Microsoft’s Windows engineers are still busy fixing star components of this feature update just weeks out from the Windows 11 mainstream release.
The October 5 release date for Windows 11 is a little over three weeks away, so it’s highly unlikely Microsoft will throw in new features, but Windows engineers are still trying to wrangle some bugs before it starts rolling out the update.
Windows 11 will roll out fairly gradually as a free upgrade for a narrow set of new hardware that meets Microsoft’s minimum hardware requirements.
SEE: Windows 11: Here’s how to get Microsoft’s free operating system update
The latest Windows 11 preview for the Beta Channel in the Windows Insider Program delivers build 22000.184, Microsoft announced in a blogpost.
There aren’t many changes in this preview release, but Microsoft is working on fixing glitches spotted by insiders and acknowledges there are several known issues affecting core parts of Windows.
There are only two fixes addressed in this build, but they’re fairly minor compared with the problems in its known issues list, which include problems with the Start menu, Taskbar, Search from Start, Widgets. Microsoft Store search, and the Windows Sandbox security feature.
Microsoft is investigating reports that after upgrading to Windows 11, Beta Channel users aren’t seeing the new Taskbar and the Start menu is broken. Microsoft recommends uninstalling the latest cumulative update for Windows and then reinstalling it by checking for updates.
It’s also working on a fix for an issue that prompts some Surface Pro X’s to bugcheck with a WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR.
Other known issues affect Search from Start and the Taskbar, as well System and Windows Terminal missing when right-clicking on the Start button or using the shortcut WIN + X.
The Taskbar also sometimes flickers when switching input methods.
Widgets are an important visual change to Windows 11 and a new take on Windows 10’s news and interests feature. It consists of a panel displaying news snippets, weather updates and reminders. It can be customized with additional widgets.
Unfortunately, it’s not working smoothly yet. “The widgets board may appear empty. To work around the issue, you can sign out and then sign back in again,” Microsoft concedes.
Additionally, widgets can show up in the wrong size on external monitors. To get around this, Microsoft recommends launching widgets via touch or WIN + W shortcut on the primary PC display first, and then launching it on a secondary monitor.
There are several problems with Windows Sandbox, the main one being that the language input switcher fails to launch after users click the switcher icon on the Taskbar. Users can try these tricks: Alt + Shift, Ctrl + Shift, or Win + Space. However, Win + Space is only an option if Sandbox is full-screened.
The two fixes include one that addresses a problem where the new learn more info in OOBE about Windows Hello wasn’t translated for non-English languages, and another where some languages were missing translations across the UI in Windows 11.
SEE: Windows 11 FAQ: Release date, requirements, price — plus when and how to upgrade
People can see if their PC is eligible for Windows 11 when it arrives by downloading the PC Heath Check app from Microsoft’s Windows 11 landing page.
In late August, Microsoft said it would maintain its minimum hardware requirements, which ZDNet’s Ed Bott points out will exclude most PCs from 2018 and earlier, including those running 7th Gen Intel Core and first-generation AMD Zen CPUs.
The actual minimum requirements for Windows 11 are: a PC needs at least 4GB of memory and 64GB of available storage; UEFI secure boot must be enabled; the graphics card must be compatible with DirectX 12 or later, with a WDDM 2.0 driver; and a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) 2.0 must be included.
