Author: Anu Watson

To prevent users from simply shutting down their computers, you can remove the power button from the Windows 11 Start menu. However, it’s not obvious; This requires a small registry tweak rather than toggling an option in the normal Windows settings. Type regedit in the Windows 11 search box and click on the “Registry Editor” option that appears. In the registry editor, follow the path “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\default\Start\HidePowerButton”. In the HidePowerButton folder you will find the “value” entry. Double click on it and set the value on “1”. Then restart the windows. Tree! The ON / OFF button has now disappeared from…

Microsoft’s ChatGPT-based Bing AI chatbot has garnered a lot of hype in recent months, but has so far only worked in Microsoft’s own Edge browser. Windows Latest reports that Bing Chat has just introduced support for Google’s Chrome browser, but with some limitations in the functionality of the chatbot. Your chat prompts are limited to 2,000 characters in Chrome, and conversations with the chatbot are limited to five messages before the session resets. In the Microsoft Edge browser, prompts can be up to 4,000 characters and you can exchange 30 messages with Bing before the chat resets. As part of…

The future of Outlook is here, albeit with a few caveats. Microsoft officially released the new Outlook for Windows on Tuesday afternoon, with features that complement Microsoft’s futuristic Loop interface, plus more practical innovations like quick document attachments, a “My Day” overview, and reminders to reply to important emails. However, for now, the new features are only available to members of the Office Insiders program, specifically the Beta channel. We’ve seen the “future of Outlook” many times over the years, from 2015’s simple and effective Outlook apps for iOS and Android to 2017’s more consistent approach to unifying Outlook across…

Microsoft has already announced that it is working on a new version of Outlook for Windows. In fact, Office Insiders can already test out the next-gen version by selecting “Try New Outlook” at the top right of the program itself. Now, Microsoft has said a bit more about what will happen to existing Windows 11 Mail and Calendar apps. Basically, at the end of 2024, they will no longer exist. In September of next year, the new Outlook experience will roll out to the public and new PCs will ship with the new Outlook pre-installed. “Starting in 2024, new Windows…

Microsoft Outlook is synonymous with email and calendar, and many people don’t realize that it’s actually a paid part of the Office suite. But that will soon change. Starting in August, Microsoft plans to phase out the free Windows Mail and Windows Calendar apps included with Windows 10 and 11 and replace them with the new Outlook for Windows. The new app, which has been available for months on Windows Insider’s upgrade channel, is also free. The conversion will be complete in early calendar year 2024. At that point, existing email and calendar apps will no longer be available. Users…

After skipping 2022, Microsoft may have plans for the Surface Laptop Studio again. Windows Central expects the Surface Laptop 2, codenamed “Ersa” (curiously not “Ursa” or Latin for “bear”), to launch in the fall. What we dubbed the “wave of the future” in our Surface Laptop Studio review will be updated with the latest hardware from Intel and Nvidia, the site reports, citing confidential sources. Based on some leaked Geekbench benchmarks, the site posits that Microsoft will drop a Core i5 model and go straight to the 13th Gen Core i7-13700H and Core i7-13800H. When it comes to graphics, Microsoft…

Many major US companies developing AI have agreed to work with the US government and commit to several principles to ensure public trust in AI, the White House said on Friday. Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft, and OpenAI have all signed pledges to make AI safe, secure, and trusted. In May, the Biden administration said it would meet with leading AI developers to make sure they aligned with US policy. The commitments are not binding and there are no penalties for non-compliance. The policy also cannot be applied retroactively to AI systems that have already been deployed: one of…

Edge’s move from its proprietary engine to Chromium is widely seen as a positive move by Microsoft. However, the browser lost some notable features during the transition. Features such as Set Tab Aside and Reading List are no longer available, and EPUB support was also initially missing. Although Microsoft has repeatedly confirmed that it won’t be bringing back the first two features, there is a surprise in store for EPUB support. Earlier this month, Microsoft Edge announced that it would take action against and block spam notifications. In the latest version of Microsoft Edge Canary (version 117.0.1989.0), EPUB support is…

Microsoft and Activision have agreed to extend the merger deadline until October 18, while negotiations with the CMA continue. The initial deadline expired yesterday, July 18. The companies also agreed to increase the termination fee from $3 billion to $3.5 billion if either side walks away from the deal, which is currently highly unlikely. Update on Activision Blizzard’s merger with Microsoft: agreement deadline extendedThe recent decision in the U.S. and approvals in 40 countries all validate that the deal is good for competition, players, and the future of gaming.Given global regulatory approvals and the…— Lulu Cheng Meservey (@lulumeservey) July 19,…

In most cases, Windows will recognize the new hardware installed on your computer and you can start using it. This applies to internal components such as a network or graphics card, as well as external devices such as scanners. Normally the operating system will recognize the device and then load and install the correct driver. This can be checked in the Windows Device Manager (right-click Start > Device Manager), which usually shows all entries without further explanation. But what if Windows flags a component with a yellow exclamation mark and trying to find the correct driver using Windows Update fails?…