Microsoft continued its preparation for Windows 10 20H1 yesterday with the release of Windows 10 Preview build 18894. Covering the company's planned Windows 10 update for the first half of next year, there are new features, fixes, and even some problems.
Firstly, we'll discuss what's wrong with this latest update. Microsoft's new Windows 10 20H1 update disables the company's Your Phone experience. Your Phone is a handy feature that allows Android users to mirror their device on a Windows 10 PC.
For some reason, build 18894 has blocked the feature, citing an OS bug as the reason. Either way, if you want to keep using Your Phone, you should stick back on Build 18890.
Now, let's have a look at changes Microsoft has made to Windows 10 20H1 this week. The company has integrated its Windows Search improvements into File Explorer on the platform. Searching across files will now combine with OneDrive when surfacing results.
When typing a search term into File Explorer, a dropdown menu will fill with suggested files. Users will also be able to right click to open file location as well as just select results.
Elsewhere in Windows 10 Preview build, 18894, Microsoft has made some accessibility improvements. Specifically, the Narrator is now better at reading tables. For example, it will no longer repeat header details and also making it easier to exit and enter tables.
Bug fixes
- Fixed an issue resulting in scrolling with the mouse wheel or touchpad not working reliably across the system in the last few flights.
- Fixed an issue where opening the Memory Integrity page in Windows Security would crash the app.
- An issue where the Windows Update icon in taskbar system tray is not high DPI optimized.
- Fixed a recent issue where the “Add someone else to this PC” window would crash if an MSA-attached user would try to add a local user to the PC.
- Fixed a typo in the WIN+(period) kaomoji section category names.
- A race condition that could result in users getting stuck with an outdated version of the search relevancy logic, impacting subsequent search results.
- Fixed an issue where Start menu wasn't launching if the “continue experiences on this device” group policy was “disabled”.
- Fixed an issue where navigating using Narrator + R command got stuck in PowerPoint Edit View.
- Narrator no longer reads “null” after each command listed in the Narrator + F2 list.
- Fixed a problem where Narrator was at low volume and could not be increased.
Known Issues
- Due to an OS bug, the Your Phone app will not work on this build.
- Older versions of anti-cheat software in games may cause PCs to crash. Make sure you are running the latest version of your games before attempting to update Windows.
- Some Realtek SD card readers are not functioning properly.
- If you use remote desktop to connect to an enhanced session VM, taskbar search results will not be visible (just a dark area) until you restart searchui.exe.
- On certain devices if fast startup is enabled, night-light doesn't turn on until after a restart.
- There's a noticeable lag when dragging the emoji and dictation panels.
- Tamper Protection may be turned off in Windows Security after updating to this build.
- Some features on Start Menu and in All apps are not localized in languages such as FR-FR, RU-RU, and ZH-CN.
- In the Ease of Access settings, selecting a color filter may not take effect right away unless color filters option is turned off and back on again.
- The IME candidate window for East Asian IMEs (Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, and the Japanese IME) may not open sometimes.
- There is an issue in the Bopomofo IME where the character width is suddenly changed to Full width from Half width.
- If you install builds from the Fast ring and switch to either the Slow ring or the Release Preview ring, optional content such as enabling developer mode will fail. You will have to remain in the Fast ring to add/install/enable optional content. This is because optional content will only install on builds approved for specific rings.
