Windows 11 version 23H2 started rolling out last October, but many users of Microsoft's flagship operating system opted out of an upgrade, thanks to a handy "optional" toggle. News outlets have latched onto a freshly published (February 20) Windows 11 "Release Health" notice—the official Microsoft dashboard alert states that Windows 11 2023 Update: "is now entering a new rollout phase." Fastidious users will not be happy to discover that "eligible Windows 11 devices" are now subject to an automatic bump up to version 23H2. Very passive-aggressive tactics have been utilized in the past—Microsoft is seemingly eager to get it audience upgraded onto its latest and greatest feature-rich experience.

According to NeoWin, an official announcement from last week alerted users to an "impending end of optional preview updates on Windows 11 22H2." Yesterday's "23H2" dashboard confessional provided a little bit more context—unsurprisingly involving artificial intelligence: "This automatic update targets Windows 11 devices that have reached or are approaching end of servicing, and it follows the machine learning-based (ML) training we have utilized so far. We will continue to train our intelligent ML model to safely roll out this new Windows version in phases to deliver a smooth update experience."

Systems running on older hardware could be excluded from upcoming public versions of Windows 11—the recently released preview/insider build (26052) has introduced all sorts of new features including "Sudo for Windows", an improved regedit, and hidden beneath the surface, an AI-flavored Super Resolution settings menu. Early partakers of version 24H2 are running into instruction set-related problems—Windows operating expert, Bob Pony, was one of the unlucky candidates. Microsoft's preview code seems to require a specific instruction set to reach operational status—Pony documented his frustrations on social media: "Using the command line argument "/product server" for setup.exe, BYPASSES the system requirement checks for the Windows 11 24H2 setup program. But unfortunately, after setup completes then reboots into the next stage. It'll be indefinitely stuck on the Windows logo boot screen."

He continued to narrow in on the source of blame: "Windows 11 Version 24H2 Build 26058's setup (if ran in a live Windows Install) now checks for a CPU instruction: PopCnt." The Register provided some history/context on the SSE4 set: "POPCNT/PopCnt counts the number of bits in a machine word that have been set (or different from zero.) You might see it in cryptography and it has been lurking in CPU architectures for years, pre-dating Intel and AMD's implementation by decades." It is believed that Microsoft has deployed PopCnt as part of its push into AI-augmented software features, although a segment of online discussion proposes that an engineer has "accidentally enabled" newer CPU instruction sets. Tom's Hardware marked a line in the sand: "PopCnt has been supported since the Intel Nehalem and AMD Phenom II (microarchitecture) era—14 years ago—so compatibility won't be an issue for any modern systems. The only users that will be affected are enthusiasts running modified versions of Windows 11 on 15+ year-old chips like Core 2 Duos or Athlon 64." Bob Pony's long-serving Core 2 Quad Q9650 processor—a late summer 2008 product—was deemed unworthy by the preview build's setup process.

Late last year, we officially launched EA's next-generation game platform, the EA app, for Windows OS. A faster, more reliable, and more streamlined experience - it's the best place for you to experience EA's incredible games, services and content.

We've been working to bring the same updated experience to our Mac players. Today, we're excited to say that the EA app for Mac will soon replace Origin as our primary Mac platform. The EA app is our fastest and lightest Mac client to date. With the new streamlined design you will easily find the games and content you're looking for and discover your new favorite games. With simple content downloads and background updates you can ensure that your games are ready to play when you are.

macOS Sonoma brings all‑new capabilities for elevating productivity and creativity with more ways to personalize via widgets and stunning new screen savers, significant updates to Safari and video conferencing, along with an optimized gaming experience - the Mac experience is better than ever. Apple yesterday previewed macOS Sonoma, the latest version of the world's most advanced desktop operating system, bringing a rich set of features that elevate the Mac experience. Stunning screen savers and powerful widgets unlock an entirely new way to personalize. Users can now place widgets right on the desktop, interact with them with just a click, and through the magic of Continuity, access the extensive ecosystem of iPhone widgets on their Mac.

In macOS Sonoma, video conferencing also gets more engaging with great new features to help users present remotely, like Presenter Overlay, which places a presenter on top of the content being shared, and Reactions, which enables fun gesture-triggered video effects in cinematic quality. Significant updates come to Safari, taking the web experience to the next level. Profiles keeps browsing separate between multiple topics or projects, and web apps provide faster access to favorite sites. And gaming gets even better, with the introduction of Game Mode, exciting new titles, and a new game porting toolkit that makes it even easier for developers to bring more games to Mac.

Panos Panay, Chief Product Officer, Windows and Devices: "The team and I are pumped to be back at Build with the developer community this year. Over the last year, Windows has continued to see incredible growth fueled by Windows 11 adoption. In fact, one of the most exciting areas driving that growth for Windows has been developers themselves, with a 24% YoY increase in monthly devices used for development."

"AI is the defining technology of our time and developers are at the forefront of this transformation. With the right tools we can empower developers and our shared customers to shape the future and leave their mark on the world. We are just starting to see the incredible impact AI is having across industries and in our own daily lives. Today, the team and I are excited to share the next steps we are taking on our journey with Windows 11, to meet this new age of AI."

Synology today announced the release of DSM 7.2. DSM 7.2 offers a range of innovative enhancements to address IT challenges, including immutable storage and backup, full-volume encryption, performance improvements, stricter access controls, and storage planning capabilities. "At Synology, we are committed to continuous improvement and innovation to ensure that organizations have the tools they need to manage their data with confidence and ease," said Shamrock Ko, Product Manager at Synology.

License-free immutable storage and backup makes its way to DSM 7.2 with WriteOnce shared folders and Immutable Snapshots. Leveraging write once read many (WORM) technology, these features allow organizations to safeguard their data from malicious attacks, tampering, and accidental deletions by creating an unalterable copy of their data. This capability is crucial for industries such as healthcare, finance, and government, which must comply with strict data retention policies.

Intel has published a highly involved and extensive whitepaper on the topic of streamlining its CPU architectures, most notably by focusing on a purely 64-bit specification, and consequently dropping legacy 32-bit operating modes (as well as 16-bit!). Team Blue's key proposal states: "This whitepaper details the architectural enhancements and modifications that Intel is currently investigating for a 64-bit mode-only architecture referred to as x86S (for simplification). Intel is publishing this paper to solicit feedback from the ecosystem while exploring the benefits of extending the ISA transition to a 64-bit mode-only solution."

The paper provides a bit of background context: "Since its introduction over 20 years ago, the Intel 64 architecture became the dominant operating mode. As an example of this evolution, Microsoft stopped shipping the 32-bit version of their Windows 11 operating system. Intel firmware no longer supports non UEFI64 operating systems natively. 64-bit operating systems are the de facto standard today. They retain the ability to run 32-bit applications but have stopped supporting 16-bit applications natively. With this evolution, Intel believes there are opportunities for simplification in our hardware and software ecosystem."

Popular gaming hardware content creator, ETA PRIME, yesterday teased that his ASUS ROG Ally preview unit was seemingly running Valve's Steam Deck operating system - the short YouTube video provided a glimpse of basic UI functionality as well as in-game performance (Forza Horizon 5). He promised that a full video was incoming, thus providing a full explanation of his modification process and a more in-depth exploration of more games running on the formerly Windows 11-based example. ETA PRIME has delivered on his earlier pledge - the first look/early impressions video was released only a few hours ago (at the time of writing). He reveals that his test platform ROG Ally is not running on Valve's Steam OS.

He has resorted to installing a gaming-focused Linux distro called Chimera OS - he notes that the similar HoloISO platform was not booting up on his handheld unit. On-board audio is reported to be non-functional - the Ally is connected to an external USB-C hub that outputs sound via the in-built 3.5 mm jack. Wi-Fi performance is reported to be inconsistent, ETA PRIME says that he has to reset the system in order to re-establish online connectivity. He was largely impressed with the Ally's gaming performance in a Linux-based environment, but prefers the Steam Deck's power efficiency. He will look into lowering the Ally's TDP, but there is no sure-fire way of making optimizations within the Chimera OS test build.

A press release (dated April 27) states: "We plan to release Debian 12.0 "Bookworm" on June 10. If you want to celebrate it, please consider attending a Debian release party, or hosting your own! See wiki.debian.org/ReleasePartyBookworm for more information. The release process typically takes the whole day and the release isn't done until the early hours of Sunday UTC."

Full Freeze Date
With the release date set, it's time to announce the Full Freeze date: Wednesday May 24. This means that from that moment on, every package requires a manual unblock by the release team if it needs to migrate to bookworm. Please note that, as with all freezes, the newrules apply for all packages that haven't migrated to testing yet (not only for uploads after the freeze). For all uploads, please review the Freeze Policy once again to make sure you know what is appropriate at this phase of the release.

Microsoft has confirmed that the current version of Windows 10 - 22H2 - will be the final one. A company product manager revealed this information yesterday in a Windows IT Pro Blog entry posted alongside a mass of articles on Microsoft's Tech Community site. As covered on TPU almost two years ago, Microsoft had given advance notice that it was terminating support for Windows 10 on October 14th 2025 - for both Home and Pro versions of the operating system. Windows 11 was released later on in 2021, and thus became the priority OS product for the North American tech firm.

Yesterday's blog reiterates key information from the past, and details an interim update cycle (albeit small): "Windows 10 will reach end of support on October 14, 2025. The current version, 22H2, will be the final version of Windows 10, and all editions will remain in support with monthly security update releases through that date. Existing (enterprise) releases will continue to receive updates beyond that date based on their specific lifecycles." Microsoft has proceeded to update the lifecycle page entry for Windows 10 Home and Pro in line with the latest announcement. The product manager (in his blog) recommends that current Windows 10 users move to 11 as soon as possible, in order to enjoy a continued stream of feature updates.

Earlier on in April keen-eyed users of macOS uncovered the presence of a strange document hidden deep within Apple's operating system directories. It turns out that this Easter egg was a digital copy of the original Bitcoin whitepaper, it is speculated that Apple engineers have been running a long term prank by stashing the manifesto inside of every released version of macOS since 2018 - which indicates that Mojave was the starting point. According to yesterday's 9to5Mac-published article the cryptocurrency whitepaper (said to be authored by mysterious figure Satoshi Nakamoto) has been removed from the latest macOS Ventura build - 13.4 beta 3 (made available to developers).

The initial discovery of the manifesto received significant press coverage, and it seems that Apple has chosen to send in the cleanup crew at some point in the weeks since then. The file was sat alongside miscellaneous assets in a folder relating to an Image Capture application. The internal tool "VirtualScanner.app" has also been removed from the latest macOS beta build. The 9to5Mac piece posits that Apple's engineers never intended to include the prototype image and document scanner app in any finalized operating system releases - hence the burying of the program's assets deep inside system files.

Microsoft has introduced a handy new feature within the Windows 11 File Explorer application - an update was released last week (Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 23434), and it adds a Photo Gallery feature layer. It does not look too far removed from the operating system's standard photo/picture viewer, as well as the discontinued (as of 2012) Windows Photo Gallery app - although the latter offered a wide range of image organization, photo editing and photo sharing functionalities.

Microsoft's Amanda Langowski (Head of Insider Program) and Brandon LeBlanc (Senior Program Manager) go into further detail about the latest addition in an official Windows blog: "We are introducing Gallery, a new feature in File Explorer designed to make it easy to access your photo collection. The set of content shown in Gallery is the same as what you'll see in the All Photos view in the Photos app."

Insider sources at Microsoft have spoken of continued efforts to modernize the core of its operating system, with the work-in-progress Windows 12 cited as the ideal candidate for substantial updates. The engineering team is reported to be integrating a modular design, which will allow for a reduced operating system footprint - similar in principle to ChromeOS. According to a Windows Report article the operating system development team is hard at work on a spiritual successor to the abandoned Windows Core OS project. Their newest effort is reported to be called "Windows CorePC" and Microsoft is aiming to hit the same goals it set for its Windows 10X edition, which was cancelled in mid-2021, but they will also target native support for legacy applications on devices that require necessary access.

Windows Core OS was shutdown after years of development and internal testing - it was hoped that a modular Universal Windows Platform-first (UWP-F) operating system would be more lightweight and gain stronger security features, as well as greater access to regular updates. The inside sources stated that Windows Core OS will not be developed any further, at least not for desktop computer purposes. The Microsoft team is anticipating that its new CorePC project will lead onto new configurations of Windows that feature a capability of scaling up and down depending on hardware variations. Windows PCs and devices, in some user case scenarios, do not require full breadth of legacy Win32 application support. CorePC will enable different configurations of Windows to be installed on a custom basis.

A new operating system for Nintendo Switch? Yes, please! Download nOS new Operating System today and join the revolution! Explore the various options nOS has to offer, including some not yet seen on this console, from writing texts to your day planning. Have fun, customize the platform, and make it your very own.

nOS new Operating System will allow you to transform your favorite console into an amazing, and surprisingly small personal computer. Enjoy every awesome feature of the nOS. Draw, write, calculate, organize your day, and play around at your convenience. Brighten up your day and customize the nOS to suit your every need. Find your favorite setup and create the fantastic user experience you deserve.

Intel has been focusing its resources on data center and high-performance computing lately and the company has made some interesting products. Today, Intel has released its latest creation - mOS operating system. Created as a research project, Intel has made an OS made for some extreme-scale HPC systems, meaning that the OS is created for hyper scalers and ones alike. The goal of mOS is to deliver a high-performance environment for software with low-noise, scalability, and the concept of lightweight kernels (LWK) that manage the system.. Being based on the Linux kernel, the OS is essentially another distribution, however, it has been modified so it fits the HPC ecosystem the best way. The mOS is a product in the pre-alpha phase, however, it can already be used in supercomputers like ASCI Red, IBM Blue Gene, and others. Intel is aiming to develop a stable release by the time the Aurora exascale system is ready so it can deploy mOS there.

Tails OS the operating system recommended by Edward Snowden, now works on systems with UEFI Secure Boot enabled. Tails OS is built from the ground up to offer maximum security and privacy running of a portable drive and leaving no trace on the host computer. The latest Tails OS 4.5 update added support for this crucial UEFI Secure Boot feature which was already found in most operating systems. Secure Boot uses cryptographic signatures to verify the integrity of firmware files loaded on system boot and insure they have not been tempered with.

Secure Boot has been available as part of the UEFI specification now for over two decades but is rarely used due to compatibility reasons. While not commonly used, the fact that a security focused operating system did not support this security feature was worrying for many as it meant Secure Boot had to be disabled on the host computer before the OS could boot. Work to add the feature has been ongoing over the last 6 years and is now complete and ready for use.