Microsoft is back from Thanksgiving vacation and is delivering a treat for Windows Insiders. The company released two new Windows 11 builds, across both the Dev Channel and the Beta Channel.
Dev Channel Windows Insiders are getting build 25252 with a new glanceable VPN status icon in the system tray. Meanwhile, Beta channel Windows Insiders are seeing either build 22623.1020 for those who have new features rolling out or build 22621.1020 for those who have new features off by default. The new beta channel feature is support for braille displays in Narrator. We have the details for both builds right here.
Windows 11 Insider Dev Channel build 25252
We'll start with the Dev Channel and Windows 11 Insider Preview build 25252. This release adds glanceable VPN status into the system tray when connected to a recognized VPN profile. Now, you should see a small shield over your network icon in the clock area overlayed in your system's accent color when connected to a VPN. Also, new in the release is Microsoft A/B testing a new search bar icon. The new search icon is longer, and square, with a graphic for the daily search highlight similar to Windows 10. Not everyone might see it though.
Other than those new features, there are a bunch of fixes, as usual. The fixes cover the taskbar and system tray, the Start Menu, and several issues with crashing apps. Check these out below.
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Fixed an explorer.exe crash when using Alt+F4 with the show hidden icons flyout in the system tray open.
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Fixed multiple explorer.exe crashes impacting system tray performance.
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Updated the battery icon’s tooltip to let you know if your device is charging slowly.
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Made a small refinement for tablet-optimized taskbar users to make it a bit easier to expand the taskbar without invoking the Start menu.
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Fixed an issue which could lead to the taskbar jump lists and preview thumbnails not appearing in the correct position for Insiders with 2 in 1 PCs.
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Fixed an issue causing some Insiders to see a bugcheck with the error SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION after upgrading to the previous flight.
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Fixed an issue which was causing certain apps (including Media Player) to crash when playing media in the background in recent flights.
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Fixed an issue which could lead to your PC going to sleep although it was configured to not sleep.
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Fixed an issue where network-to-local copying (for example, when copying a file from a network share) was slower than expected from some users.
Of course, if you're considering upgrading, you'll have to keep these known issues in mind. There are several critical ones this week, with widgets, secondary drives, the taskbar, and the task manager. Most notably, Microsoft says there is an issue causing some Insiders to not be able to view certain secondary drives. Upgrading to a build with a future fix will resolve this issue.
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[NEW] Under certain circumstances, Widgets may appear missing for a small subset of Windows Insiders causing explorer.exe to crash in a loop after upgrading to this build. If it is missing, you can install it here. We recommend doing this before you upgrade. If you upgrade and are impacted, please follow these steps for rolling back the build.
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We’re looking into reports that audio stopped working for some Insiders after upgrading to the latest flights.
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We’re investigating reports of crashes with a few different apps and games in recent builds.
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We’re working on the fix for an issue causing various UI elements in apps appear to disappear and reappear sometimes in recent builds.
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The taskbar is sometimes cropped in half when using the tablet-optimized taskbar.
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[NEW] We’re working on the fix for an issue causing the Bluetooth section of Quick Settings to crash starting with the previous flight. If you are impacted, please use the Settings > Bluetooth & Devices for the time being instead.
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The taskbar is sometimes cropped in half when using the tablet-optimized taskbar.
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[NEW] We’re working on the fix for an issue causing the Bluetooth section of Quick Settings to crash starting with the previous flight. If you are impacted, please use the Settings > Bluetooth & Devices for the time being instead.
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[NEW] When you change your primary monitor, for example by plugging an external display in, you will see a search box that appears to be floating on the desktop. You can fix this issue by going into Personalization > Taskbar > Search and toggling the setting.
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[NEW] When using multiple monitors, the search box is not visible on the non-active monitor when the search flyout is open. This is only present when “Show my taskbar on all displays” is enabled.
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[NEW] When you click on the search box on taskbar, the search box will momentarily flash before the Search flyout shows up
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[NEW] In right-to-left display languages like Arabic, there are layout issues with the text in the search box on taskbar.
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[NEW] Some Japanese IME candidate items are clipped inside the search box on taskbar.
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Filtering by publisher name does not match correctly on the Processes page.
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Some services may not show in the Services page after filtering is applied.
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If a new process is starting while a filter is set, then that process may appear for a split second in the filtered list.
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Some dialogs may not render in the correct theme when applied from Task Manager Settings page.
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The data content area of the Processes page may flash once when theme changes are applied in the Task Manager Settings page.
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There’s an issue we’re investigating where Task Manager isn’t displaying light and dark content correctly, leading to unreadable text. This happens when you have your mode in Settings > Personalization > Colors set to Custom – as a workaround for the time being, please switch it to Light or Dark.
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The Startup apps page in Task manager does not list any apps for some Insiders. If you are impacted, please use Settings > Apps > Startup for the time being.
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In right-to-left display languages like Arabic, content animates out of view before the widgets board resizes when clicking to expanded view of the widgets board.
Windows 11 Beta Channel build 22623.1020
Windows 11 Beta Channel build 22623.1020 brings one new feature, support for Braille display in the narrator. There's detailed documentation on how to use this feature on Microsoft's website, but you'll need to remove narrator's current braille support first. Other than that, there are fixes covering the taskbar and system tray, windowing, and task manager. Check these out below.
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The spelling dictionary now uses a language-neutral word list and syncs across all devices that use the same Windows account (Microsoft accounts and AAD) is now available to all Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel. Users can toggle this feature via Settings > Accounts > Windows backup > Remember my preferences > Language preferences
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Fixed a high hitting explorer.exe crash in the previous Beta Channel flight related to the system tray. This crash is also believed to be the cause of some Insiders experiencing a repeated explorer.exe crash when entering safe mode on that flight.
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Fixed an issue which was causing certain third-party app icons in the system tray to be unresponsive after the latest system tray changes.
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The Windows Update icon in the system tray should no longer look pixelated after changing between light and dark mode.
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If you have two monitors on top of each other, the Desktops list in Task View should no longer appear to be floating in the middle of Task View.
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Moved the open navigation pane button to be under the title bar when Task Manager is wide enough to expand it inline – in doing so, addressed an issue where you couldn’t drag Task Manager from the area in the title bar above the navigation pane if the navigate pane was expanded.
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The Delete key should work in the search box now.
Windows 11 Beta Channel build 22621.1020 & build 22623.1020
For those who are not getting new features and getting Windows 11 build 22623.1020, there are just fixes for you. There are a bunch of tweaks for Windows Spotlight, OneDrive, organizational messages, and more. The full changelog can be expanded by clicking the box below this text.
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New! We combined Windows Spotlight with Themes on the Personalization page. This made it easier for you to discover and turn on the Windows Spotlight feature.
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New! We provided the full amount of storage capacity of all your Microsoft OneDrive subscriptions. We also displayed the total storage on the Accounts page in the Settings app.
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New! We gave Microsoft OneDrive subscribers storage alerts on the Systems page in the Settings app. The alerts appeared when you were close to your storage limit. You could also manage your storage and purchase additional storage, if needed.
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New! We added the organizational messages feature. With it, third-party companies could provide content to their employees. They did not need to use the default behavior of Windows.
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We fixed an issue that affected protocol activation of the Settings app. The app failed to open a page under the Accounts category.
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We fixed an issue that affected certain applications. They stopped working. This occurred when you used keyboard shortcuts to change the input mode for the Japanese Input Method Editor (IME).
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We fixed an issue that affected cluster name objects (CNO) or virtual computer objects (VCO). Password reset failed. The error message was, ” There was an error resetting the AD password… // 0x80070005”.
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We fixed an issue that might have caused certain apps to stop responding. This occurred when you opened the Open File dialog.
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We fixed an issue that sometimes affected File Explorer when you opened a file. Because of that, there was high CPU usage.
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We fixed an issue that affected Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. Automated investigation blocked live response investigations.
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We fixed an issue that affected Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM) authentication hardening. We would automatically raise the authentication level for all non-anonymous activation requests from DCOM clients to RPC_C_AUTHN_LEVEL_PKT_INTEGRITY. This occurred if the authentication level was below Packet Integrity.
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We fixed an issue that affected microphone streams that used the Listen To feature to route to the speaker endpoint. The microphone stopped working after you restarted the device.
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We fixed an issue that caused File Explorer to stop working. This occurred when you closed context menus and menu items.
On known issues with this release, there's a bunch covering the task manager, system tray, and one where Microsoft says some Insiders might not be getting audio in recent builds.
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We’re looking into reports that audio stopped working for some Insiders in recent Beta Channel builds.
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The taskbar sometimes flashes when transitioning between desktop posture and tablet posture.
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The taskbar takes longer than expected to transition to the touch-optimized version when switching between desktop posture and tablet posture.
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Filtering by publisher name does not match correctly on the Processes page.
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Some services may not show in the Services page after filtering is applied.
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If a new process is starting while a filter is set, then that process may appear for a split second in the filtered list.
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Some dialogs may not render in the correct theme when applied from Task Manager Settings page.
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The data content area of the Processes page may flash once when theme changes are applied in the Task Manager Settings page.
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There’s an issue we’re investigating where Task Manager isn’t displaying light and dark content correctly, leading to unreadable text. This happens when you have your mode in Settings > Personalization > Colors set to Custom – as a workaround for the time being, please switch it to Light or Dark.
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The Startup apps page in Task manager does not list any apps for some Insiders. If you are impacted, please use Settings > Apps > Startup for the time being.
That's all the Windows Insider action for today. Microsoft kicked things off earlier than usual, but that gives you plenty of time to submit your feedback. As always, these builds will be waiting for you in Windows Update when ready.
Source: Microsoft (1, and 2)