Windows 11 has been continuously improved and is now a great operating system. Over the past few months, Microsoft has been adding a lot of features and fixing bugs in the Windows Insider channel. The highly anticipated Windows 11 23H2 update will make these fully tested, fixed, and enhanced features available to a wider audience. While most of the new features are helpful, 5 of them stand out for improving the overall user experience.
5 new features that Windows 11 23H2 is looking forward to look at first
Dynamic lighting effect (RGB control item)
If you are a fan of RGB color light, then you are probably no stranger to the compatibility issues between wanting to synchronize the lighting effects of different brands of equipment. As various manufacturers provide their own SDKs, you have to download and install multiple third-party applications to set RGB lighting effects for all external devices. While apps like OpenRGB and SignalRGB are compatible with a wide range of devices, the dynamic lighting controls that come with this update are even more exciting.
Admittedly, Dynamic Lighting is fairly simple at the moment, with few supported devices other than some Razer keyboards and mice, but it’s still a step in the right direction, as Dynamic Lighting is Microsoft’s first attempt at creating a centralized management interface to control all RGB peripherals. Compared to most third-party apps, Dynamic Lighting consumes hardly any system resources, and won’t bombard you with ads and shopping offers from time to time.
From everything we’ve seen so far, the future of dynamic lighting looks positive. First, Microsoft claims that Asus, Acer, HP, and Logitech have agreed to incorporate dynamic lighting effects into their products. If Microsoft manages to add support for lesser-known and generic brands of peripherals, Dynamic Lighting could very well be the RGB customization interface we’ve been waiting for.
Support multiple compression formats
For years, Windows users have had to rely on third-party applications such as WinRAR, 7-Zip, etc. to decompress files other than .zip formats. However, the upcoming Windows 11 23H2 update will take advantage of tools in Libarchive that allow users to extract .gz, .tar, and .rar archive formats directly from the file explorer. Since the Libarchive tool is compatible with .pax, .cpio, and many other file types, hopefully once 23H2 is out, we’ll eventually see native support for nearly every major compression format.
Dev Home 和 Dev Drive
First introduced in Windows 11 preview build 23466 in May, Dev Home serves as an all-in-one launcher for app developers. In addition to the built-in hardware monitoring platform and direct access to the GitHub repository, Dev Home also allows you to install more than 20 extensions, including Android Studio, Visual Studio and PyCharm, to achieve the purpose of creating and modifying projects from a single interface. After publishing extensive documentation on how developers can create new extensions for this app, Microsoft aims to launch an extension store to increase the number of gadgets supported by the developer homepage.
Best of all, you can access Dev Drive directly from Dev Home. This is a unique storage format designed to store source code and project data. Dev Drive is built on top of ReFS and NTFS, using copy-on-write (CoW) links and other features in ReFS to optimize performance when building applications.
HDR wallpaper support (may be available)
Microsoft has finally added support for Real HDR wallpapers in Windows Preview 23516. However, there are some limitations to this feature, as images must be in .jxr format, and you need to enable some settings and calibrate your monitor’s HDR settings for it to work properly. At present, it is not clear whether this function will be included in the 23H2 update. Whether it is used or not is one thing, but I still hope to have it (better than nothing).
Exclusive backup application
Microsoft introduced the Windows Backup application and Dev Drive earlier in Indider build 23466. The new app will allow you to back up all your files and folders to OneDrive cloud storage with the push of a button. It also helps you load your app’s preferred presets, settings, and credentials when setting up a new computer for the first time.
The restore tool has also been overhauled. Backups of the old system will retain the pinned application locations on the Start menu and taskbar. On new PCs, you can quickly reinstall apps from the Microsoft Store by double-clicking on their icons. This feature also extends to non-Windows Store apps, where double-clicking the icon directs you to its official website. New Windows Backup and improved restore features make it easier to transfer data to another system when you’re moving from an older computer.
The Windows 11 23H2 update also includes other useful features, including a redesigned File Explorer, enhancements to Windows Copilot, and Windows Ink. What’s more, the 23H2 update will be in the form of a small installation package, so you don’t have to spend hours waiting for the installation file to download. Microsoft has not announced the exact release date of the official version update, but judging from the behavior of past versions, Microsoft is likely to launch it sometime in October 2023 (unless there are force majeure factors, policy changes or is a bottleneck obstacle, etc.).
