Share this article
Latest news
With KB5043178 to Release Preview Channel, Microsoft advises Windows 11 users to plug in when the battery is low
Copilot in Outlook will generate personalized themes for you to customize the app
Microsoft will raise the price of its 365 Suite to include AI capabilities
Death Stranding Director’s Cut is now Xbox X|S at a huge discount
Outlook will let users create custom account icons so they can tell their accounts apart easier
Windows 10 20H1 build 18963 is out with improvements for Task Manager, Virtual Desktops, and Windows Search
10 min. read
Published onAugust 16, 2019
published onAugust 16, 2019
Share this article
Read our disclosure page to find out how can you help Windows Report sustain the editorial teamRead more
In this article
Toggle
That was a bit unexpected, but Microsoft has just released a new Windows 20H1 build for Fast Ring Insiders, and it’s a pretty big one. Indeed, Thepreview build 18963brings GPU temperature to Task manager for PCs with dedicated GPUs, something that PC gamers should appreciate.
Power users who juggle between multiple virtual desktops all day will also be pleased to know that it’s finally possible to rename virtual desktops in this build, and name changes will persist after a reboot. For now, this feature will only be available for 50% of Fast Ring Insiders, and Microsoft says it will roll it out to more Insiders in the futures.
There are many other new features in this build, including a Mouse Cursor speed in Settings, improvements to Windows Search, and Microsoft also made some changes to make an new account picture in Windows appear more quickly across Windows apps.
Another important change in this build is that Notepad is becoming a Microsoft Store app. After years of neglect, the has been updated with a couple of new features recent in recent months, and this change will allow Microsoft to update it separately from Windows updates.
You can check out everything that’s new in this build below:
GPU temperature comes to Task Manager
One of the longstanding requests we’ve been tracking for Task Manager is to add temperature monitoring support, and with today’s build we’re making progress on that ask. If you have a dedicated GPU card, we will now bubble up the current temperature next to its listing in the Performance Tab.
We hope you like the change! If you have any further feedback for Task Manager, please don’t hesitate to share it. To make suggestions or report issues in this space, press WIN+F and file the feedback under Desktop Environment > Task Manager in the Feedback Hub.
Notes:
Renaming your virtual desktops
Virtual Desktops exist to help you visually and cognitively separate different tasks on your PC. They can also be handy when doing presentations – enabling you to prepare demos on different desktops. Something we’ve heard loud and clear is that you want to be able to set names for your different desktops, in order to help cement the separation between workspaces, and we’re excited to share that rolling out to Insiders in the Fast ring is exactly that!
Wanna try it out? With the change, when you open Task View (by selecting the Task View button in the taskbar, or by pressing WIN+Tab,) clicking the name of your desktop will now switch it to be an editable fiel where you can set the name to be anything you’d like (including emoji). You can also right-click the thumbnail of the desired desktop in Task View, and a context menu with a Rename entry in it should appear. If you don’t have any additional desktops created yet, select “New desktop” in Task View to get started.
And yes, since we know you’ll ask – the names persist reboot.
Currently this change is live for 50% of Insiders in the Fast ring, and we’ll be expanding the rollout over the next few weeks as we evaluate the quality of experience.
Improving the Optional Features page in Settings
Based on your feedback, we’ve made a number of usability improvements to the Optional Features page in Settings (Settings > Apps & Features > Optional Features), and they’re now starting to roll out to Insiders in the Fast ring.
We’re excited for you to try it! Currently these changes are live for 50% of Insiders in the Fast ring, and we’ll be expanding the rollout over the next few weeks as we evaluate the quality of experience. Here’s a peek at what you’ll see once it’s available on your PC:
Adding Mouse Cursor speed to Settings
As some Insiders have noticed, you can now set your mouse cursor speed from within Settings! This is the latest piece of our larger ongoing effort to converge Settings and Control Panel experiences. You can find the setting under Settings > Devices > Mouse.
Making Notepad store-updatable
Notepad has been a well-loved text editor in Windows for over 30 years. Over the last few releases, we’ve been making a number of small improvements to Notepad based on your feedback (includingexpanded line ending support,wrap around search, andindicating when there’s unsaved content.) Starting with this build, we’re making a change so that future Notepad updates will be automatically available via the store. This will allow us the flexibility to respond to issues and feedback outside the bounds of Windows releases. As always, if you have any feedback for Notepad, we welcome it in the Feedback Hub underApps > Notepad.
Traditional Chinese IME improvements
Thank you everyone who’s shared feedback about the new Traditional Chinese Bopomofo, ChangJie, and Quick IMEs. The developer team has been working on improving the quality and fixing bugs. With today’s build:
Note:Other ways to show/hide toolbar:
Please keep trying out this new IME, andlet us knowyour feedback.
Changes to your account picture in Windows
Changing the picture for the account you use to sign in to Windows is now better than ever! Your updated picture will now show up quickly across Windows, apps, and many of the Microsoft sites you use every day. Previously, you might see as many as three or four different pictures for your account in different apps and sites at one time. Its super easy to try out – just go to Your info in Windows settings and change your picture there!
Steps
Note:We’re still working with many sites and apps that will need to be updated to work well with this new feature. For example, the account manager control that appears in the upper right of many Microsoft websites currently updates every 24 hours. This will be changed in the next few months to update quickly when your account picture changes.
Other updates for Insiders
Windows Search improvements
We wanted to take a moment to cover some of the server-side search improvements we’ve been rolling out based on your feedback:
Improved spell correction for Apps & Settings searches
Windows Search has built-in spell correction to help you find what you’re looking for. When you’re typing quickly sometimes mistakes happen – we’re excited to announce that we’ve updated our spell correction technology to intelligently understand and correct small typos like “powerpiont” and “exce;,” which previously would return no results. With these updates, you get better results faster. This feature is now available on both Insider and retail builds in English-language markets.
Hints to improve Best match results
Our goal with Windows Search is to provide a simple, to-use experience, and a key aspect of this is making results easy to understand. Something we’ve heard from you is surprise that sometimes settings search results don’t match your search. To help address this, in certain cases where the Best match result isn’t an exact match for your search, a “Related:” line will be included below the result to help clarify why this result is appearing. We’ll be expanding this feature to include Apps search in the coming weeks. This feature is now available on both Insider and retail builds in English (United States).
Bringing the latest Search Home experience to more users
With the Windows 10 May 2019 Update we updated Search Home to help you save time by adding quick access to your Top apps and Recent activities. After receiving positive feedback and comments about this new experience, we’re now making it available to more users by rolling it out to everyone using the Windows 10 October 2018 Update as well. We hope you find them useful and that they help make Search Home more productive for you.
Here’s a glance at what it looks like for those on the Windows 10 October 2018 Update:
We hope you like the changes, and if you have any further feedback about search, let us know!
As usual, there are a couple of quality fixes in this new build, including a fix preventing Insiders to setup Windows Hello in Settings in recent builds. Moreover, starting with this build Microsoft is making its Connect app available as an optional download in the Windows 10 Settings app. You can learn more about bug fixes, changes and known issues in ourseparate post.
Radu Tyrsina
Radu Tyrsina has been a Windows fan ever since he got his first PC, a Pentium III (a monster at that time).
For most of the kids of his age, the Internet was an amazing way to play and communicate with others, but he was deeply impressed by the flow of information and how easily you can find anything on the web.
Prior to founding Windows Report, this particular curiosity about digital content enabled him to grow a number of sites that helped hundreds of millions reach faster the answer they’re looking for.
User forum
0 messages
Sort by:LatestOldestMost Votes
Comment*
Name*
Email*
Commenting as.Not you?
Save information for future comments
Comment
Δ
Radu Tyrsina
