The Windows 10 October 2018 Update (1809): Let's Try This Again
by Brett Howse on November 14, 2018 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Software
- Operating Systems
- Windows
- Microsoft
- Windows 10
Shell Updates and More
File Explorer Dark Mode
Windows 10 has offered a Dark Mode for quite a while now, but as with everything Windows, the legacy bits can take a while to clean up. But with the October 2018 Update, users using the Dark Mode setting will now also see the new dark mode in Windows Explorer.
Home Screen
The Home Screen has also gotten an updated look, and new functionality. You can easily open TimeLine from within the Home Screen, and searches within here offer previews for apps, documents, email, people, and more. You can also more easily filter searches for web results versus documents or files, and the preview pane lets you get a better feel for what you’ve found, showing modified dates and more.
Registry Editor
For those that love Regedit, the extra functionality of being able to type in a location has been improved with a dropdown that fills in as you type, and you can now do Ctrl + Backspace to delete the last word for easier navigation, or Ctrl + Delete to delete the next word.
Biometric Remote Desktop Sign-In
Windows 10 1809 also brings biometric login support for Remote Desktop when authentication to a VM over Active Directory or Azure Active Directory.
Wireless Projection
There’s also updates to wireless projection, to improve the experience across multiple scenarios. There’s now a control banner on the host device to let you set and configure the wireless display projection, and there’s three settings you can choose:
- Game Mode: minimizes the screen-to-screen latency to make gaming over a wireless connection possible
- Video Mode: increases the screen-to-screen latency to ensure the video on the big screen plays back smoothly
- Productivity Mode: strikes a balance between game mode and video mode; the screen-to screen-latency is responsive enough that typing feels natural, while ensuring videos don’t glitch as often.
Storage Sense
Storage Sense is the feature that helps keep Windows clean, and in previous updates it’s gained the ability to empty your recycle bin or delete files in Downloads. New to 1809 is the ability to mark content as online-only in OneDrive if you not opened it for between 1 and 60 days, or never. For those on small SSDs, it should help keeping some space available.
Task Manager
The Task Manager now offers columns showing an applications power usage, and it’s power usage trend, so you can use it to track down where all your battery has gone
Fonts
New to 1809 is the ability to install fonts from the Windows Store with no admin rights needed, or to install fonts on a per-user basis where admin rights also won’t be needed.
HDR and Wide Color Gamut Updates
If your display offers HDR and Wide Color Support, you enable support for video, HDR games and apps, and Wide Color apps in the new Windows HD Color Settings menu under Display properties. There’s a preview video as well so you can test the changes quickly. HDR still seems to be in its infancy on the PC, but with more displays now offering HDR it won’t be too long before it becomes more mainstream like it is in the TV industry.
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SkyBill40 - Monday, November 19, 2018 - link
It's "October Update +."Rookierookie - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
Windows 10 updates are proof that the early worm gets eaten.PeachNCream - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
"Likely one of the most annoying things on the web is auto-playing videos..."Oh, like the auto-playing CPU video Anandtech stuffed into the middle of every page of every article?
On a serious note though, some of the features in the latest update look pretty good. I don't know why I'd ever want to run Linux inside of Windows, but I'd imagine someone has a use case for it. I'd rather VirtualBox Windows inside of Linux or just dual boot a box like I do currently with Windows 7 or use WINE for the Windows programs I still need. The dark UI features are a nice addition though some form of that was doable in prior versions of Windows dating back to 95 if you tweaked individual settings so that's not really a huge change.
jordanclock - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
I use WSL because it offers near-native performance, none of the overhead of a VM and way more convenient than dual booting. I mainly use it on my work laptop and this also is much easier on my sysadmins to manage than dual booting.PeachNCream - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
Nice! I'm glad someone has a use for it. In my case, Windows plays a relatively minor role in life as I keep it for MS Office (not sure how much longer I'll bother since WINE provides a good enough framework for Microsoft Office these days) and playing an occasional game that doesn't have a native Linux build or is WINE friendly.1_rick - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
Exactly. Not only that, but you can get an X server like XMing and run X applications on your desktop, if you like that sort of thing.HStewart - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
I would agree about the videos - and hopefully it is not flash related which is notorious for problems on systems.wintermute000 - Thursday, November 15, 2018 - link
pretty much this, a godsend for fuzting around in python or ansible etc.nico_mach - Thursday, November 29, 2018 - link
A full VM install is enormous for many machines, this is a very nice option to have.flgt - Wednesday, November 14, 2018 - link
I wish our sysadmins would allow us to install WSL. Windows is still dominant for day to day work but as embedded Linux starts to take over in our embedded processors in our products it would be nice to go seamlessly between the two development environments.