In a interesting discovery that sent a series of shockwaves through the Linux community, Andres Freund, Principal Software Engineer at Microsoft, located a malicious backdoor in the widely used compression tool called "xz Utils." The backdoor, introduced in versions 5.6.0 and 5.6.1 of the utility, can break the robust encryption provided by the Secure Shell (SSH) protocol, allowing unauthorized access to affected systems. What Andres Freund found is that the latest version of xz Utils is taking 0.5 seconds in SSH on his system, while the older system with the older version took 0.1 seconds for simple processing, prompting the user to investigate and later send a widespread act for caution. While there are no confirmed reports of the backdoored versions being incorporated into production releases of major Linux distributions, the incident has raised serious concerns among users and developers alike.

Red Hat and Debian, two of the most well-known Linux distribution developers, have reported that their recently published beta releases, including Fedora 40, Fedora Rawhide, and Debian testing, unstable, and experimental distributions, used at least one of the affected versions of xz Utils. According to Red Hat officials, the first signs of the backdoor were introduced in a February 23 update, which added obfuscated (unreadable) code to xz Utils. A subsequent update the following day introduced functions for deobfuscating the code and injecting it into code libraries during the utility's update process. The malicious code has been cleverly hidden only in the tarballs, which target upstream releases of Linux distributions.

There has been plenty of leaked activity on the Xbox front lately—late last month a couple of extra details emerged regarding the oft-rumored physical media-less Xbox Series S refresh. Exputer's exclusive follow-up piece included a set of very low resolution shots—an insider managed to capture an apparent "white-colored Xbox Series X that features a digital-only format" out in an unknown environment/context. The images were sent via email according to the Exputer report. As expected, the less than adequate photos showcase a white device that shares the existing black Xbox Series X's overall design language, albeit minus a slot for optical media.

Exputer believes that: "peripherals and ports remain pretty much the same," when analyzing the unit's rear section. Many folks were expecting Microsoft to roll out the cylindrical "Project Brooklin" design (leaked in FTC court case documentation), but reports from last month indicated that the refresh would recycle the standard elongated cube aesthetic. Exputer has reiterated a rumored price point of "$50 to $100" below the standard Xbox Series X MSRP of $499. Internal upgrades are speculated to include an improved heatsink and a modernized wireless network card.

Microsoft, Intel, and AMD are attempting to jumpstart demand in the PC industry again, under the aegis of the AI PC—devices with native acceleration for AI workloads. Both Intel and AMD have mobile processors with on-silicon NPUs (neural processing units), which are designed to accelerate the first wave of AI-enhanced client experiences on Windows 11 23H2. Microsoft's bulwark with democratizing AI has been Copilot, as a licensee of Open AI GPT-4, GPT-4 Turbo, Dali, and other generative AI tools from the Open AI stable. Copilot is currently Microsoft's most heavily invested application, with its most capital and best minds mobilized to making it the most popular AI assistant. Microsoft even pushed for the AI PC designator to PC OEMs, which requires them to have a dedicated Copilot key akin to the Start key (we'll see how anti-competition regulators deal with that).

The problem with Microsoft's tango with Intel and AMD to push AI PCs, is that Copilot doesn't really use an NPU, not even at the edge—you input a query or a prompt, and Copilot hands it over to a cloud-based AI service. This is about to change, with Microsoft announcing that Copilot will be able to run locally on AI PCs. Microsoft identified several kinds of Copilot use-cases that an NPU can handle on-device, which should speed up response times to Copilot queries, but this requires the NPU to have at least 40 TOPS of performance. This is a problem for the current crop of processors with NPUs. Intel's Core Ultra "Meteor Lake" has an AI Boost NPU with 10 TOPS on tap, while the Ryzen 8040 "Hawk Point" is only slightly faster, with a 16 TOPS Ryzen AI NPU. AMD has already revealed that the XDNA 2-based 2nd Generation Ryzen AI NPU in its upcoming "Strix Point" processors will come with over 40 TOPS of performance, and it stands to reason that the NPUs in Intel's "Arrow Lake" or "Lunar Lake" processors are comparable in performance; which should enable on-device Copilot.

Microsoft, in a patent application, revealed that it is developing a new pixel dimming technology that allows software to control the brightness of specific regions of a compatible display, to greatly enhance realism. Put simply, this is a means for software to tell a display to increase the brightness of specific pixels of a display, while dimming others.

This is accomplished more easily on some display types, such as OLED, where each pixel is its own source of illumination. LCDs rely on backlit illumination from usually no more than a hundred LEDs, and so they're not capable of this technology, at least the way Microsoft describes it. Patent applications tend to have oversimplified language, and here, Microsoft describes how a component called an EM gate driver sends a PWM signal to pixels to adjust their brightness. All modern displays rely on the concept of PWM to adjust brightness, where the number of pulses of energy in a time period define how bright a display gets; and so Microsoft's language is rather vague. What's important, though, is that the company is claiming that it found a way to dim individual pixels. The patent application was originally filed in 2022, but published on March 21, 2024.

Phil Spencer has professed that he is a proud owner of a Lenovo Legion Go handheld gaming PC, but has experimented with other mainstream portable devices in recent times. Polygon conducted an "extensive" interview with the CEO of Microsoft Gaming—headlines have been generated from this tête-à-tête, mostly focusing on his wishlist of additional digital storefronts appearing on Xbox platforms. Ecosystem familiarity seem to be a very important aspect (in Spencer's opinion)—something that the current crop of handhelds lack: "I want my Lenovo Legion Go to feel like an Xbox. I brought (the Legion Go) with me to GDC. I'm on the airplane and I have this list of everything that makes it not feel like an Xbox. Forget about the brand. More like: Are all of my games there? Do all my games show up with the save (files) that I want? I'll tell you one (game) that doesn't right now—it's driving me crazy—is Fallout 76. It doesn't have cross-save."

He continued: "I want to be able to boot into the Xbox app in a full screen, but in a compact mode. And all of my social (experience) is there. Like I want it to feel like the dash of my Xbox when I turn on the television. (Except I want it) on those devices." Industry rumors have swirled around the possible existence of an in-development Xbox handheld—Spencer confirmed that his hardware design team, headed up by Roanne Sones, has weighed up: "different hardware form factors and things that (they) could go do...What should we build that will find new players? That will allow people to play at times when they couldn't go play (in the past)?"

Hey Xbox Insiders! We have a new Xbox Update Preview releasing to the Alpha Skip-Ahead ring today. It's important we note that some updates made to these preview OS builds include background improvements that ensure a quality and stable build for Xbox consoles. We will continue to post these release notes, even when the noticeable changes to the UI are minimal or behind the scenes, so you're aware when updates are coming to your device. Details can be found below!

New Features and Experiences
We have exciting news! Alpha Skip-Ahead users can expect something new coming to their Xbox Update Preview.

Xbox Cloud Gaming (Beta)
Xbox Insiders can preview Mouse and Keyboard support while playing via cloud gaming on supported browsers (Edge and Chrome) and the Xbox App on Windows PCs for users enrolled in the PC Gaming Preview. Note: Users on browser will need to enable Preview features on their browser to gain access to the feature. This is done by clicking on your profile picture at xbox.com/play and then select Settings and then enable "Preview features."

The Arctic Camo Special Edition controller is now making its worldwide debut! It was originally launched in the United States on May 2023 at select retailers and will now expand to international markets to reach more fans. Arctic Camo features a patchwork of rugged white and gray that all tie together into one striking visual. This monochromatic multitool, from the thumbsticks to the hybrid D-Pad and all the way to the triggers, is the perfect purchase for gamers who crave a controller that exudes both style and sophistication.

Like the rest of the Camo series, Arctic Camo comes with features which make Xbox controllers stand out. Enjoy modern sculpted surfaces and refined geometry for enhanced comfort during gameplay—with a hybrid D-Pad that allows your fingers to glide across the surface, textured grips on the bumpers, triggers, and back case for a stronger support. By using Bluetooth and Xbox Wireless, the Arctic Camo controller can connect to Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One consoles, PC, mobile phones and tablets (see xbox.com/controller-compatibility for more details).

Microsoft revealed that its DirectSR (Direct Super Resolution) API, which seeks to standardize super resolution-based performance enhancement technologies in games, has a hardware-independent default code path that is essentially based on AMD FSR 2.2, a Microsoft Dev Manager speaking at GDC has revealed. DirectSR provides a common set of APIs for game developers to integrate super resolution—so that developers don't have to separately implement DLSS, FSR and XeSS. Rather these upscalers, and others, can register themselves with the DirectSR API, and then get fed a dozen of input parameters that they may (or may not) use to improve the upscaling quality. Since AMD has open-sourced the code of FSR 2.2 on GPUOpen, and it is entirely shader-based, and doesn't use exotic technologies such as AI, Microsoft decided to use FSR 2.2 as the base algorithm for DirectSR. If other algorithms like DLSS are available on the user system, these can be activated by the user, too, of course, but supporting them requires no extra work from the developer side.Update 18:15 UTC: Updated the news post to make it clear that the FSR 2.2 code path is merely a default, and other upscalers are free to hook into DirectSR to provide upscaling.

Microsoft has filed for a new and even potentially groundbreaking patent that could transform the way ray tracing graphics are processed, especially when video memory (VRAM) is scarce. The patent proposes a technique to minimize the memory footprint of ray tracing graphics, tackling the escalating concerns about the growing memory demands for ray tracing and path tracing. The innovation outlined in Microsoft's patent employs a dynamic level of detail (LOD) approach to adaptively modify the quality of ray tracing effects based on accessible resources. The patent portrays the ray tracing pipeline as an acceleration structure that can be streamlined using this LOD system. The cornerstone of this optimization is a residency map that aligns with a bounding volume hierarchy of objects. The graphics processing system can then utilize this map to ascertain the suitable quality level for objects at any given moment. This methodology enables a more reasonable allocation of resources, guaranteeing that the most crucial objects receive the highest quality rendering. At the same time, less important elements can be rendered at lower quality to conserve memory.

Microsoft's patent could have far-reaching ramifications for the design and performance of upcoming GPUs. By implementing this novel LOD system, GPUs with more modest VRAM capacities, such as those with 8 GB, could provide ray tracing performance on par with higher-end models boasting larger memory buffers, given enough compute capacity. This advancement could pave the way for more budget-friendly GPUs that still deliver adequate ray tracing capabilities, making the technology more accessible. Moreover, the adaptive nature of the LOD system could contribute to a more reliable performance across diverse scenarios, as the GPU would be capable of adjusting to the available resources in real time. Microsoft's patent could emerge as a game-changer in the realm of GPU design and performance, and we are now waiting to see if any real-world implementations appear.

Xbox and Fallout fans, rejoice! Today, we are thrilled to announce a striking collaboration between Xbox and new series on Prime Video "Fallout", premiering on April 11. Introducing the Xbox and Fallout Vault Box—a custom collaboration that combines the rugged essence of the Fallout universe with the unparalleled security of a Fort Knox vault. Based on one of the greatest video game series of all time, "Fallout" is the story of haves and have-nots in a world in which there's almost nothing left to have. Two-hundred years after the apocalypse, the gentle denizens of luxury fallout shelters are forced to return to the irradiated hellscape their ancestors left behind—and are shocked to discover an incredibly complex, gleefully weird, and highly violent universe waiting for them.

The series comes from Kilter Films and executive producers Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy. Nolan directed the first three episodes. Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner serve as executive producers, writers and co-showrunners. The series stars Ella Purnell (Yellowjackets), Aaron Moten (Emancipation) and Walton Goggins (The Hateful Eight). Athena Wickham of Kilter Films also executive produces along with Todd Howard for Bethesda Game Studios and James Altman for Bethesda Softworks. Amazon MGM Studios and Kilter Films produce in association with Bethesda Game Studios and Bethesda Softworks.

We are excited to announce the first Surface AI PCs built exclusively for business: Surface Pro 10 for Business and Surface Laptop 6 for Business. These new PCs represent a major step forward in customer-focused design and are packed with features that business customers have been requesting - from amazing performance and battery life to more ports, better security and custom, durable anti-reflective displays. These are the first Surface PCs optimized for AI, with the new Copilot key being added to Surface Laptop 6 and Surface Pro keyboards that accelerate access to the best Windows AI experiences. In addition to the new Surface for Business products, we are pleased to announce the Microsoft Adaptive Accessories will now be available to commercial customers.

These new PCs are powered by the latest Intel Core Ultra processors. We partnered with Intel to deliver the power and reliable performance our customers depend on, along with compelling AI experiences for Surface and the Windows ecosystem. Surface has also been leading in Neural Processing Unit (NPU) integration to drive AI experiences on the PC since 2019, and the benefits of these connected efforts are evident. From a performance perspective, Surface Laptop 6 is 2x faster than Laptop 52, and Surface Pro 10 is up to 53% faster than Pro 9. The benefits of the NPU integration include AI features like Windows Studio Effects and Live Captions and the opportunity for businesses and developers to build their own AI apps and experiences.

Today, Lenovo launched its latest business laptop offerings in the form of the ThinkPad L series and ThinkPad X13 series. The new laptops are a testament to Lenovo's commitment to innovation and sustainability with features such as enhanced repairability, more recycled materials, efficient power management, and powerful processing capabilities with built-in security and manageability. With these offerings, Lenovo is not only showcasing its technological expertise but also its dedication to supporting a diverse customer base in achieving success across many business segments.

Lenovo's latest ThinkPad L series and X13 series with multiple advancements geared towards enhancing user experience. The new models offer several form factors - including 13-inch or 13-inch 2-in-1, 14-inch and introducing new 16-inch displays in ThinkPad L16 - catering to those in need of portability without compromising performance. Equipped with an optional higher resolution 5MP camera, users can expect enhanced video conferencing and content creation capabilities. The 16:10 ratio displays are designed to offer an immersive viewing experience for optimal productivity and with support up to 64 GB RAM, these laptops promise seamless multitasking and enhanced performance. Improvements in rear vent thermals ensure efficient cooling for prolonged usage, while select models offer support for up to Wi-Fi 7 and 4G LTE or 5G sub6 on select models, enhancing connectivity options. Powered by Intel Core Ultra processors with Intel vPro or AMD Ryzen PRO 7030 Series processors on ThinkPad L14 Gen 5 and L16 Gen 1, these new laptops are designed to optimally run Windows 11 and are poised to elevate productivity and streamline professional tasks.

Yesterday, South Korea's National Radio Research Agency certified a brand new and very mysterious Xbox Development Kit—naturally, the "Xbox News for Koreans" social media account took credit for this intriguing discovery: "this means that you can use the device in Korea. It is likely to be distributed to game developers in Korea soon." The model's serial code—2089—does not correspond to any of Microsoft's current Xbox Series (X|S) development kits. The tipster shared a short history lesson: "Xbox Series X|S dev kit consoles were certified by the National Radio Research Agency on June 10-11, 2020. The release of the Xbox Series X|S console in Korea was on November 10, 2020." By referencing the current generation's five-month gap—between registration and release of finalized retail units—it is speculated that something new could be arriving around August time.

Industry experts reckon that the leaked devkit is not linked to a rumored "All-Digital" White Xbox Series X Refresh—the latter likely contains unchanged basic hardware designs. Windows Central posited that an Xbox handheld is another possibility—leaked product roadmaps (of 2022 vintage) revealed that Microsoft was considering a move into portable gaming segments. A month ago, Xbox leadership discussed the platform's future—Sarah Bond stated: "there's some exciting stuff coming out in hardware that we're going to share this holiday, and we're also invested in the next generation roadmap...and what we're really focused on there, is delivering the largest technical leap you will have ever seen in a hardware generation." Many media outlets believed that an Xbox Series "Pro" model was teased during the special Official Xbox Videocast.

This "coming soon" announcement we're going to many different places with Game Pass, including the Old West, the open road, the other roads meant for toy themed cars, and even going to hell. That's just a small taste of where Game Pass is taking us, so let's dive in!

Available Today
Lightyear Frontier (Game Preview) (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X|S)—Available on day one with Game Pass: Start your interstellar homestead in this peaceful open-world farming adventure! Build your sustainable exofarm, grow alien crops, customize your mech, and explore a new world full of mystery with up to three friends!

MLB The Show 24 (Cloud and Console) —Available on day one with Game Pass: Swing for the fences, experience game-deciding moments, become a legend and live out your baseball dreams in MLB The Show 24.

At GTC on Monday, Microsoft Corp. and NVIDIA expanded their longstanding collaboration with powerful new integrations that leverage the latest NVIDIA generative AI and Omniverse technologies across Microsoft Azure, Azure AI services, Microsoft Fabric and Microsoft 365.

"Together with NVIDIA, we are making the promise of AI real, helping to drive new benefits and productivity gains for people and organizations everywhere," said Satya Nadella, Chairman and CEO, Microsoft. "From bringing the GB200 Grace Blackwell processor to Azure, to new integrations between DGX Cloud and Microsoft Fabric, the announcements we are making today will ensure customers have the most comprehensive platforms and tools across every layer of the Copilot stack, from silicon to software, to build their own breakthrough AI capability."

"AI is transforming our daily lives - opening up a world of new opportunities," said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA. "Through our collaboration with Microsoft, we're building a future that unlocks the promise of AI for customers, helping them deliver innovative solutions to the world."

NVIDIA today announced a new wave of networking switches, the X800 series, designed for massive-scale AI. The world's first networking platforms capable of end-to-end 800 Gb/s throughput, NVIDIA Quantum-X800 InfiniBand and NVIDIA Spectrum -X800 Ethernet push the boundaries of networking performance for computing and AI workloads. They feature software that further accelerates AI, cloud, data processing and HPC applications in every type of data center, including those that incorporate the newly released NVIDIA Blackwell architecture-based product lineup.

"NVIDIA Networking is central to the scalability of our AI supercomputing infrastructure," said Gilad Shainer, senior vice president of Networking at NVIDIA. "NVIDIA X800 switches are end-to-end networking platforms that enable us to achieve trillion-parameter-scale generative AI essential for new AI infrastructures."

Today, Microsoft announced that Windows 10 version 21H2 will reach its end-of-support date for Enterprise and Education editions on June 10, 2024. Following this date, organizations that are still running this version of Windows will no longer receive technical support, security patches, or bug fixes from the Redmond giant. If they seek help from Microsoft in troubleshooting their systems, users of Windows 10 21H2 will get advisory to upgrade to the next supported version, with Windows 11 being in the upgrade path pipeline. Alternatively, they can upgrade to the newer Windows 10 version 22H2, which will receive support until October 14, 2025. It's important to note that support for the Home and Pro editions of Windows 10 21H2 has already ended in June 2023.

The end of support applies to all variants of Windows 10 21H2, including Enterprise, Enterprise multi-session, Education, and IoT Enterprise. Businesses and schools still utilizing Windows 10 21H2 should plan their upgrades promptly. However, they may face challenges as Windows 11 has higher system requirements compared to Windows 10, such as requiring a UEFI BIOS, Secure Boot, DirectX 12 compatible graphics, and a TPM 2.0 security chip. While the Enterprise and Education editions have somewhat relaxed specifications, meeting all these criteria may necessitate hardware upgrades for some organizations, in addition to the operating system migration. If not possible, some organizations may go the Linux-based route of installing lightweight operating systems to keep their PC's lifecycle running.

Microsoft's DirectX department is scheduled to show off several innovations at this month's Game Developers Conference (GDC), although a late February preview has already spilled their DirectSR Super Resolution API's beans. Today, retail support for Shader Model 6.8 and Work Graphs has been introduced with an updated version of the company's Agility Software Development Kit. Program manager, Joshua Tucker, stated that these technologies will be showcased on-stage at GDC 2024—Shader Model 6.8 arrives with a "host of new features for shader developers, including Start Vertex/Instance Location, Wave Size Range, and Expanded Comparison Sampling." A linked supplementary article—D3D12 Work Graphs—provides an in-depth look into the cutting-edge API's underpinnings, best consumed if you have an hour or two to spare.

Tucker summarized the Work Graphs API: "(it) utilizes the full potential of your GPU. It's not just an upgrade to the existing models, but a whole new paradigm that enables more efficient, flexible, and creative game development. With Work Graphs, you can generate and schedule GPU work on the fly, without relying on the host. This means you can achieve higher performance, lower latency, and greater scalability for your games with tasks such as culling, binning, chaining of compute work, and much more." AMD and NVIDIA are offering driver support on day one. Team Red has discussed the launch of "Microsoft DirectX 12 Work Graphs 1.0 API" in a GPUOpen blog—they confirm that "a deep dive" into the API will happen during their Advanced Graphics Summit presentation. NVIDIA's Wessam Bahnassi has also discussed the significance of Work Graphs—check out his "Advancing GPU-driven rendering" article. Graham Wihlidal—of Epic Games—is excited about the latest development: "we have been advocating for something like this for a number of years, and it is very exciting to finally see the release of Work Graphs."

Intel is revamping its foundry play, and the company is set on its goals of becoming a strong contender to rivals such as TSMC and Samsung. Under Pat Gelsinger's lead, Intel recently split (virtually, under the same company) its units into Intel Product and Intel Foundry. During the SPIE 2024 conference for optics and photonics, Anne Kelleher, Intel's senior vice president, revealed that the 14A (1.4 nm) process offers a 15% performance-per-watt improvement over the company's 18A (1.8 nanometers) process. Additionally, the enhanced 14A-E process boasts a further 5% performance boost from the regular A14 node, being a small refresh. Intel's 14A process is set to be the first to utilize High-NA extreme ultraviolet (EUV) equipment, delivering a 20% increase in transistor logic density compared to the 18A node.

The company's aggressive pursuit of next-generation processes poses a significant threat to Samsung Electronics, which currently holds the second position in the foundry market. As part of its IDM 2.0 strategy, Intel hopes to reclaim its position as a leading foundry player and surpass Samsung by 2030. The company's collaboration with American companies, such as Microsoft, further solidifies its ambitions. Intel has already secured a $15 billion chip production contract with Microsoft for its 1.8 nm 18A process. The semiconductor industry is closely monitoring Intel's progress, as the company's advancements in process technology could potentially reshape the competitive landscape. With Samsung planning to mass-produce 2 nm process products next year, the race for dominance in the foundry market is heating up.

According to TPU's SSD database, the Microsoft Z1000 M.2 22110 form factor solid-state drive launched back in 2020—last week, well-known hardware tipster, yuuki_ans, leaked a set of photos and specifications. Their March 7 social media post showcases close-ups of a potential enterprise product—sporting a CNEX Labs CNX-2670AA-CB2T controller, Toshiba BiCS4 96-layer eTLC NAND flash dies and 1 GB Micron MT40A1G8SA-075:E DDR4 RAM cache. The mysterious storage device appears to be an engineering sample (PV1.1)—an attached label lists a possible manufacturing date of May 18, 2020, but its part number and serial code are redacted in yuuki's set of photos. PCIe specifications are not disclosed, but experts reckon that a 4.0 standard is present here (given the prototype's age).

The long form factor and presence of a CNEX Labs controller suggest that Microsoft has readied a 960 GB capacity model for usage in data servers. Unoccupied spaces on the board provide evidence of different configurations. Extra BGA mounting points could introduce another DRAM chip, and there is enough room for additional capacitors—via solder pads on both sides of the Z1000's PCB. It is speculated that 2 TB and 4 TB variants exist alongside the leaked 960 GB example—a "broad portfolio" of finalized Z1000 products could be in service right now, but the wider public is unlikely to see these items outside of Microsoft facilities.

In what is a solid hint that Arm-based SoCs such as the Qualcomm Snapdragon X don't just intend to serve as cheaper alternatives to x86-based U-segment processors from Intel and AMD, but also compete in the high-end on virtue of their performance and battery life advantages; Samsung is designing a line of premium thin-and-light notebooks around the upcoming Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processor. Snapdragon X crams in the company's most advanced Arm CPU IP, and the latest generation Qualcomm Adreno iGPU; with Qualcomm claiming to offer 2x the CPU and graphics performance over x86 processors in its price-class, at 1/3rd the power (in other words, over 2x the battery life). It also packs a powerful NPU with 45 TOPS AI inferencing performance on tap. The Snapdragon X Elite is essentially Qualcomm's answer to the M3.

With the Snapdragon X Elite, Samsung has designed the new Galaxy Book 4 Edge, and WinFuture has some specs. Apparently the notebook comes in a 14-inch thin-and-light form-factor. The Snapdragon X Elite will be paired with 16 GB of LPDDR5/X memory, and 512 GB of NVMe-based SSD storage. Comms will include a 5G MODEM for connectivity anywhere; and possibly Wi-Fi 7 BE. Although we can't tell from the company images, it stands to reason that Samsung is using an AMOLED touchscreen display. WinFuture reports that Samsung plans to price the Galaxy Book 4 Edge at €1,759, which should put it in competition with several models of M3-powered MacBooks. The best part? The notebook is powered by Windows 11, and comes with a Microsoft-supplied translation layer for running legacy PC apps on it.

We have provided an update on the nation-state attack that was detected by the Microsoft Security Team on January 12, 2024. As we shared, on January 19, the security team detected this attack on our corporate email systems and immediately activated our response process. The Microsoft Threat Intelligence investigation identified the threat actor as Midnight Blizzard, the Russian state-sponsored actor also known as NOBELIUM. As we said at that time, our investigation was ongoing, and we would provide additional details as appropriate.

In recent weeks, we have seen evidence that Midnight Blizzard is using information initially exfiltrated from our corporate email systems to gain, or attempt to gain, unauthorized access. This has included access to some of the company's source code repositories and internal systems. To date we have found no evidence that Microsoft-hosted customer-facing systems have been compromised. It is apparent that Midnight Blizzard is attempting to use secrets of different types it has found. Some of these secrets were shared between customers and Microsoft in email, and as we discover them in our exfiltrated email, we have been and are reaching out to these customers to assist them in taking mitigating measures. Midnight Blizzard has increased the volume of some aspects of the attack, such as password sprays, by as much as 10-fold in February, compared to the already large volume we saw in January 2024.

In March last year, we announced a 10-year partnership with Boosteroid to bring Xbox PC games to more players around the world. In June, we brought the first batch of Xbox PC games to Boosteroid and today, we're taking another step in our partnership. We're bringing more high-quality, immersive PC games by giving players another option to stream select games purchased through Microsoft Store on Windows, or available with a Game Pass membership. Our partnership continues to accelerate access to players by letting them choose how and where they play their games.

Starting today, you can play Deathloop, Dishonored, Dishonored 2, Dishonored: Death of The Outsider, Gears 5, Gears Tactics, Ghostwire: Tokyo, and Pentiment. You can also enjoy cross-play and cross-save features with your Xbox console and Windows PC for these games. We'll continue to add more hits and fan favorites from our extensive catalog of PC games over time. To get started, you'll need to gain access to the game through the Microsoft Store—either via a PC Game Pass or Xbox Game Pass Ultimate membership, or by a direct purchase of the game through the Microsoft Store—long with a Boosteroid membership.

ViewSonic Corp., a leading global provider of visual solutions, introduces the LX700-4K Laser Projector for Xbox. Designed exclusively for Xbox, the LX7004K features native 4K Ultra HD resolution, 3,500 lumens of brightness, and built-in Harman Kardon speakers for immersive big-screen audio and video experiences with images up to 300-inches.

ViewSonic again partnered with Microsoft to deliver the best gaming experience to Xbox series X/S consoles to develop the LX700-4K laser projector. It is compatible with the Xbox CEC (consumer electronics control), and features Xbox-exclusive resolution and refresh rate combinations. When used with other video sources, the LX700-4K runs with a 4.2 ms response time and 240 Hz refresh rate for super smooth gaming or video playback.

Today, during the latest Xbox Partner Preview broadcast—as a surprise for Xbox gamers everywhere—GSC Game World launched the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone Trilogy for Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S (via backwards compatibility). That's right - it's available today! The Legends of the Zone Trilogy bundle—available on the Microsoft Store for $39.99 USD—includes all three iconic games that make up the original S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Trilogy: Shadow of Chernobyl, Clear Sky, and Call of Pripyat—or you can pick up each of the games individually for $19.99 USD each. Every element from the original games has been maintained and faithfully ported to console thanks to the hard work of GSC Game World and their partners at Mataboo. This all makes for a great opportunity for Xbox gamers everywhere to get some foundational knowledge of S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s universe in the lead-up to the launch of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl, coming day one to Game Pass on September 5, 2024.

But translating these hardcore PC games to an Xbox controller has been no small feat. For a series that is known for blending a variety of genres like horror, first-person shooter, exploration, and immersive sim, it was important for the team to get it right. Speaking with GSC Game World PR Specialist Zakhar Bocharov, we wanted to learn more about what this process was like, bringing these cult-classic, hardcore PC titles to console, and some of the innovative design and UI adjustments the team had to make to bring all three games to Xbox.