Windows 10 preview build 18290 rolls out to Fast ring Insiders

Fast ring Insiders, it's time to fire up Windows Update. Microsoft today began pushing out another Windows 10 preview build for Fast ring Insiders, bringing the build number up to 18290.

The latest build adds some additional Fluent Design touches for the Start menu, insights into which apps are using your microphone, and improvements to the Search and Cortana experiences. Here's the full rundown of what's new in build 18290.

What's new

• A touch of Fluent for menus in Start: Following up on our jump list improvements with Build 18282, when you update to today's build you'll notice we've polished up the power and user menus in Start as well – including adding icons for easier identification.

• Sync your clock: In response to your feedback, we're adding an option in Date & Time Settings to manually synchronize your clock with the time server. This will help in scenarios where you think the clock might be out of sync, or if the time service has been disabled. We'll also show the last time that time was successfully synced, and the address of your current time server.
• See which app is using your microphone: In Build 18252 we introduced a new mic icon that would appear in the notification area letting you know when an app was accessing your microphone. Today we're updating it so if you hover over the icon, it will now show you which app. Double clicking the icon will open Microphone Privacy Settings. If multiple apps are using your microphone, then it will just list how many are actively using your microphone. We still have a bit more to do, stay tuned!
• Improving your Search and Cortana experiences: We're exploring some options for improving these experiences in Windows. When you start a search now, you'll notice we've updated the landing page – giving recent activities a bit more room to breathe, adding light theme support, a touch of acrylic and including all the search filter options as pivots from the get go.
• Windows Update Notifications: Starting with 19H1, when your device has an update requiring reboot (including new builds we release) you will see Windows Update icon with orange indicator in the notification area (system tray) alerting you to restart your device.
• Mail & Calendar (Version 11001.20106): It is now easier to keep track of your tasks from Mail and Calendar in Microsoft To-Do! With the latest Mail & Calendar update from the Store, we've added the ability to switch directly to To-Do in our app navigation. This update is rolling out to both Insiders and Retail users as we speak.

General changes, improvements, and fixes for PC

• We fixed an issue resulting in PDFs opened in Microsoft Edge not displaying correctly (small, instead of using the entire space).
• We fixed an issue resulting in mouse wheel scrolling in many UWP apps and XAML surfaces being unexpectedly fast in recent builds.
• We've made some updates to the taskbar to reduce the number of times you may see the icons redraw. Most noticeably when interacting with the recycle bin, although in other scenarios as well.
• Antivirus apps must run as a protected process to register with Windows and appear in the Windows Security app. If an AV app does not register, Windows Defender Antivirus will remain enabled.
• We fixed an issue resulting in the System unexpectedly consuming a high amount of CPU for prolonged periods of time when enumerating Bluetooth devices.
• We fixed an issue resulting in Cortana.Signals.dll crashing in the background.
• We fixed an issue that caused Remote Desktop to show a black screen for some users. This same issue could also cause freezes over Remote Desktop when using VPN.
• We fixed an issue resulting in mapped network drivers potentially displayed as Unavailable when using the net use command, and displaying a red X in File Explorer.
• Improved compatibility of Narrator with Chrome.
• Improved performance of Magnifier centered mouse mode.
• We fixed an issue where the Pinyin IME would always show English mode in the taskbar, even when typing in Chinese in the previous flight.
• We fixed an issue resulting in languages showing an unexpected "Unavailable input method" in their list of keyboards in Settings if you added the language via Language Settings in recent flights.
• Thanks everyone who's shared feedback about the new Japanese Microsoft IME introduced with Build 18272. For the moment the IME version will be returning to the one that shipped with the October 2018 Update while we take your feedback into consideration.
• We've added support for LEDBAT in uploads to Delivery Optimization peers on the same LAN (behind the same NAT). Currently LEDBAT is only used by Delivery Optimization in uploads to Group or Internet peers. This feature should prevent congestion on the local network and allow peer-to-peer upload traffic to back off instantly when the network is utilized for higher priority traffic.

As always, you can find the full list of release notes, along with the known issues with today's release, at the Windows Blog. Otherwise, Fast ring Insiders can update to build 18290 now via Windows Update.