Windows 11 just got its most noticeable Start menu revamp in a while, but is it a productivity boost or just more Microsoft meddling? The team digs into Patch Tuesday’s big

I still don’t understand how she did it, but in the two weeks of time we had between our trip to Berlin in early September and our trip to Mexico City (and, from there, onto Hawaii) in mid-September, my wife Stephanie somehow orchestrated the purchase of the condo we’ve been living in, in Pennsylvania, for almost two years now. “Herding cats” doesn’t even begin to describe the effort, which involved corralling my three sisters (two in PA, one in Arizona, all three of whom have power of attorney over their mother, the now-previous owner) and representatives of local mortgage and title companies, plus an in-person signing that (thankfully) only one of my sisters had to attend. And if this wasn’t essentially an in-family sale, it could never have happened when it did, as the check that paid my sister’s mother wasn’t even ready until after we had signed all the papers. This sale came about, oddly enough, this past spring when it occurred to me that, barring any unforeseen events, we would spend more time in Mexico in 2025 than we would in the United States. Commenting on this to Steph in my own joking way, I noted that since we were crossing that milestone, we should obviously buy a place in Pennsylvania, instead of renting as we’d done for the previous couple of years. It was meant to be funny, in that it didn’t make sense logically. But she surprised me by saying that she was thinking the same thing. And here we are. Our places in Mexico City and PA share several commonalities, the most obvious being that both represent considerable downsizes from our last house. (Indeed, both places added together are smaller than that house.) But to me, the nicest commonality is that we have neighbors in both places that we explicitly rely on. This is important because we are gone from either place for months at a time. We have security systems in both places, and we only use the one in PA when we’re not there. But it’s really our neighbors who make what we do possible. In PA, our next-door neighbor collects our mail and whatever packages as needed. We obviously stop mail delivery when we can, but the time frame on that has gone down. And some packages are outside our control as we get certain things on whatever schedules, and it’s not always obvious. But our neighbor is there, monitoring the neighborhood, as she does, and God love her. And when a UPS or FedEx truck or whatever shows up, she’s on it. Last year, I wrote about the bizarrely agonizing day that UPS delivered the iPhone 16 Pro Max in iPhone Day (Premium): We were planning to drive up to Rochester to visit our son, the phone was supposed to arrive in the afternoon, and, well, things went south. The schedules for UPS and other deliveries are very much based on whatever routes you happen to be on, and for things like new iPhones, there’s nothing you can do about it. When we were in the house in PA, our deliveries always came early in the day, which was ... The post From the Editor’s Desk: Good Decisions, Less Good Decisions ⭐ appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Netflix is launching today a new collection of social party games on TV and the web that can be played using a smartphone as a controller. The post Netflix Launches New Party Games on TV appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Tesla is reportedly planning to make its vehicles compatible with CarPlay, Apple’s iPhone mirroring system that most modern vehicles now support. The post Tesla is Reporting Planning to Add Apple CarPlay Support to its Vehicles appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Anyone running Windows 11 version 25H2 can test the full screen experience that debuted on the Xbox Ally gaming handhelds. And while this isn’t particularly useful on traditional laptop and desktop PCs, I happen to be reviewing the Lenovo Legion Go 2, which is slated to get this experience officially sometime in 2026. But why wait? Make the full screen experience available to Windows 11 Our friend Mauro Huculak has a nice write-up about enabling this feature, which involves some registry editing and two third-party utilities made by two other friends, Mark Russinovich’s PSTools and Rafael Rivera’s Physpanel. The short version of these instructions goes like so: Ensure you’re running Windows 11 version 25H2 Add (or, in my case, edit) a Registry key Restart the PC Use the psexec utility from PSTools to run Command Prompt with System account privileges, as required for the next step Create a scheduled task that runs physpanel each time the system boots; this utility simulates a gaming handheld (and so it was possibly not required in my case) Restart the PC If you do want to undergo these steps, be sure to use the linked write-up above for all the details. Enable the full screen experience With that done, I opened Settings and navigated to Gaming, which now has a Full screen experience entry in addition to Game Bar, Captures, and Game Mode. Then, in Full screen experience, I chose “Xbox” (the only choice) as the home app and enabled the option “Enter full screen experience on startup.” You can also enable “Show accessibility control hints in Task View,” which displays one-button alternatives to the default button combos, so I did that as well. And then I restarted the Legion Go 2 again so I could see that it correctly boots into the Xbox app instead of the Windows desktop. Which it did. Using the full screen experience The Xbox app has evolved into a nice frontend for gaming activities via a controller-friendly Compact mode and, more recently, compatibility with third-party PC game stores like Steam, Battle.net, Epic Game Store, GOG Galaxy, and Ubisoft Connect. On the Legion, as on the ROG Xbox Ally gaming handhelds, you can fully navigate the system using the integrated (and, in the case of the Legion Go 2, detachable) controllers. The left stick and d-pad can be used to tab between any selected on screen items, you can select those items by pressing (A). It all pretty much works as expected and could almost be described as intuitive. But an on screen menu notes some less obvious choices, too. For example, you can use the (☰) key to access more options (as with a right-click), the (Y) button to search, and the (B) button to go back. The Game Bar, also in controller-friendly Compact mode here, works as before: You can press the (Xbox) button to enable it (or, on the Legion Go 2, whichever button you configured for that) and then tab through each of its ma... The post Hands-On: Windows 11 Full Screen Experience appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Spotify is launching a new Audiobook recap feature in beta on iOS that summarizes the content of an audiobook right up to the point where users stopped listening. The post Spotify Launches Audiobook Recaps on iOS appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Mozilla announced a new opt-in experience for Firefox called AI Window so users can access AI only when they want to. The post Mozilla Announces AI Window for Firefox appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Google will soon require Android apps distributed outside of the Play Store to be registered by verified developers, but the company will still allow "experienced users" to sideload unverified apps. The post Google is Tweaking its Android Developer Verification Requirements to Add New Sideloading Process appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Vivaldi 7.7 is here on the desktop with a major change to how the web browser syncs tabs between devices and several user experience updates. The post Vivaldi 7.7 Arrives with Improved Tab Sync, User Experience Updates appeared first on Thurrott.com.

OpenAI just released two GPT-5.1 AI models with new personality options, and they're rolling out first to paid ChatGPT users. The post OpenAI Releases GPT-5.1 Model With New Personalization Options appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Anthropic said today that it will begin building its own AI infrastructure for the first time. It plans to spend $50 billion on datacenters. The post Anthropic Announces $50 Billion AI Infrastructure Plans appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Valved unveiled today a new Steam controller and two new devices running SteamOS, the new Steam Machine for the living room and the Steam Frame VR headset. The post Valve Announces New Steam Machine, Steam Frame Headset, and Steam Controller appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Apple is launching today a new Digital ID feature in its Wallet app that US users will be able to use for age and identity verification in apps, online, and select stores. The post iPhone Users in the US Can Now Create a Digital ID in Apple Wallet appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Backbone today announced the Backbone Pro Xbox Edition controller, which features a classic green transparent design inspired by Xbox. The post Backbone Pro Xbox Edition is Now Available appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Google announced today that its Cameyo Virtual App Delivery service is now available to enterprise customers with Chrome, ChromeOS, and ChromeOS Flex. The post Cameyo by Google Brings Virtual App Delivery to Chrome, ChromeOS Enterprise appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Sony announced yesterday a new 27-inch Gaming Monitor with a DualSense Charging Hook that will be released exclusively in the US and Japan in 2026. The post PlayStation Unveils 27” Gaming Monitor Coming to the US and Japan appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Google has begun rolling out its November Pixel Drop and a separate set of updates for all supported Android devices. The post The November Pixel Drop is Here with a Big Update for Android Too appeared first on Thurrott.com.

I've reviewed all the Pixel 10 series phones, but one major piece of this puzzle is waiting for me at home, the Pixel 10 Pro Fold. The post Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold Preview appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Uno Platform today announced Uno Platform Studio 2.0, a major AI-based update to its cross-platform .NET coding solution. The post Uno Platform Studio 2.0 Brings AI to Cross-Platform .NET Apps appeared first on Thurrott.com.

The November 2025 Patch Tuesday updates for Windows 11 mark the rollout of a redesigned Start Menu with a responsive layout and a scrollable apps list. The post Microsoft Starts Rolling Out Redesigned Start Menu to All Windows 11 Users appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Google announced a major update to Google Photos, with nice improvements across Android, iPhone, and the web versions of the service. The post Google Photos Gets Nano Banana, More appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Don’t call it a netbook: Apple’s rumored A-series MacBook isn’t just a great idea, it could revitalize the Mac by being truly competitive with the sweet spot of the PC market. 🍎 Apple, netbooks, and what-ifs Apple almost made a netbook. This low-cost line of Linux- based PCs revitalized the PC market at a time when Windows Vista was dragging it down, setting off a cascading series of events that would forever change the industry. It forced Microsoft to keep Windows XP around in Starter Edition form as a low-cost, comparatively low-resource alternative to Vista. It triggered a rush to the bottom—in pricing and quality—that undermined PC maker profits and reset customer expectations. And it made Apple, which had just released the first iPhone, blink. As described in the official Steve Jobs biography, Apple’s former CEO gathered his executive team together in 2007 to brainstorm a response to the netbook. The obvious choice was to simply ape what PC makers were doing and throw together a low-end Mac laptop. Such a thing would cost more than PC-based netbooks, but less than its entry-level MacBook, which started at $1099. But Jony Ive asked why this machine needed a keyboard hinged to the screen, reviving Jobs’s pre-iPhone dream of a tablet. And so Apple set out to design and build what would become the iPad. When Jobs introduced the iPad in early 2010, Microsoft had just shipped Windows 7, which had been stripped down enough to support netbooks. And so he did what Steve Jobs did and crapped all over Microsoft’s aspirations despite having almost gone down that road himself. “If there’s going to be a third category of devices [in addition to phones and laptop], it’s going to have to be better at these kinds of tasks than a laptop or smartphone,” Jobs said at the iPad launch, having just listed several common computing activities. “Some people have thought that’s a netbook. The problem is, netbooks aren’t better at anything! They’re slow, they have low-quality displays, and they run clunky old PC software. So they’re no better than a laptop at anything, they’re just cheaper. They’re just cheap laptops.” The iPad wasn’t the only major Apple product introduction in 2010, of course. Apple also shipped its second-generation MacBook Air that year, and this is the model with the iconic design everyone remembers. This MacBook Air came in both 13.3- and 11-inch models, and the latter was as close as Apple would ever get to a netbook, with its tiny form factor and $999 starting price. It was discontinued in 2015, and Apple then offered a more premium 12-inch MacBook that started at $1299. Of course, by this point, Jobs was long gone. And Apple had also bulked out its tablet lineup with Mini, Air, and Pro models in addition to the standard iPad. 🖥️ Apple Silicon saved the Mac One of the oddities of history is that Apple was never able to make the Mac a bigger hit. Under Steve Jobs, the co... The post In Defense of an A-Series MacBook appeared first on Thurrott.com.

Google wants Android apps to stop wasting battery with excessive wake locks, and those that don’t meet a certain threshold will soon be penalized on the Play Store. The post Google Play Store to Start Penalizing Apps That Drain Too Much Battery appeared first on Thurrott.com.

As promised, Microsoft today released .NET 10 after a 9 month development cycle that started with a first preview in February. The post Microsoft Delivers .NET 10 appeared first on Thurrott.com.