Windows 10 Insider Build 16226: lots of improvements

Microsoft published Windows 10 Insider Build 16226 a couple of hours ago to the Fast Ring Insider channel. This new build includes a truckload of improvements and features, and also some fixes.
Insiders who have been plagued by the dreaded "inaccessible boot device" error, or updates that hung at around 33% can run the new update as the issues have been fixed.
The update is available through Windows Update already, provided that the device is part of the Windows 10 Insider Fast Ring channel.
Highlights of this release is the new auto-captioning feature of Narrator which describes images to you or uses OCR to extract text from images, the new GPU performance history in the Task Manager, and better error descriptions for failed Windows Updates.
Windows 10 Insider Build 16226 improvements
Microsoft Edge
The default system browser of Windows 10 benefits from another round of improvements:
- Chrome users may import cookies and settings from Chrome to Microsoft Edge.
- New Copy and Ask Cortana option in Edge when selecting text.
- Ink Notes support to add a note with a digital pen.
- Books from Windows Store are synced across all devices now, and so is bookmarks, notes and reading progress.
- When you save Favorites you can view them as a directory tree now, and collapse or expand folders.
- URLs of any bookmark can be edited directly in the Favorites menu now.
- Favorites can be managed via group policy and mobile device management in the Enterprise
OneDrive Files On-Demand
The feature made a comeback in the last Windows 10 Insider Build 16215. Microsoft added a dialog that informs users when an application tries to download files from cloud storage.
The information includes the app that requested the download, the source of the file, size, and name. Options are provided to dismiss the message, cancel the download, or block the app.
You may unblock apps that you have blocked under Settings > Privacy > App-requested downloads.
Gaming Improvements
Another new feature enables you to track the GPU performance of the video card. The Task Manager displays the GPU now as a graph under performance.
It shows GPU utilization for GPU components such as 3D or Video encode/decode, and graphics memory usage statistics.
The GPU Utilization of each process that runs on the system is highlighted on the details tab.
Gamers find a new Xbox Networking option under Settings > Gaming. This lists connection status and performance information, and includes an option to fix issues that you may experience that prevent you from using voice chat or playing multiplayer games.
Other changes
- Emoji updated to include the latest Unicode updates. You get dinosaurs, snacks, and fantasy characters now.
- Emoji Panel supports searching for emoji in the latest version. You can open the panel with Windows+. This is only available if you have the EN-US keyboard enabled.
- Shape writing for additional languages when the touch keyboard is used.
- Text prediction for more languages.
- Touch keyboard for East Asian languages such as Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese.
- One-handed curve-flick touch keyboard for Japanese (similar to Windows 10 Mobile). This is a method for inputting Japanese Kana quickly.
- Touch Keyboard can be moved without holding the move icon.
- Clipboard content is now highlighted with its own icon for easy pasting.
- Shift-key lets you cycle between capitalization states.
- Handwriting panel received several improvements
- Use the back of the pen to erase words.
- Text is drawn using the font Segoe UI now.
- Pen scrolling support works in Win32 apps.
- Spatial sound can be enabled through the notification area now. Just click on the sound icon there and select Spatial sound. You may also select other formats, Dolby Atmos, 7.1 or 5.1 there for instance.
- Storage Sense Settings page updated with a new look. You find a new option there to delete previous versions of Windows directly by using the feature (Storage Sense runs scheduled clean up operations that remove temporary files).
- Remote Desktop is available as a Settings page now. You can use it to configure Remote Desktop directly from there.
- Starting with this build, Windows 10 will describe the error that made an update of the operating system fail.
- Reveal is a new visual eye candy feature for apps that target the Fall Creators Update. It highlights the menu item the mouse cursor is on.
- File Explorer context menu includes an option to share files directly from File Explorer. The old "share with" option has been renamed to "Give access to".
- My People can be turned off with a right-click on the Windows Taskbar now.
- Calculator has a new Currency Converter feature. Windows 10 Stable users may get the feature when they update the app in Store.
- Narrator supports auto-captioning now. It supports creating descriptions for images that don't have alternative text, and may also be used to extract text from images using OCR. To use it, focus the image, and press Capslock-Shift-D to hear the description. This feature requires an Internet connection.
- Microsoft removes the SMB1 networking protocol from Windows by default. This affects only clean installations of Windows 10.
- All Home and Pro versions of Windows 10 have the SMB1 server component removed by default. The SMB1 client remains installed however so that connections using SMB1 are still possible, but connections to the Windows 10 device using SMB1 are not.
- All Enterprise and Education editions have SMB1 removed completely by default. This means that Computer Browser service won't function anymore as it relies on SMB1.
- New Hyper-V VM sharing feature. Just click on the new icon to compress the active VM to a .vmcz file. You can double-click on the file to import it on the same machine, or another.
- Improvements to Japanese Input Method Editor
- IME understands when predictive candidates using backspaces are used for better selection.
- Spelling correction for English predictive candidates.
- Run searches from the Predictive candidate window.
- Mixed Reality got a bunch of improvements and fixes, including for 360 Video, Speech, or Headset reliability.
I suggest you check out the blog post over on the Microsoft blog for additional information. Make sure you read the known issues before you run the update. Some apps or features may not work in this build, e.g. some UWP apps like Twitter will crash on launch.
Closing Words
Microsoft continues to improve Windows 10. All improvements and new features will land in the Fall Creators Update, out later this year.
Now You: what's your take on the new and improved feature set?


What mental age of reader are you targeting with the first sentence? 10?
Why not write an article on how to *avoid* upgrading from W10 to W11. Analogous to those like me who avoided upgrading from 7 to 10 for as long as possible.
If your paymaster Microsoft permits it, of course.
5. Rufus
6. Ventoy
PS. I hate reading these “SEO optimized” articles.
I used Rufus to create an installer for a 6th gen intel i5 that had MBR. It upgraded using Setup. No issues except for Win 11 always prompting me to replace my local account. Still using Win 10 Pro on all my other PCs to avoid the bullying.
bit pointless to upgrade for the sake of upgrading as you never know when you’ll get locked out because ms might suddenly not provide updates to unsupported systems.
ps…. time travelling?
written. Jan 15, 2023
Updated • Jan 13, 2023
This happens when you schedule a post in WordPress and update it before setting the publication date.
Anyone willing to downgrade to this awful OS must like inflicting themselves with harm.
I have become convinced now that anybody who has no qualms with using Windows 11/10 must fit into one of the following brackets:
1) Too young to remember a time before W10 and W11 (doesn’t know better)
2) Wants to play the latest games on their PC above anything else (or deeply needs some software which already dropped W7 support)
3) Doesn’t know too much about how computers work, worried that they’d be absolutely lost and in trouble without the “”latest security””
4) Microsoft apologist that tries to justify that the latest “features” and “changes” are actually a good thing, that improve Windows
5) Uses their computer to do a bare minimum of like 3 different things, browse web, check emails, etc, so really doesn’t fuss
Obviously that doesn’t cover everyone, there’s also the category that:
6) Actually liked W7 more than 10, and held out as long as possible before switching, begrudgingly uses 10 now
Have I missed any group off this list?
You have missed in this group just about any professional user that uses business software like CAD programs or ERP Programs which are 99% of all professional users from this list.
Linux doesn’t help anyone who is not a linux kid and apple is just a fancy facebook machine.
Microsoft has removed KB5029351 update
only from windows update though
KB5029351 is still available from the ms update catalog site
1. This update is labaled as PREVIEW if it causes issues to unintelligent people, then they shouldn’t have allowed Preview updates ot install.
2. I have installed it in a 11 years old computer, and no problems at all.
3. Making a big drama over a bluescreen for an updated labeled as preview is ridiculous.
This is probably another BS internet drama where people ran programs and scripts that modified the registry until they broke Windows, just for removing stuff that they weren’t even using just for the sake of it.
Maybe people should stop playing geeks and actually either use Windows 10 or Windows 11, but don’t try to modify things just for the sake of it.
Sometimes removing or stopping things (like defender is a perfect example) only need intelligence, not scripts or 3rd party programs that might mess with windows.
Windows 11 was a pointless release, it was just created because some of the Windows team wanted to boost sales with some sort of new and improved Windows 10. Instead, Microsoft cannot support one version well let alone two.
Windows 11 is the worst ugly shame by Microsoft ever. They should release with every new W11 version a complete free version of Starallback inside just to make this sh** OS functionally again.
motherboard maker MSI has recently released a statement regarding the “unsupported processor” blue screen error for their boards using Intel 600/700 series chipsets & to avoid the KB5029351 Win11 update:
https://www.msi.com/news/detail/MSI-On–UNSUPPORTED-PROCESSOR–Error-Message-of-Windows-11-Update-KB5029351-Preview-142215
check out the following recent articles:
Neowin – Microsoft puts little blame on its Windows update after UNSUPPORTED PROCESSOR BSOD bug:
https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-puts-little-blame-on-its-windows-update-after-unsupported-processor-bsod-bug/
BleepingComputer – Microsoft blames ‘unsupported processor’ blue screens on OEM vendors:
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-blames-unsupported-processor-blue-screens-on-oem-vendors/
While there may be changes or updates to the Windows 10 Store for Business and Education in the future, it is premature to conclude that it will be discontinued based solely on rumors.
My advice, I left win 15 years ago. Now I’m a happy linux user (linuxmint) but there is Centos, Fedora, Ubuntu depending on your needs.
motherboard maker MSI has recently released new BIOS/firmware updates for their Intel 600 & 700 series motherboards to fix the “UNSUPPORTED_PROCESSOR” problem (Sept. 6):
https://www.msi.com/news/detail/Updated-BIOS-fixes-Error-Message–UNSUPPORTED-PROCESSOR–caused-BSOD-on-MSI-s-Intel-700-and-600-Series-Motherboards-142277
I try to disable the Diagnostics Tracking Service (Connected Devices Platform User Services) but it wont let me disable it, any help will be greatly appreciated.
Tank you for your help