Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25211 Announcement (Dev Channel)

Good evening, friends. Microsoft has released a new preview build of Windows 11 under the number 25211 for members of the Windows Insider program using the Dev channel.

The full build number is 10.0.25211.1001.rs_prerelease.220923-1354.

Innovations

Widget settings

In this build, Microsoft separated the list of widgets and settings to make it easier for users to interact with each of these sections. Now to add widgets to the panel you need to click on the “+” button, while to open the settings you need to click on the profile picture in the upper right corner.

When you open the settings section, you will see three radio buttons related to the behavior of the Widgets in the taskbar. Note that in this build, the description of the settings is different from what you see in the screenshot. The text will be updated in the future.

Available settings:

• Control whether the Widgets panel opens when you hover over a button on the taskbar.
• Control whether “Widgets” will display notification icons on the taskbar.
• Control whether the taskbar shows dynamic content other than the weather.

This change is not yet available to all insiders on the Dev channel. Microsoft wants to collect feedback from a small group of users before the change becomes available to all insiders.

Changes and improvements

• Taskbar:
  • Based on the feedback, Microsoft added a link to the “Task Manager” in the context menu that appears when you right-click on the taskbar.
    
• System tray:
  • This build introduces an experimental implementation of a feature that allows you to change the order in which icons appear in the system tray on the taskbar. Now the function will be able to evaluate only those insiders who have access to other changes to the system tray, which appeared in build 25197. Over time, the function will be refined.
• Conductor:
  • Fixed an issue that caused the top of File Explorer (including the search box and address bar) to not work if File Explorer was started in full-screen mode (F11).
• Options:
  • From now on, you can no longer uninstall applications with dependencies (for example, Steam and gaming applications that require Steam) and restore Win32 applications from the “Applications” -> “Installed Applications” section. You can still modify and delete Win32 applications without dependencies.

Corrections

• General:
  • Microsoft on the server side fixed an issue that displayed the erroneous message “date, time, and time zone settings are incorrect,” which prevented the installation of Insider Builds of Windows.
• Conductor:
  • Fixed an issue where items such as Copy, Paste, and Empty Recycle Bin might not appear in the Command Bar, even though they should be.
  • Fixed an issue that caused black bars to appear on the sides of horizontal scroll bars when using a dark theme.
• Start Menu:
  • Now the animation of opening folders in the Start menu will play in the right place if the start menu is selected a layout with more fixed items.
• Taskbar:
  • Fixed a frequent failure of the Shell Experience Host in recent builds for the Dev channel. This issue affected the stability of opening the Quick Actions menu.
• Input:
  • The capture area for moving the emoji panel and touch keyboard now changes color correctly when switching between a dark and light theme.
  • Fixed a memory leak when repeatedly calling the input method or layout switcher.
• Options:
  • Fixed a crash in the Settings app that could occur when changing the name of a mobile hotspot.
  • Updated the examples for the “Short Time” format in the “Time and Language” -> “Language and Region” -> “Regional Formats” section to make the 12-hour options more understandable.
• Task Manager:
  • Updated graphics on the Performance page. They’ve become more transparent to make it easier for you to see the grid lines below them.
  • Another fix has been made to improve the stability of the Task Manager.
  • Fixed the black flash that was observed when starting the “Task Manager” in the light theme.
  • Fixed several issues that caused the font color of some elements to be incorrect or unreadable when using a contrast theme.
• Other:
  • Fix an issue where Narrator reads calendar information displayed in the Date & Time panel of the taskbar even though the narrator has been collapsed.
  • Fixed an issue that caused explorer to crash in a loop.exe in Windows Sandbox for Insiders with a tablet-optimized taskbar and an updated system tray.
  • Fixed an issue that could cause some applications to hang when opening the Open File dialog box.
  • Fixed an issue that caused some insiders to turn black after enabling HDR.
  • Fixed an issue where, after using the Open With dialog box, a process could continue to run in the background even though it wasn’t in use.
  • Fixed an issue that increased CPU load on ARM64 devices when WSL2 is installed. The problem manifested itself even if WSL2 was inactive.
  • Fixed an issue where closing the Print dialog box could cause the application to crash.

Note. Some of the fixes listed above may be included in cumulative updates for release versions of Windows 11.

Known Issues

• General:
  • Reports are being investigated that some insiders stopped playing audio after upgrading to previous builds.
  • Reports are being investigated that in the latest insider builds, failures in the work of some applications have become more frequent.
  • [New] Exploring reports that in the last few builds, some UI elements sometimes disappear and reappear in applications.
• A taskbar optimized for tablets:
  • The taskbar may blink when you switch between desktop mode and tablet mode.
  • Switching the taskbar to the touchscreen version takes longer than expected. This will be noticeable when switching between desktop mode and tablet mode.
  • The taskbar can overlap the Widgets and Notification Center panels when you open them with gestures from the left and right edges of the screen.
  • When you open the Quick Actions menu with a gesture in the lower-right corner of the screen, the taskbar may not collapse and remain in an expanded state.
  • If there are no running windows on the desktop, the taskbar can sometimes collapse, although it should be expanded.
• Widgets:
  • In right-to-left languages (such as Arabic), widget panel content is animated out of sight when you move to the full-screen version of the widget panel.
  • The number on the notification indicator on the taskbar can be displayed at an offset.