Windows 11 Build 25247 (Dev) includes improved Task manager, tray clock seconds, and more

Microsoft has released a new preview of Windows 11, build 25247 to Windows Insiders in the Dev channel. It features Windows Studio Effects from the Quick Actions Menu, Energy Saving Recommendations in the Settings app, Task Manager with search for processes and a better dark theme. Besides, there is a new "Suggested action" that allows directly searching for selected text in Bing. Also in Settings you will see a reminder if you are running out of free OneDrive space. For the clock in the taskbar, you can enable seconds. Finally, the Start menu now shows recently visited websites in the Recommended section.

You can install Windows 11 build 25247 by opening Settings > Windows Update. Also, Microsoft has released the official ISO images, so you perform a clean install of this build.

What is new in Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25247 (Dev Channel)

New features

Access Windows Studio Effects from Quick Settings

Windows Studio effects can now be accessed directly from Quick Settings on the taskbar, for devices that have a supported Neural Processing Unit (NPU). This makes it quick and easy to enable and configure camera effects (Background Blur, Eye Contact, and automatic framing) and audio effects (Voice Focus). You can still access these effects in the Settings pages if desired.

Energy Recommendations

We are beginning to roll out Energy Recommendations under Settings > System > Power & Battery > Energy Recommendations. Review and apply these recommendations to improve the energy efficiency of your PC and reduce your carbon footprint.

Task Manager Improvements

We have a set of Task Manager improvements rolling out with this build.

Filter processes: We are bringing process filtering to Task Manager. This is the top feature request from our users to filter/search for processes. You can filter either using the binary name, PID or publisher name. The filter algorithm matches the context keyword with all possible matches and displays them on the current page. The filter is also applied as you switch between pages. You can also use the keyboard shortcut ALT + F to focus on the filter box. This is a helpful feature if you want to single out a process or a group of processes and want to take action or just monitor the performance of the filtered processes.

Better theme support: We have added the ability to use your preferred theme in Task Manager regardless of the active theme in Windows. You can set it in the setting page in Task Manager.

Task Manager now also supports themes for in-app dialogs. All dialog except for “Run new task” and Properties dialog now support themes and will adhere to either app specific theme or Windows theme.

Improved Efficiency mode dialog: We are making it easy for you to apply Efficiency mode and offering the ability to opt-out of the confirmation dialog. You can make changes on the Efficiency mode dialog box by unchecking “Don’t ask me again” or you can enable/disable it the settings for Task Manager.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Desktop Environment > Task Manager.

New Suggested Action

On copying text with search potential, Windows will pop up an inline light dismissible UI that suggests searching this text in Microsoft Edge. Upon user selection of the search action, a new Edge tab is launched to search the copied text. This will initially be available for Insiders in the U.S. only.

[We are beginning to roll this feature out, so it isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.]

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Desktop Environment  > Suggested actions on copy.

Updates to your cloud storage in settings for Windows 11

With today’s build, the Settings app supports new visuals on your Accounts page to provide a visual overview of your cloud storage usage across Microsoft products. The new visuals include a consolidated cloud storage bar that shows your storage usage for each product and notifies you if you’re running low on storage. We removed the quota bar from our subscriptions card to eliminate duplication on these visuals.

In the months to come, you will also see updates to what Microsoft 365 apps and services data is included in your cloud storage. These updates may impact your storage amount starting February 1st, 2023. Learn more about cloud storage here.

[We are beginning to roll this feature out, so it isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.]

Changes and Improvements

[General]

• Earlier this week, we released an optional .NET update (2022-11 Cumulative Update Preview for .NET Framework 3.5 and 4.8.1 for Windows Version Next for x64 (KB5020992)) to Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel designed to test delivery of .NET improvements in the future. This .NET update does not include anything new and will be available under Settings > Windows Update > Advanced Options > Optional Updates If you run into any issues finding or installing this update, please submit feedback via Feedback Hub.

[Start menu]

• We’ve been working on adding more valuable content to the Recommended section in Start and are excited to introduce a new content type: websites. For the first phase, we will recommend common websites based on your region or browsing history to help you easily get back to the websites you care about. This can be controlled by right-clicking on a website and choosing to remove that website individually or to stop showing all recommended websites entirely. Only some Insiders will see this experience and, if you do, please share your feedback.

[Taskbar & System Tray]

• In response to user feedback, we are introducing the capability to show seconds in the clock on the system tray. This feature can be enabled by toggling the option listed under Settings > Personalization > Taskbar in the Taskbar behavior section. You can also right-click on taskbar to quickly get to taskbar settings. We are beginning to roll this change out so not all Windows Insiders will see this change right away, but we hope to make it available to everyone soon.

[Search on the Taskbar]

• We made performance improvements that will allow more files and content on your PC to show up as results in the Windows search box. We look forward to hearing your feedback on whether you notice an improvement with your file results within Windows.

[Input]

• Switched the touch keyboard icon option under Settings > Personalization > Taskbar from being a toggle to now being a dropdown where you can select Never, Always, or When no keyboard attached.
• We are including two new keyboard layouts in this flight. These keyboards implement the two new French keyboard layout standards (AZERTY and BÉPO). The new layouts are designed to allow the user to type all the required characters of the French language. They also include support for all the Latin-based languages of the European Union as well as Greek letters and a large variety of scientific, mathematical, and financial symbols. To enable one of these layouts, go to Settings > Time & language > Language & region and select Language options under the ellipsis for the language you would like to use this keyboard with. On the Options page, select “Add a keyboard” and look for the new keyboard layouts “French (Standard, AZERTY)” or “French (Standard, BÉPO)”. The previous AZERTY layout now displays as (Legacy, AZERTY).
• We have made improvements to Emoji search for Japanese and Simplified Chinese by handling Kana/Kanji and Pinyin properly in the emoji panel.

You will find the list of fixes and known issues in the official announcement linked here.

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