PCs (8 laptops and 4 desktops), there are 7 machines with NVIDIA graphics cards of one kind or another. I’ve got the updates running on all of them right now (except for the desktop my son is using away at college, so I’ll mention this to him the next time we talk). By the time you read this, they should all be updated.

If you’ve got an NVIDIA GPU in your neighborhood, now you know there’s a new update out there, too. Three cheers for the 551.23 release!

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Backup/Restpre, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10

KB5034441 Partition Work Kills Reflect Backup

Leave a comment

There’s a very good reason why I run my Macrium Reflect backups at 9 AM. I’m usually at my desk, so I can see it fire up and –eventually — complete successfully. This morning, I noticed the backup had failed pretty soon after it started up. What I wanted to see shows up above in the lead-in graphic — namely “Image Completed Successfully.” Upon investigation, the reason for failure was a missing partition. Indeed, I’d deleted it to make room to expand my WinRE partition. That’s why I call this post KB5034441 Partition Work Kills Reflect Backup. Now, I’ll explain…

Why KB5034441 Partition Work Kills Reflect Backup

KB5034441 appeared on January 9 for Windows 10. It works some Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) magic and also rebuilds the WinRE partition on the sys/boot disk. Alas, it wants an additional 250MB of partition space. That’s usually not available in most existing recovery partitions, so it’s necessary to resize that partition to make room for the new additions.

This is where things get interesting for me. I run a daily backup on my sys/boot (and key data) disk(s). Because I made room to grow my existing WinRE partition — using reagentc /info to identify it, and MTPW to give it more space — I first deleted partition 6 on that drive (an older, now ununsed WinRE partition). Because my Reflect Macrium drives image backups from a partition map, killing Partition 6 on the drive made the XML backup schedule diverge from the actual disk layout. When that happens, out of an abundance of caution, Macrium Reflect refuses to image that changed  layout.

Fixing the Backup Backup (Failure)

All I had to do to fix the problem was to define a new backup schedule with the proper partitions ticked off on the boot/sys drive. But before I could do that, I had to notice the old backup definition was no longer working. Of course, I also deleted the no-longer-working definition file as well.

That finally happened this morning and I got a new backup completed shortly thereafter. I’m sure glad nothing blew up in the meantime. As you can see, my last successful backup (before today) occurred on January 12 — one week ago. Dodged a bullet, that time.

KB5034441 Partition Work Kills Reflect Backup.backfiles

Notice the second date in the descending series of files. It’s a week old. Ouch! {Click image for full-sized view.}

Learned an important lesson, too: if the partition map changes, the backup definition file must be changed to match. Otherwise, Macrium Reflect image backup won’t work! Because I rely on daily image backups to haul my fat out of the fire, that’s uncommonly good to know and understand…

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Cool Tools, Recent Activity, Updates, WED Blog, Windows 10

Laughable Stardock Version Mixup

Leave a comment

I have to chuckle. Winget just told me to upgrade Stardock Start10 on my lone remaining physical Windows 10 PC. Why? It sees a version numbered 1.9.7.0 but wants to take that package to 1.97. Of course, they are one and the same thing, and the update install fails with error code 9, as shown in the lead-in graphic. This laughable Stardock version mixup tells me there may be an issue with how version numbers get parsed and divided up inside winget’s package database.

Laughable Stardock Version Mixup:
1.9.7.0 v 1.97

When I run the about screen from the version that’s actually running what you see next is what I see too. Guess what? The in-app update check confirms that 1.97 is indeed already running and the most current release. So what’s the confusion?

Laughable Stardock Version Mixup.197-already-on

Not only is 1.97 already running, in-app update says it’s current.

This is one of the little mishaps to which winget sometimes succumbs. It’s no big deal, and it’s actually kind of endearing. And it gives me something to report in to the team. Not that they’ll be short of things to do next week when the world gets back to work!

I’m guessing it will take one or two database corrections to fix this, and probably less than 5 minutes’ work. Perhaps I’ll be finding out. If I do, I’ll share here so stay tuned!

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Thoughts & concerns, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Final 2023 Insider Channel Flights

Leave a comment

It’s a consistent pattern. I’m looking at the most recent “flight announcements” in the Windows Insider blog. All of them include this sentence: “This will be our last <Name> Channel flight until January 2024” where <Name> is one of: Canary, Dev or Beta. The most recent instance popped on December 14. Its header appears as the lead-in graphic above.

Why Say: Final 2023 Insider Channel Flights Are Out?

Beyond the flat assertions from MS indicating they’re on pause until after New Year’s, I’ll observe this is a typical thing for Windows development. It’s been ongoing as far back as I can remember. Indeed, it usually hits in the 2nd or 3rd week of December, before the major end-of-year holidays get going in earnest.

This makes pretty good sense to me. Productivity usually slumps between December 20 and January 3 or 4 (depending on what day of the week New Year’s hits — next year it’s a Monday). MS is smart to call a hiatus by the middle of the month, to give everybody time to gear up for, and then recover from, the hollidays. Most other businesses (except those in leisure and hospitality) tend to do likewise.

Take a Deep Breath, And …

Indeed, I just wrote my last weekly blog/column for GoCertify yesterday (it will publish Monday). And I’ve noticed the pace of work will be letting up with the websites and publications I write for starting next week.

Does this mean I’ll be taking a break from this blog, too? Yes and no. I probably won’t blog on December 24 and 25 or January 1, but other than that it should be close to normal as it ever gets here at Chez Tittel. I should have more time to fool around with my PCs, so I should find plenty of stuff to share. Do stay tuned if you’re so inclined, but I hope you’ll have time to enjoy the end-of-year break in your own special ways. Cheers!

 

 

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
AI, Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10

Windows 10 Copilot Remains Elusive

Leave a comment

There’s a new KB in circulation that claims to extend the reach of Copilot in Windows 10. That would be KB5033372, released December 12. But alas: on the lone eligible  physical PC and various Windows VMs here at Chez Tittel, Windows 10 Copilot remains elusive. It runs fine inside Edge, but will not show up as a Taskbar or Start menu item on any of their desktops. Sigh.

Why Windows 10 Copilot Remains Elusive

A quick visit to the KB announcement (link in preceding paragraph) gives me an excellent idea why my PC isn’t getting Copilot. Because some multi-monitor set-ups are subject to “mysterious icon migration” across or among desktops, MS has blocked it for such configs. Here’s what they say:

To prevent users from encountering this issue, Copilot in Windows (in preview) might not be available on devices that have been used or are currently being used in a multimonitor configuration.

And wouildn’t you know it: my Windows 10 PC runs with dual Dell UltraSharp 2717 monitors. That definitely accounts for my physical PC’s lack of Copilot. But I’m not so sure about the VMs. It may stem from my typical mode of access to them (using one of the two just-mentioned monitors) or it may be something else.

A Ray of Hope?

In the same KB announcement already cited MS also says that they’re “working on a solution and will provide an update in an upcoming release.” Here’s hoping that release is upcoming sooner rather than later!

And once again, I’m a Johnny-come-lately among all those already in the vanguard. But hey: that exactly the way that things go here in Windows-World. Once more with feeling, I guess!!

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Device drivers, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Counting MS 2006 Drivers

Leave a comment

Yesterday’s post about generic, MS-supplied device drivers got me thinking. These drivers bear an issue date of 6/21/2006, which coincides with Windows Vista’s RTM date. To be more specific, I wondered how many such items might appear in the Windows DriverStore. With counting MS 2006 drivers in mind, I asked Copilot for a PowerShell script to count them for me. Just for grins I compared that count to the total items as well.

Scripting Out Counting MS 2006 Drivers

You can see the results of my query to Copilot in the lead-in graphic. That query was “Write me a PowerShell script to display number of Windows drivers dated 6/21/2006 and total driver count.” As it turned out, on my Lenovo X380 ThinkPad running Windows 11, those numbers were 517 (2006 count) and 701 (total count). On my i7Skylake homebuilt system running Windows 10, those numbers were 511 and 672, respectively.

I’ll show the PowerShell commands below, but first I want to observe I had NO IDEA that MS supplies roughly 5 of every 7 drivers that Windows uses (over 70%). From looking at the items in the DriverStore more closely thanks to PowerShell, I see that this is because many of them are class, bus and service drivers. You can thus understand them as part of the driver stack between the OS and the function driver (at the bottom of the stack, it actually interacts with devices).

Here’s how MS shows this architecture in its MS Learn article “What is a driver?”

Counting MS 2006 Drivers.diagram
The driver at the bottom of the stack that communicates with a device is a function driver; according to the MS Learn item, filter drivers do “auxiliary processing” which may involve monitoring, verifying, translating, or otherwise manipulating in- and out-bound stack communications. By convention app to device communication moves down the stack, while device to app communication goes the other way.

PowerShell Details

Here’s the PowerShell that Copilot handed to me in response to my query, including comments (start with a # character):

#Get all the drivers from the online Windows image
$drivers = Get-WindowsDriver -Online -All
# Filter the drivers by the date of June 21, 2006
$drivers_2006 = $drivers | Where-Object {$_.Date -eq "6/21/2006"}
# Count the number of drivers with that date
$drivers_2006_count = $drivers_2006.Count
# Display the number of drivers and their names
Write-Output "There are $drivers_2006_count drivers dated 6/21/2006 in the online Windows image."
Write-Output "The names of the drivers are:"
$drivers_2006 | ForEach-Object {Write-Output $_.OriginalFileName}
# Display the total number of drivers
$alld = $drivers | Where-Object {$_.Inbox -eq "True"}
Write-Output "There are $alld.count total Windows drivers in the online Windows image."

Some of the lines shown above break across two lines in the browser, but are actually single PowerShell commands. If you run them, you must put them on a single line. I just ran the commands in sequence, one at a time as you can see in the lead-in graphic. I cheated, though: I simply output $alld.count in the last line shown. The PowerShell shown above wraps this in some explanatory text.

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Thoughts & concerns, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows Update

Windows 10 Lifecycle Changes

1 Comment

If I’m reading its HTML metadata correctly, Microsoft updated its Lifecycle FAQ = Windows document yesterday (December 5).  That’s when they added information about Extended Support Updates (ESUs) beyond the Windows 10 EOL date of October 14, 2025. ESU is a paid-for kind of support that allows licensees to get updates even after that cut-off date. Let’s explore what these Windows 10 Lifecycle changes  could mean.

Exploring Windows 10 Lifecycle Changes

For previous versions of Windows (e.g. 7) MS offered ESUs only to MS customers with existing paid-for support or licensing agreements. If I’m reading the afore-linked FAQ’s text correctly (see lead-in graphic), ordinary users (“individual users”) will also be eligible to pay for and receive these updates. That should be interesting.

I asked Copilot this question “How much did MS charge for ESU on Windows 7?” Here’s how it answered (superscript numbers 1-3 link to the sources for this information):

According to the web search results, Microsoft charged different amounts for Extended Security Updates (ESU) for Windows 7 depending on the edition and the year of purchase. For Windows 7 Professional, the ESU prices were $50, $100, and $200 per device for the first, second, and third year respectively1. For Windows 7 Enterprise, the ESU prices were $25, $50, and $100 per device for the same period1. However, some customers could get ESU for Windows 7 for free through Windows Virtual Desktop or other support contracts23.

Given that EOL for Windows 7 was January 14, 2020, let’s factor in some inflation. That makes it exactly 5.75 years between that date and the Windows 10 EOL. Using a low-ball average inflation rate of 2.5% over that period means adjusting the foregoing numbers by 14.4% or thereabouts. That means $50 becomes $57, $100 → $114, $200 → $228. You can do the math for the rest (but I think the Professional prices are the ones to go by).

Are They Ready to Rumble?

I’m forced to speculate that MS is adding individual consumers to its upcoming ESU coverage because they believe they left money on the table during the Windows 7 extended service period. This essentially brings businesses and users who are willing to pay for coverage, but who don’t have a licensing agreement or equivalent already in place with MS. It could easily be as big a revenue stream as the covered Windows 7 population was when EOL rolls around.

Inertia is indeed a strong force in business affairs. And sometimes, smaller businesses — especially sole proprietorships — can strongly resist change. This should be interesting to watch and try to figure out. I’m not sure if I should be impressed or appalled. Stay tuned: I’ll tell you…

PS Thanks to Sergey Tkachenko at WinAero.com for bringing this to my attention. I figured out the date info on my own…

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
AI, Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10

Windows 10 Copilot Limitations

Leave a comment

Dang! I’d have to call my desktop experience “a swing and a miss.” I jumped on the KB5023378 Preview update, expecting to get Copilot out of that amendment. Wrong! Among the first words in the afore-linked update Support note, key Windows 10 Copilot limitations emerge. This includes this scoping statment: “This [Copilot addition] only applies to devices that run Home or Pro editions…” (emphasis mine). As you can see from the lead-in graphic for reasons that are too long and tedious to explain, this PC is running Windows 10 Enterprise. Sigh.

Bitten By Windows 10 Copilot Limitations

Sigh. It just goes to show that my personal dark cloud hasn’t quit hovering in the vicinity. I’ve often observed that if MS slides an update out as a gradual release, my PCs are invariably in the rear guard. This is something of a spin on this all-too-familiar situation, but nontheless an amusing one.

Fortunately, my physical desktop is not the only Windows 10 image I can run. I just jumped over to the ThinkPad P16 Mobile Workstation where I have a couple of Win10 images from which to choose. My cleanest one (installed last week for an AskWoody column) is installing same right now. When it reboots, I expect to see a Copilot icon in the Taskbar. Here goes…

Overall, install time on a 4GB Gen2 VM was quick. The whole thing took under 3 minutes to download, install, then cycle through post-reboot update processing. Good stuff. But did I see Copilot on the Taskbar when it was all done? Nope.

I had to turn on and relaunch the VM to come back from the update reboot. And another reboot didn’t bring it up, either. Nor did a right-click in the Taskbar show a Copilot control. No Copilot item under Settings → Personalization, either. Very interesting. I’m obviously going to have to learn more to get Copilot working on my Windows 10 Pro VMs. Should be fun: stay tuned!

That Old Familiar Sensation

I see in the Windows Latest coverage (Mayank Pamar) that “Microsoft has also warned that the feature may not be available on devices with compatibility issues, including devices with an incompatible app.” Why do I get the feeling that includes either my ThinkPad P16 Mobile Workstation or its Hyper-V runtime environment for my 2 Windows 10 VMs on that machine?

Note Added December 6: Maybe I should be grateful none of my Win10 PCs got Copilot? I’m seeing numerous reports that MS has put updates for both 10 and 11 on hold because of Copilot issues. I guess waiting is better than troubleshooting problems of Microsoft’s making. Isn’t that just the way things go here in Windows-World?

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin
Cool Tools, Hyper-V and VMs, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10

Recent Windows Terminal Follies

Leave a comment

It’s always a humbling experience to work and work with Windows. This week, I’ve been relearning how Windows 10 works with Windows Terminal (and sometimes doesn’t). I had to stand up a squeaky clean Windows 10 instance in a VM for some WT testing and research. Tongue planted firmly in cheek as I went through some recent Windows Terminal follies, I realized I’d forgotten more about WT than I’d ever known. Let me explain…

History Underlies Recent Windows Terminal Follies

Today, my production Windows 10 installation has been running since 2016, when I stood up my present primary desktop PC. There have been a LOT of changes to Windows since then. And indeed, Windows Terminal (WT) is one of the things that has changed the most. But because I’d gone along with those changes — growing more experienced and wise to the ways of WT — I really didn’t remember all of the little twists and turns along the way.

Thus, installing a clean Windows 10 OS image came as a series of shocks where WT was concerned. Let me list a few of them:

1. Windows 10 made its Insider Preview debut in 2014, WT didn’t come along until May 2019. Thus, it’s not set as the default command line environment in Windows 10.

2. WinKey+X, to my consternation, kept launching an older PowerShell version (v5.1.19014.3570). And the only version of WT present was an older Preview that I didn’t want.

3. Thus, I found myself visiting the MS Store to grab the latest copy of WT, installing it, then setting it as my default terminal application (see lead-in graphic: notice further than this version needs an upgrade).

Eventually, I got things sorted and where I want them to be. But it did come as something of a shock to understand how much change I’d been introducing to my desktop runtime, step by little step. Only when I had to jump the whole stretch in a single bound did I see how far things has really come.

Some Unexpected MSA Bonuses Also Present

OneDrive picks up files from my User folder as part of what it keeps in the cloud. Apparently this includes my PowerShell Profile, because an invocation to OhMyPosh showed up as I fired off the new WT install for the first time. That made setting up OMP even faster and easier than usual.

The moral of today’s story is that one doesn’t really recognize how far one has come (or how much things have changed) until one is forced to recover the same ground and see what’s different. That’s one good reason why — for me, at least — Windows-World is always an adventure.

Facebooklinkedin
Facebooklinkedin