LinkedIn announced this morning a big redesign that should affect many aspects of the web and mobile experience including search and profiles, while also adding new social features. The professional social network received its last fresh coat of paint nearly five years ago, and this new design update aims to “make your LinkedIn experience easy, inclusive, enjoyable, and most importantly to put the community front and center.”

The new search experience will add filters to make it easier to find what you’re looking for between people, posts, jobs, industries, groups, and more. In an effort to make the platform more inclusive, LinkedIn will also add new illustrations to reflect the diverse backgrounds and ethnicities of LinkedIn members.

On the messaging front, LinkedIn will add the ability to edit or delete private messages, react to messages with an emoji, as well as the ability to bulk-manage your messages. The professional social network will also make it easy to start a video meeting with LinkedIn contacts on Microsoft Teams, Zoom, or Verizon’s BlueJeans app. These video meetings integrations are coming to the LinkedIn mobile app later this Fall.

After some initial testing with select LinkedIn users, LinkedIn Stories are now rolling out to all users in the US and Canada. Similar to Snapchat and Instagram Stories, LinkedIn Stories will only be available for 24 hours, allowing users to share brief professional moments with their network. Through tests in various regions around the world, we’ve seen members adopt this format to connect more personally and less formally with their peers and friends. In the COVID world, LinkedIn Stories are letting people replace those essential water cooler moments,” the company explained.

If LinkedIn Stories are rolling out now on mobile, the bigger LinkedIn redesign will start rolling out to all users over the next few months, and the company is still working on other improvements including a dark mode. LinkedIn now boasts a community of 700 million professionals, and the company said it saw increased usage since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic with users sending hundreds of millions of messages every week.

“Whether we’re navigating a COVID downturn or post-COVID recovery, addressing an existing skills gap or a coming skills revolution, breaking systemic barriers to equal opportunity, or tackling whatever else defines work in the future, we’re fully committed to continuing to provide the tools and experiences that will let every professional connect to the right opportunities for them,” the team said today.

The Xbox team announced that there’s another Free Play Days event for this weekend on Xbox Wire. From now until Sunday, September 24, at 12:01 a.m. PDT, Tom Clancy’s The Division 2, Warhammer: Vermintide 2, and Bomber Crew are all available for Xbox Live Gold and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members for free as part of their subscription.

Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 is an online action-shooter RPG experience. Your mission is to save the US on the brink of collapse as you build up your character with the best arsenal you can as you fight your way through the open, dynamic and extremely hostile environment in Washington, D.C.

Warhammer: Vermintide 2 is a first-person online co-op set in the Warhammer Fantasy Battles world. Vermintide 2 brings new enhancements in the sequel with a brand new enemy faction, 15 new career paths, talent trees, new weapons, an improved loot system, and much more. You can buy the Ultimate Edition right now for 75% off the original price, but hurry, this deal ends soon!

Bomber Crew is a World War 2 strategic flying simulator, where you completing the objective is as important as keeping your crew alive. You will need to manage everything; fuel, ammo, hydraulics, and more in your very own physics-based Bomber, which can be customized with an array of upgrades and other customizations. Keep in mind, if you pre-order the upcoming sequel, Space Crew, you will get Bomber Crew for free!

As always, Xbox Live Gold and Xbox Game Pass subscribers can download and install all of these games through Xbox.com or via your Xbox console. Which games will you be playing this weekend? Let us know in the comments.

Microsoft Teams is finally getting a new webinar feature that will allow meeting organizers to use event registration with automated emails (via Petri). The company announced the feature at Microsoft Ignite 2020, indicating it will be available for all Teams users by the end of this year.

Coming to #MicrosoftTeams later this year –

Webinar registration and reporting, allowing meeting organizers to use event registration with automated emails before the event and view a detailed reporting dashboard afterwards.

Announced at #MSIgnite pic.twitter.com/FCt7crtu5E

— Anne Michels (@Anne_Michels) September 22, 2020

A majority of businesses worldwide have been hosting webinars to conduct presentations, lectures, workshops or seminars in recent months, making it easier to engage with audiences remotely. With this new feature, Teams meeting organizers will also be able to view a detailed reporting dashboard after the meeting has ended. The new capability should help them to understand attendee engagement.

The software giant has also promised to deliver attendee reporting and scheduling APIs to help users bring the data into their marketing and CRM solutions. In case you missed it, Microsoft has also announced a raft of other new Teams features such as Breakout rooms, new Together mode scenes, and more. We invite you to check out our separate post for more details.

Microsoft has made it easier for parents to monitor their children’s gameplay time with the Xbox Family Settings app, now generally available on Android and iOS. In May 2020, Microsoft quietly released the Xbox Family Settings app in preview on Android.

Here’s a video look at how the Family Settings app works on Android and iOS.

As noted in a post on Xbox Wire, Microsoft adopted user feedback from the Android preview to implement three new features to the app on Android and iOS:

1. Accept or decline friends your child wants to add.
2. View and manage your child’s friends list.
3. Proactively grant your child more screen time.

The Xbox Family Settings app helps parents monitor their children’s Xbox activity without interfering with their gameplay. Once a child account is set up, parents can set screen time limits, game content limits, as well as play and communication settings. You can view your child’s friends list and actively approve and decline friend requests directly from your phone. There is also an option to get activity reports to view your child’s daily and weekly time on Xbox.

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‎Xbox Family Settings

Developer:
Microsoft Corporation

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Free

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Xbox Family Settings

Developer:
Microsoft Corporation

Price:
Free

Pre-orders for the Seagate Storage Expansion Card for Xbox Series X have gone live on the BestBuy website (via WC) revealing that each 1TB card will cost $219.99.

Seagate’s expansion cards are designed exclusively for Microsoft’s upcoming Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S video game consoles, feature custom PCIe Gen4x2 NVMe flash memory, and can be used to store Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Xbox 360, and original Xbox video games.

Pre-orders for the Seagate Storage Expansion Card have yet to go live on the official Microsoft website or other online retailers though they are expected to soon. It’s unlikely that such accessories will sell out as quickly as the Series X and Series S consoles themselves did so, if you prefer to order your gaming supplies from elsewhere, there’s no pressure to buy exclusively from BestBuy. At least not yet.

Are you planning to buy a Seagate Storage Expansion Card for your Xbox Series X or S console? Let us know why or why not in the comments below and then follow us on Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook for more Xbox gaming news. Like podcasts? Check out our new OnMSFT podcast where we discuss Xbox and everything else Microsoft.

With Google seemingly shifting gears on its pricing scheme with the upcoming Pixel 5 release, and Apple finding continued success with its SE lineup, the market is primed for Samsung to follow suit.

Today, Samsung took its stab at reintroducing what it considers a reasonably priced flagship experience with its new S20 FE (Fan Edition). In the age of $1,000+ phone prices, OEM’s are now doing a sleight of hand with the headroom their recent pricing hikes has created by “offering” a version of their latest flagships in what used to be “normal” retail.

Samsung’s new S20 FE is, by all accounts, a great deal coming in at just under $700 for a phone that’s powered by Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 865 processor, 6GB’s of RAM, and 128GB’s of expandable storage. Other Samsung S20 FE features include 5G support on a 6-and-a-half-inch Super AMOLED screen with a 120 Hz refresh rate panel and a camera array of three lenses for various wide-angle photography, digital zooms the telephoto capture.

Perhaps the more compelling value of the S20 FE is its color option pallet. Instead of some sleek “business-friendly” shades of rose gold, black, white, and blue, Samsung is offering more playful pastel-like tones that include lavender, mint, navy, red, orange, and white.

Moments after the Samsung live stream event, the S20 FE was put up for pre-order with device shipping as early as October 1, 2020.

The move for Samsung to offer a value-packed (albeit plastic) version follows those of OnePlus, LG, Google, and even Apple this year, hopefully, the trend continues well into the future and Microsoft’s Duo finds itself part of the trend.

OK, I don’t need a new phone. I don’t even need all the capabilities of the phone I’ve been using, a used Apple iPhone 7+. But like many of you, I like toys, especially technology toys, and when I saw the “Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2 5G” announced back in August, I was very intrigued. With Samsung’s recently expanded partnership with Microsoft, and the promise of features like Link To Windows and the Microsoft Launcher (unavailable for iPhone), and also as my colleague Arif Bacchus has been equally stricken with the Surface Duo, I decided to bite the bullet and order a Z Fold 2 for myself from Verizon. I’ll be having more to say about Samsung and Microsoft, the Z Fold 2, and even a bit on Apple vs. Android and Z Fold 2 vs Duo in the coming weeks, but for now, let’s start with some first impressions.

Unboxing:

Yep, it came in a box. Why anyone gets excited about unboxing videos is beyond me, and I didn’t make one. I did snap a few pictures, though, just for fun. Aside from printed cardboard, the Z Fold 2 comes with… a charger. Woohoo!

A note on my backwater life:

First off, a number of issues we’ll come to all boil down to my moving to rural NE Washington (I’m 12 miles from Canada to the north and 12 miles from Idaho to the east). I love it here for every reason except one, broadband internet. The closest thing to “high speed internet” I can get is via an AT&T MiFi, which gives me ~20mbps/10mbps and unlimited bandwidth (only unlimited because AT&T doesn’t actually throttle speeds after 22gb, unlike Verizon or T-Mobile).  My latest incarnation works (and I’ve tried just about everything), but I live in a world far away from fiber optic or cable or 5G. My connection is from a WiFi router to an AT&T cell connection, and it is what it is.

One other note: I’m not a phone reviewer, and I don’t change phones every week or every month. I bought my Lumia 950XL the day it came out in November 2015, and since then I’ve had a Samsung S8+ and an iPhone 6s (used) and an iPhone 7+ (also used). I plan on keeping this Z Fold 2 for years (at $2,000, I’d better!). Some of my setup issues would have been easier if I did it all the time, but most of you probably don’t switch phones every week either. I won’t be spouting off a bunch of specs; I’m a phone user, not a phone reviewing professional. Just one of the people, here :).

Setup (not seamless)

After my last Windows Phone, a Lumia 950XL, I bought a Samsung S8+, which I liked, but due to some of those broadband internet sharing and cap issues, I switched to an iPhone. Now I’m back on Samsung and Android. The trick to moving from one to the other has mainly to do with saving your messages. The iPhone uses iMessage, a thinly disguised attempt to lock you into the Apple platform. Still, Samsung has “Smart Switch,” and once you turn off iMessage, and then back up your iPhone to iTunes (iCloud backs up iMessages, but not SMS messages, but iTunes does, apparently), the process is fairly seamless. Well, seamless after jumping through a bunch of hoops that is.

One big disappointment was with LastPass. After years of managing passwords with an Excel spreadsheet, post it notes, and a healthy does of “oh, I’ll remember that” (you know how that ends), I made the switch to the LastPass password manager. It hasn’t been a perfect experience, more of an incremental step in the right direction than a complete solution, but I’ve been sticking with it.

With the iPhone, I downloaded the app, logged in with my LastPass master password, and was using the service right off. Apparently, however, Android has developed an AutoFill platform, and you not only need to install LastPass, but dig into the depths of Android’s settings and allow LastPass to work with AutoFill, and to enable “Draw over other apps,” an obscure setting deep down in System Settings>Apps>LastPass>Advanced. Since I didn’t know that (and there was no warning when installing LastPass that there were multiple other steps still to go), I lost out on the convenience of LastPass when doing that most intensive of all password enabling endeavors, setting up a new phone. Finally, a couple days in, I buckled down and learned how to set up LastPass, but by then it was too late. Lesson learned, and now everything is working, but a painful experience when LastPass was supposed to make things easier.

Getting Started

Some first first impressions of the Z Fold 2:

• It’s heavy, but not in a bad way. It feels substantial, like a $2,000 device should. It feels serious, and the metal casing makes it feel more like a fine watch than a mass produced phone. It’s an elegant feel.
• This is not Samsung’s version of the Surface Duo. It’s a different device altogether. With its world class cameras, great battery life, a fully functioning front screen and a the large main screen, the Z Fold 2 answers a different question than the Surface Duo. It’s not a dual screen device, it’s a big screen device, with an additional small screen, that still fits (easily) in your pocket.
• The learning curve to getting everything set up is steeper than I’d like. Splitting the big screen for two apps isn’t intuitive, although fairly straightforward once you know how, but again, splitting the screen is a secondary feature of the Z Fold 2, not the be all and end all that it is on the Duo.
• Smartphones have changed the way we use photography, and this phone is the epitome of that. Great cameras and a large screen to show them off. I can’t wait to unfold the Z Fold 2 to show off pictures. For many users, a phone *IS* a camera, more than it’s a telephone or an internet connection, and the Z Fold 2 is a top of the line camera phone.

Microsoft Launcher and the future of the Microsoft Phone

Although it’s not a seamless setup, either, the Z Fold 2, along with most Android devices, can become a powerful Microsoft machine. The apps, from Microsoft Launcher to Outlook to Edge to Office, are great, and together, they make you *almost* forget about the death of Windows Phone. While I haven’t had a chance to play with it yet except to get it running, the Link To Windows feature is largely a gimmick at this point, but it’s early in what could be a major opportunity to, well, link the desktop to the phone in ways that just haven’t been possible before.

Another impression coming from the iPhone: while Apple is famous for doing everything they can to lock you into their ecosystem (and lock other ecosystems out), the pendulum swings all the way over with Android and the Z Fold 2. Instead of being pushed to iCloud, this phone has cloud services baked in from Google, from Samsung, from Verizon, and from Microsoft (I bought the phone from my carrier, Verizon, instead of from Samsung directly. The Microsoft Store doesn’t yet have the Z Fold 2). You can’t delete these cloud service apps, although you can do an ok good job of hiding them. Samsung’s Bixby is still around, inexplicably, but you can easily remap the power button to power off with a long press instead of open Bixby (on the S8+, this took some hacking).

As much as Microsoft has done to build an ecosystem of Microsoft-centric apps, it’s still Google’s operating system, and Google services remain close to the metal. Instead of fighting that, I’m going to use Google Drive for phone backups and photo storage (while still using OneDrive for lots of other stuff).

Some final first thoughts, and more to come

This is a great phone. It’s a big screen in a small package, without compromise. I bought it because it does all the things I really want in a phone, ie: great battery life, beautiful screens, easy to use, great cameras and an unparalleled main display. It’s going to be great at what I use a phone for: taking and sharing pictures, catching up on Twitter and email, watching movies and playing music, and perhaps doing the occasional work in Office. I still contend that the best productivity suite available is a laptop and a phone, and I don’t see myself leaving a laptop at home when I travel (if I ever travel again). But the Z Fold 2 isn’t a small laptop, it’s a big phone, one that, amazingly, folds up. I’m excited to get past the setup phase and really start using this phone.

Microsoft has just released the Windows 10 preview build 20221 for Insiders in the Dev Channel, and the main new feature is the addition of a shortcut to Skype’s Meet Now feature in the Taskbar. The Meet Now button will appear in the system tray and make it easy to set up or join a video meeting in Skype.

Please note that this new Meet Now button in the Taskbar will only show up for a subset of Insiders who will install this latest build. Microsoft will eventually make it available for all Insiders in the Dev channel once it has fixed all the issues reported by early testers.

This new build also brings a notable change for the People app, which will no longer appear as a standalone app in the Start Menu. While the app isn’t going away, the Windows Insiders team explained that this app is mostly opened right from the dedicated shortcuts in the Windows 10 Mail and Calendar apps.

The Your Phone app is also getting a new Notifications pinning feature today. “With notifications pinning, you can easily pin to save important notifications that will stick to the top of your feed so they are readily accessible and distinguished from the rest of your notifications,” the team explained. This feature will roll out to all Insiders and the installation of this new build isn’t required to get it.

Lastly, this new build also brings some fixes for Windows Update, the Start Menu, the Action Center, as well as the Windows Subsystem for Linux. You find the full details about new features, bug fixes and known issues in the build 20221 below:

What’s new in Build 20221

Introducing Meet Now in the Windows 10 Taskbar

Earlier this year we introduced Meet Now in Skype. Meet Now makes it easy to connect with anyone in as little as two clicks for free and each call can last up to 24 hours. Today, we’re excited to share that we are extending this capability in Windows 10 by bringing Meet Now right to the taskbar. You can now easily set up a video call and reach friends and family in an instant by clicking on the Meet Now icon in the notification area (system tray) of the taskbar in Windows 10. No sign ups or downloads needed.

Create a meeting:

Join a meeting:

This feature is rolling out to a subset of Insiders in the Dev Channel at first, to help us quickly identify issues that may impact performance and reliability. Rest assured they will be gradually rolled out to everyone in the Dev Channel.

Changes and Improvements

• As some Insiders may have noticed, we’re adding a notification to let you know when an app registers to run at startup (Settings > Apps > Startup Apps).
• With most of the launches of the People app coming directly from within the Mail and Calendar apps in Windows 10, the People app no longer appears as a standalone app in Start. It remains as an inbox app and can be launched to manage your contacts from the button in the Mail and Calendar apps.

Fixes

• We fixed an issue where the new Manage Disks and Volumes section in Settings wasn’t blocking the ability to change the drive letter of the system volume.
• We fixed an issue that could result in Start menu, and Action Center being totally transparent when certain apps were open in the background.
• We fixed an issue that could result in a crash when opening the Power menu in Start while running Magnifier at a high zoom level.
• We fixed an issue that could result in a virtual desktop thumbnail in Task View showing an empty desktop even after moving an app over to that desktop.
• We fixed an issue when typing with an IME into text fields in certain apps that could result in input no longer being accepted.
• We fixed an issue that could result in the Chinese Pinyin IME candidate pane getting stuck on the first letter when typing into certain games.
• We fixed an issue that could result in Windows Update getting stuck at “Downloading – 0%” for a long time.
• We fixed seeing generic errors when using wsl --install in the Windows Subsystem for Linux.
• We fixed a bug where the Linux kernel would not be installed when using wsl --install in the Windows Subsystem for Linux.

Known issues

• We’re looking into reports of the update process hanging for extended periods of time when attempting to install a new build.
• We’re working on a fix to enable live preview for pinned site tabs.
• We’re working on enabling the new taskbar experience for existing pinned sites. In the meantime, you can unpin the site from the taskbar, remove it from the edge://apps page, and then re-pin the site.
• We’re investigating reports of some Office applications crashing or missing after updating to a new build.
• We’re working on a fix for an issue resulting in Settings crashing for some Insiders when opening Manage Disks and Volumes.
• We’re investigating reports of some devices experiencing a KMODE_EXCEPTION bugcheck when using certain virtualization technologies.
• We are investigating an issue affecting Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 distros where users can receive the error: “The remote procedure call failed” on startup.
• We’re investigating a bug where the vEthernet adapter in Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 distros becomes disconnected after a period of use. For full details please follow this Github thread.

Skype has seen increased usage since the beginning of the covid-19 pandemic, and Microsoft said back in May that it wants the app to coexist with Microsoft Teams. Skype is still preinstalled on all Windows 10 PCs, and it makes sense for Microsoft to make the app’s new Meet Now feature more discoverable. However, this test may well not be welcomed by Insiders who never use Skype. Do you think Microsoft is pushing too hard with this new Meet Now button in the Taskbar? Let us know in the comments below.

Microsoft kicked off its Ignite 2020 conference yesterday with lots of news about Azure, Microsoft Teams, and other Microsoft 365 apps. Microsoft Lists, the company’s new smart information tracking also got some love with a new Offline mode powered by a new intelligent sync technology codenamed “Project Nucleus.”

If Project Nucleus will come to life first in Microsoft Lists later this year, the new sync technology could soon be integrated within many more Microsoft online services, providing a faster and better way to sync content from the cloud to web apps. Here’s what Jeff Teper, CVP of Microsoft had to say about the intelligent sync technology yesterday (via ZDNet):

Project Nucleus will power the next generation of our web apps and portals. It will use intelligent sync to a database to keep a cache on the client that our web apps use to deliver a leapfrog in performance. Project Nucleus will allow you to accomplish common tasks, like column sorting and grouping, at blazing fast speeds on lists of any size regardless of your Internet connection speed. All changes are synched with the local cache so Project Nucleus will enable you to work even when offline! All changes made are uploaded when you reconnect to Internet.

Work on Project Nucleus started last year when Teper and his team were looking for a new solution for improving the performance and reliability of web apps using large amounts of content. Microsoft already had some expertise with cloud syncing technologies thanks to its OneDrive and SharePoint services, and Project Nucleus is also leveraging the new offline capabilities offered by progressive web apps (PWAs).

We’re looking forward to seeing how Project Nucleus will power offline lists in Microsoft Lists later this year. The new web app started rolling out back in July for Microsoft 365 customers along with the new Lists app in Microsoft Teams, and a preview version of Microsoft Lists for iOS is now available for early enthusiasts.

Microsoft has recently announced its plans to build a new data center region in Arizona, which will be called the West US 3 region. The sustainable data center is expected to open in 2021, and it will create over 100 permanent jobs across various functions in this region.

The announcement builds on Microsoft’s long term goal of becoming carbon negative by 2030. It shows the company’s new focus on water conservation and the power of its HoloLens 2 device in combination with Azure. With this new data center, the company aims to deliver enterprise-grade cloud services such as Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, Power Platform, and Microsoft Azure. It will also include “Availability Zones” to support customer needs for resiliency and high-availability in their applications. Availability Zones are basically unique physical locations of data centres that will have an independent network, power, and cooling mechanism.

“Our datacenter design and operations will contribute to the sustainability of our Arizona facilities. In Arizona, we’re pursuing Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold certification, which will help conserve additional resources including energy and water, generate less waste and support human health. We’re also committed to zero waste-certified operations for this new region, which means a minimum of 90 percent of waste will be diverted away from landfills through reduction, reuse and recycling efforts,” the company explained.

Microsoft  has also committed to invest in solar energy generation and water conservation project in Arizona. Moreover, the software gaint has entered into a partnership with Nox Innovations to build sustainable data centers in the region. Nox Innovations will leverage the power of Microsoft HoloLens 2, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Remote Assist and Microsoft mixed reality partner solution VisualLive to achieve this goal.

Microsoft finally opened pre-orders for its next-gen Xbox Series X and S consoles yesterday, and as excepted, both models sold out pretty quickly. Yesterday, the Xbox Twitter account celebrated “record-breaking demand for Xbox Series X and S,” and warned Xbox enthusiasts who haven’t been able to pre-order either console to wait for more units on November 10.

We are humbled by the record-breaking demand for Xbox Series X and S. Huge thanks to everyone for the excitement. ????

If you weren't successful today be sure to sign up with retailers for updates, and expect more consoles to be available on November 10. ????

— Xbox (@Xbox) September 22, 2020

Interestingly, all the excitement for the Xbox Series X and S also gave the now deprecated Xbox One X a boost on Amazon. Indeed, the console’s sale rank (not to be confused with actual sales) on the digital retailer was up 747% yesterday, leading some to believe that some enthusiasts looking for the Xbox Series X may have bought the Xbox One X by mistake.

Others like Senior Video Games Analyst Daniel Ahmad suggested that this increase in Xbox One X sales could be the result of by misconfigured bots. Anyway, as Microsoft discontinued the Xbox One X back in July, stocks for the current-gen console should now be very low.

One X was discontinued by Microsoft recently. With One S, Series S and Series X now becoming the main options.

The increase in One X sales today could be incorrectly configured bots.

If it's not bots, the actual sales increase in minimal overall as stock is extremely low.

— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 22, 2020

Three years ago, Microsoft announced that the Xbox One X was the fastest-selling Xbox pre-order ever. This was five days after the company opened pre-orders for a special Project Scorpio Edition of the console at Gamescom 2017. At the time, the software giant didn’t share any hard-data about console pre-orders, and the Xbox team will likely do the same for Xbox Series X and S pre-orders.

We don’t know how many next-gen Xbox units were available for pre-order yesterday, but retailers’ websites including Microsoft’s own digital Store have been struggling with the increased traffic. Ironically, yesterday was also the day when Microsoft’s kicked off its Ignite conference for IT Pros, with the company’s Azure cloud being a main topic.

Looks like that even with seeing all that Sony went through last week lots of preorder woes for Microsoft. The Microsoft Store is down, Target and Best Buy pages having issues. #XboxSeriesX pic.twitter.com/rEJKFhdMxP

— Eli Blumenthal (@eliblumenthal) September 22, 2020

We hope that the Xbox team will soon share an update about Xbox Series X and S pre-orders. In the meantime, let us know in the comments if you’ve been able to pre-order your console of choice yesterday.

Tetris Effect: Connected is a now available to pre-order and pre-download on Microsoft’s Xbox One consoles. This pre-order is essentially a pre-order for the Xbox Series X version of the game as well as it supports Smart Delivery, a system that automatically unlocks the next gen version for free for those that own the Xbox One version.

While there have been various Tetris video games on Xbox consoles over the years, this is the first Tetris Effect title to appear on the platform. Tetris Effect: Connected is a re-release of the PS4 and PC Tetris Effect video game which reimagined the classic puzzle title with a surreal design aesthetic that changes in response to how the player is playing.

Connected differs from the original Tetris Effect game by including new multiplayer and single-player modes. Tetris Effect: Connected will support 4K HDR when played on an Xbox One X, Xbox Series S, or Xbox Series X console.

Here’s the official game description:

Tetris Effect: Connected adds an all-new robust multiplayer expansion to the huge variety of addictive and innovative single-player modes that Tetris Effect is known for with all-new co-op and competitive online and local multiplayer modes!

Tetris Effect is Tetris like you’ve never seen it, or heard it, or felt it before—an incredibly addictive, unique, and breathtakingly gorgeous reinvention of one of the most popular puzzle games of all time, from the people who brought you the award-winning Rez Infinite and legendary puzzle game Lumines.

Music, backgrounds, sounds, special effects—everything, down to the Tetris pieces themselves, pulse, dance, shimmer, and explode in perfect sync with how you’re playing, making any of the game’s 30+ stages and 10+ modes something you’ll want to experience over and over again.

A challenge for the mind and a feast for all the senses, TETRIS EFFECT is the perfect excuse to play Tetris again… and again…and again, and again, and again and again and again and again and again and again and…

Game leverages Smart Delivery allowing access to both the Xbox One title and the Xbox Series X|S title when available.

Tetris Effect: Connected is set to launch on Xbox One and Xbox Series X consoles on November 10th. This is the same release date as the Xbox Series X and Series S consoles which makes Tetris Effect: Connected a launch title for Microsoft’s next gen consoles.

The Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S consoles are also now up for pre-order but they’re selling out VERY fast.

Are you hyped for Tetris Effect: Connected? Let us know why or why not in the comments below and then follow us on Pinterest and Twitter for more Xbox gaming news.

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QR-Code

Tetris® Effect: Connected

Developer:
Enhance

Price:
$39.99

Microsoft has released today a new preview version of Windows Terminal, the company’s new command line tool for Windows 10. The preview version 1.4 introduces Jump list support, making it easy to launch the app with a specific profile right from the Start Menu or Task Bar.

This new release also adds hyperlink support for embedded hyperlinks in apps. The team is still working on hyperlink detection, and said that this feature would come “very soon.” There are also a couple of bug fixes in this new preview build, and more details can be found on the project’s GitHub page.

In addition to this new preview release, the team also announced that Windows Terminal version 1.3 is now generally available. This version has been in preview since late August, and it brings an advanced tab switcher, tab colours, and more.

Windows Terminal Preview 1.4 and Windows Terminal 1.3 can both be downloaded from the Microsoft Store and the project’s GitHub page. The team is still welcoming contributions from users, so make sure to visit the GitHub page if you want to help out.

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Windows Terminal

Developer:
Microsoft Corporation

Price:
Free

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Windows Terminal Preview

Developer:
Microsoft Corporation

Price:
Free

At Ignite 2020, Microsoft is announcing a slew of updates for its Teams collaboration service. The popular collaboration platform is picking up new features that should help make Teams meetings more engaging, inclusive, and dynamic than before.

First of all, the company is introducing a bunch of new Together mode scenes which will be available in the coming months. The list includes auditoriums, conference rooms, and a coffee shop, and more. Once the change rolls out, presenters will get the ability to choose a Together mode scene from the gallery and set it as the default background for all meeting participants. Notably, the company is also bringing new machine learning capabilities in Together mode. This should automatically scale and center participants in their virtual seats regardless of their distance from the camera. 

Next, Microsoft has announced custom layouts to improve the dynamic viewing experience in Teams. The feature will deliver the ability for presenters to customize how participants see the content during Teams meetings. It should allow presenters to use hand gestures and facial cues for directing the attention of their audience. 

Additionally, Microsoft is also launching the highly anticipated Breakout rooms functionality that would be available in October to Teams users. Breakout rooms will let meeting organizers split a group video or audio call into divergent sessions for workgroup discussions. After creating breakout rooms, the meeting organizer will be able to make important announcements to engage participants. Once the discussion is complete, the organizer will call back all meeting participants to the main meeting by closing the rooms. 

In addition to the new live captions with speaker attribution capabilities that are now generally available, Microsoft also announced a new recap feature coming in Teams meeting. After a meeting is over, participants will be able to access the recap with the meeting recording, transcript, chat, shared files, and more directly from the meeting Chat tab. The recap will also be accessible in the Outlook calendar. The feature has been designed for both meeting participants and people who missed the meeting to stay on track. 

Last but not least, Microsoft also announced today that it’s increasing the participant limit in interactive meetings to 1,000. Furthermore, Microsoft Teams will soon grow to support up to 20,000 participants in a view-only meeting experience. The company says these new capabilities will be enabled with a new Advanced Communications Plan for Teams. 

Moreover, a bunch of enhancements are coming later this year for the Calling experience within Microsoft Teams, including a new collaborative calling experience, Microsoft Teams display, as well as a new line of affordable Microsoft Teams phones. Other changes coming to Teams include some popular meeting features for 1:1 calls such as transcription, live captions, and more. We invite you to check out the official blog post for more details.

Despite Skype taking up most of the air in a room regarding Microsoft’s video streaming solutions, the company’s other, more corporate alternative is gaining a host of new features that may eventually overshadow Skype’s overall efficacy.

Microsoft’s “intelligent” video streaming app Stream is offered as part of the Microsoft 365 bundle and enables users to “create, share, and discover videos as easily as Office documents.”

Announced at Ignite 2020, a rollout of new features to Stream is planned for the fourth quarter of the 2020 calendar year that include external and anonymous sharing, Microsoft Search integration, enhanced analytics, improved transcript quality and updated controls for security and compliance request.

Microsoft assures that folks making use of the “classic” Stream app, that there will be a transitional period where new features will be phased into Microsoft 365 while still supporting the older version.

With the self-imposed Q4 deadline quickly upon the company, users should expect to see previews of the new Stream features beginning in the coming weeks.