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  1. hellowalkman
    Adblock: Google did not slow down and lag YouTube performance with ad blocker on by Sayan Sen Back in November, the internet was abuzz with conspiracy theories of Google purposely slowing down YouTube on Mozilla Firefox while its own browser, Chrome, would work fine. However, those rumors were shot down soon after as Google explained that it was not just Firefox that was the subject of "suboptimal viewing" experience and that it was happening irrespective of the browser. Google put the blame on "installed ad blockers." Fast forward two months, now in January we just had another similar incident with several user reports online of YouTube being slow with adblockers. As is usually the case in these instances, most netizens of course were quick to once again point the finger at Google. The issue was first brought to attention by Reddit users and the thread blew up with many more chiming in to say they were experiencing a similar thing. As it turns out, the bug was not YouTube or Google and was in fact a problem with Adblock and Adblock Plus' recent update Version 5.17.0. Hence if you were using something else like uBlock Origin (like me), you probably did not notice any slowdown. Adblock Plus developers noted the issue as performance regression on its GitLab repo. It wrote: Recently, ABP released version 3.22 which upgraded the bundled extension engine version to 1.1.1. AdBlock released version 5.17.0 which also updated the extension engine to version 1.1.1. We've had several reports of slow response time since the update. It appears to be an issue in the extension engine since ABP, AdBlock, and the EWE test extension all seem to experience a similar issue with the 1.1.1 version of the extension engine. The issue has now been fixed with the latest eyeo's Web Extension Ad Blocking Toolkit (EWE) version 1.1.2, where the breaking change has been reverted. Name: @eyeo/webext-ad-filtering-solution New version: 1.1.2 Reverted "Content filters are now updated via the history.pushState() event, when single page apps navigate using the browser's history API (EE-14, EE-90)". Breaking changes: None. Other changes: Reverted performance regression. Hence, if you are one of those users who is experiencing issues with Adblock and Adblock Plus, you should update your extension. It is also advised not to run multiple content filters or adblockers on your browser if you are facing performance issues. As an online publication, Neowin too relies on ads for operating costs and, if you use an ad blocker, we'd appreciate being whitelisted. In addition, we have an ad-free subscription for $28 a year, which is another way to show support!
  2. hellowalkman
    Following Microsoft Defender, Avira now freezing Windows at boot with 100% CPU / RAM usage by Sayan Sen Just a few days ago we published AV-TEST's and AV-Comparatives' findings regarding system performance impact by various anti-malware products. In the article, we covered how Microsoft Defender, AVG, McAfee, and Norton, among others, can hog Windows PCs under different circumstances. This was just a couple of days after we covered an issue with Microsoft Defender causing performance loss on Windows 11 23H2, where the workaround was to reset Defender. However, if you think third-party anti-virus solutions work flawlessly, you will be quite incorrect. According to multiple reports online, a recent Avira update is leading to the entire system freezing right at startup when the anti-virus app kicks off, and this is seemingly happening on Windows 10 as well as Windows 11. Most of the complaints online testify that a similar thing is happening. While the system is responsive immediately when it boots up and gets into Windows, it freezes up and becomes unusable and unresponsive as soon as the Avira application loads up. This is happening on SSDs too, whether NVMe or SATA, and the situation is likely worse on hard disks (HDDs). Some users were able to launch Task Manager in the small window of time they got when the system booted, which led them to notice that the CPU and RAM usage were seemingly both pegged at 100% as the system came to a total standstill. The issue has been pretty much confirmed to be something related to Avira as more and more users were able to fix the problem by uninstalling Avira. If you are one of those affected too, you can do so by rebooting Windows into Safe mode and then uninstalling the Avira antivirus program from the Control Panel app > Programs and Features > Uninstall a program. In case you are worried about malware protection, Microsoft Defender should take over from there when Windows notices you don't have an anti-virus enabled. The Avira Support X (Twiiter) handle has yet to publish any update and the latest Avira module release note also does not say anything about the issue yet: Avira Security 1.1.96 Bugfixes Stability Improvements Avira Browser Safety 4.2.7 Bugfixes Avira Phantom VPN 2.43.1 Bugfixes Avira Password Manager 2.19.13 Bugfixes Avira Speedup for Windows 6.26.0.18 Maintenance Stability Improvements Avira Secure Browser x86(32-bit) 118.0.22916.118 Avira Secure Browser x64(64-bit) 118.0.22914.118 Bugfixes Stability Improvements The issue happened over the weekend which is likely why Avira has not been able to get to the root of it yet. And in case you are thinking of switching over to something else, you certainly could, though bear in mind that in the latest malware protection ranking, It was amongst the best performers.
  3. hellowalkman
    Windows 11 23H2 upgrade causing performance loss and trusty Microsoft Defender may be why by Sayan Sen This weekend we published a feature looking at the performance improvements, or regressions, one can expect if they were to move from a clean-installed Windows 10 22H2 system to a clean-installed Windows 11 23H2 PC (similar to the one where we upgraded to Windows 11 22H2). What we generally noticed was that the differentials were typically within the margin of error or in the imperceptible zone, though there were situations where one was quite a beat ahead of the other. Although we haven't yet published our findings showing the differences between Windows 11 22H2 and 23H2 (we plan to do it soon), several users on the internet say they are suffering from performance losses after upgrading to version 23H2. Reddit user BNSoul opened a thread on the Windows 11 subreddit explaining how they noticed performance regression of around 5 to 8% in several CPU benchmarks. Games also apparently exhibited random stuttering and hitching. They write: To put it simple[sic], every CPU benchmark shows significantly reduced CPU performance after updating to Windows 11 23H2 from 22H2, even after a fresh/clean install. ... I could add an endless list of benchmark results here but just lets say it's always 23H2 5-8% slower in every single one be it single or multi-thread compared to 22H2. Games are also affected with random stuttering, all of this fixed by rolling back to 22H2. In a separate thread on the Microsoft forum, user Anant Acharya posted about similar performance degradation issues from the CPU side wherein games would randomly drop frames due to the GPU utilization dropping off in those instances. They also report texture loading issues. Curiously, the CPU usage seems to remain the same but the game issues bandwidth-related error messages. After I had updated to the Windows 23H2 update. I have been noticing sudden stutters and drastic FPS drops in the above-mentioned games. .. In newer games like Forza Horizon 5 the GPU utilization (remaining at 92-99 %) suddenly drops to 20-23 percent and the FPS drops from 70-80 to about 10-23, textures not loading. while the CPU utilization remains the same. the game returns a Bandwidth issue warning. as the game was installed on my 7200 RPM hard drive. i decided to move it to my SSD. the issue still existed. .. Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 (campaign remastered) crashed with GPU errors after updating the latest drivers and re-installing windows entirely (still 23H2) the issue presists[sic]. as it has suddenly been brought up and i see no physical signs of damage that may have caused it. and the issue being brought up right after the 23H2 update. i suspect the OS to be the cause. Several others upvoted this query and also posted their own findings and issues there. Fettman 53 writes: Unfortunately I have nothing to add, other than that I'm having the same issues. Games I played literally earlier the same day before downloading 23H2 worked flawlessly, and after downloading the OS update, they now run like garbage and have the same issues you listed here. A friend of mine is reporting the same. David Alfredo, another user who ran several benchmarks, posted: Same issue here after a clean install of Windows 11 Pro 23H2, I spent a whole day troubleshooting and noticed a CPU performance degradation in all the usual benchmarks (Cinebench, Geekbench, 7-zip built-in benchmark, Corona renderer, OCCT, Super Pi, Y-Cruncher.....) so yeah, it seems like there's something going on with the latest update that affects CPU performance to the point that games now show stuttering. Maybe it's just me but there's not a single CPU benchmark that gets the same or better results on 23H2 compared to 22H2, they all score much lower. Although the two threads, the Reddit one and the Microsoft forum one, may not stem from the same root cause, there seems to be a solution for the former, which involves resetting the Windows Security app, which seems to resolve the performance problems users may be noticing after upgrading to Windows 11 23H2: Received an answer from Microsoft after 3 days, they told me to reset Windows Defender through a couple of PowerShell commands (1- "Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted" and 2- "Get-AppxPackage Microsoft.SecHealthUI -AllUsers | Reset-AppxPackage") then reboot and enable CPU Virtualization in BIOS (SVM in my X570 BIOS), then in Windows 23H2 open Windows Security and enable Memory Integrity under the Core Isolation settings. Restart and Hypervisor should be running, Virtualization Security will be Enabled and... that fixes the CPU performance issues, CPU now performing as in 22H2 where I had these security features disabled. Tested some benchmarks and games, everything is now ok within margin of error compared to 22H2, GPU benchmarks are 3-5% faster which is nice, games are marginally faster at least CP2077 and SoTR benchmarks, CPU benchmarks on the other hand some performs the same as in 22H2, others improved and a couple of them are maybe 0.2% (margin of error) slower perhaps due to memory integrity being enabled. Hence, if you are experiencing performance-related issues on your newly upgraded 23H2-based PC, perhaps it's worth a shot to reset Defender.
  4. hellowalkman
    Microsoft's default BitLocker on your Windows 11 PC is hitting even the fastest SSDs hard by Sayan Sen Earlier this month, we covered an issue about a "65000" BitLocker encryption error message which was affecting both Windows 11 as well as Windows 10 PCs. And while that was only a reporting issue, something else is actually impacting the performance of Windows 11 Pro PCs. Tom's Hardware has found that the default software-based BitLocker encryption (XTS-AES 128, where XTX stands for XEX Tweakable Block Cipher with Ciphertext Stealing and AES is Advanced Encryption Standard), which is enabled by default on pre-built PCs like laptops and notebooks, among others is hitting the performance of SSDs pretty hard. The outlet notes that the impact can be as bad as up to 45%. This report comes hot on the heels of another one where we saw that Linux (Ubuntu) has continued to grow its lead over Windows 11 and in some cases, it is more than twice as fast. Tom's Hardware says: We reached out to several OEMs, and Dell, HP, and Lenovo told us they ship systems with Windows 11 Pro with software-based encryption unless a user orders an SSD that has hardware-based encryption available. It's not clear if they always enable hardware encryption on every SSD that supports the feature, but if you don't pay extra for such a drive, you'll likely end up with reduced storage performance. We haven't received a response from several other OEMs yet, but we suspect most have similar policies in place. To test the performance hit, one of the fastest PCIe Gen4 NVMe SSDs in the form of the Samsung 990 Pro 4TB was used. The least impact was seen in the sequential peak speed tests. In a DiskBench 50GB file copy test, the drive with software encryption had a 13% performance loss since unlike the hardware-accelerated Opal solution, the software one uses the CPU to do the encryption. The performance hit is far worse on random reads and writes though especially in the Queue Depth 1 (QD1) tests. In the 4KB QD1 random read test, there is a 21% slowdown in the IOPS (input/output operations per second). The impact is even greater in the case of random writes as the 990 Pro sees a 46% hit compared to hardware encryption and a 43% hit compared to no encryption: When the QD is changed to 256, the impact is different as hardware and software both see big slowdowns in performance when talking about writes: The 4TB 990 Pro tested here comes with 4GB of LPDDR4 DRAM cache as well and despite that, the slowdown in randoms is very prominent. You can find the full test results at the source link below. If you have an OEM pre-built system that came pre-installed with Windows 11 Pro, chances are it has software BitLocker enabled. You can check that by running an elevated command prompt (CMD as an admin) and entering the command: "manage-bde.exe -status". When you do so, the Protection status will be displayed as "Protection On" and in the case of software encryption, the encryption method is set to "XTS-AES 128". A device with BitLocker disabled will display "Protection Off" and the Encryption method will be "None". Another way to do so is to launch the Disk Management console and check to see if the drives show "BitLocker Encrypted" in brackets. Source and images: Tom's Hardware
  5. hellowalkman
    Old Intel 10th Gen is snappier vs newer 13th Gen and also AMD's Ryzen 7000 in Windows 10 by Sayan Sen Since July, we have been covering a series of performance tests that examine the responsiveness and snappiness of Intel's newer processors on Windows 10 and Windows 11 compared to some of the older parts. Although it is no surprise that Intel's 13th Gen/12th Gen SKUs are easily able to outdo their 10th Gen counterparts in benchmarks, the idea behind these tests has been to quantify the responsiveness or snappiness of the processors in day-to-day PC activities. One of the key components of a snappy experience is the I/O and apparently, certain architectural decisions made at Intel with 12th Gen and 13th Gen processors, which are Intel's first hybrid parts, have apparently led to the company moving the "I/O driver" of the uncore (System Agent) to be moved off the CPU. (On a related note, anti-virus apps can also slow down certain aspects of your PC as noted by AV-TEST in its latest report.) This has led to performance penalties in the case of Windows 10 it seems, though the specific Thread Director optimizations on Windows 11 meant that the latter is typically more responsive of the two OSes on a 12th Gen (Alder Lake) or 13th Gen (Raptor Lake) system. To confirm if indeed the newer Microsoft OS is not as reactive as Windows 10, another study, this time with the 10th gen Core i9, was run and the results showed Windows 11 was definitely lagging behind, at least by a slight bit, in almost every single test. While most of these tests were done using Intel 10th Gen and 13th gen CPUs, an AMD Ryzen 7000 series processor, based on Zen 4, was thrown into the mix this time, and curiously enough, AMD's much more modern offering also fell behind the older Intel chip more often than not. The CPU used for testing was the Ryzen 9 7950X, which is a 16 core 32 thread SKU. The Ryzen managed a victory in one out of the four tests as it was the best chip at opening music files. The Zen 4 recorded took an average of 72.2 milliseconds compared to 112.5ms on the 13900K and 124.9ms on the 10850K. Interestingly, the 10th Gen Intel CPU looks like the most consistent of the bunch as its results were grouped the closest together. In terms of visible input latency with a mouse as the input, the numbers were the closest between the three indicating none of the CPUs is a bad choice for such a scenario. DPC (Deferred procedure call) latency though is the best on the 10th Gen Intel, but the Ryzen 7950X is still easily able to outdo the 13th Gen processor. The worst showing from AMD was in file searching using the Taskbar Search. In this case, both the Intel CPUs were nearly five times faster as the 7950X took over 80 ms to complete the task as compared to the Intel chips that were able to do it under 17ms. Head over to this article to compare and contrast with the Windows 11 data. You can watch the full video on Tech YES City's channel on YouTube at the source link below. Source and images: Tech YES City (YouTube)
  6. hellowalkman
    Microsoft getting serious about fixing Windows 11's slow File Explorer, freezes, crashes by Sayan Sen Windows Insider builds are like a box of chocolates as one never fully knows what they are gonna get. For example, some users have noticed that the new Outlook was automatically installed on the latest Beta channel build. This was not disclosed in the release notes though a senior Microsoft official confirmed it was expected behavior. The announced changes list though also has some important improvements and fixes that many will likely appreciate. Microsoft seems to be making a conscious effort to improve the File Explorer performance in Windows 11. Back in 2021, when Windows 11 was new, Microsoft acknowledged that there were problems and promised better performance in 2022. Again in 2022, Microsoft's Panos Panay reiterated the company's new OS was all about delivering the "highest quality". Earlier this year, the tech giant also expressed in detail the performance improvements it delivered over the last year. The firm notes that it fixed a memory leak issue related to File Explorer Home which means load times should be quicker. The release notes say: We made some more improvements to help with the performance of loading Home. Also fixed a memory leak related to Home that would grow each time Home was refreshed or accessed. The latest Dev build, among other File Explorer improvements, notes multiple upgrades related to performance as well as crash fixes: Fixed an issue where rapidly opening two File Explorer windows might make explorer.exe crash. Made a few more fixes to help improve File Explorer launch performance, including fixing a leak which would impact performance over time. Fixed an issue which could make explorer.exe crash when navigating away from Home. Fixed an issue where trying to open Gallery after new images had been added might result in a crash. Fixed an issue where the progress wheel in the tab would get stuck showing that File Explorer was loading a folder when the loading had actually already finished. In case you are not aware, Microsoft has published a new redesigned File Explorer and it is based on WinAppSDK (WinUI). However, there are several reports suggesting it is rather sluggish in overall performance and responsiveness. It has also been proven to be true when more in-depth tests were conducted vs. Windows 10. Funnily, users recently discovered a full-screen (F11) bug recently which ironically boosted the performance.
  7. hellowalkman
    Windows 11 vs 10: Intel CPUs apparently sluggish, and it's worse without Microsoft's help by Sayan Sen Update: More related testing suggests Microsoft's Windows 11 is actually generally slower on Intel non-hybrid parts. Intel moved to a hybrid x86 CPU design for its 12th generation of Core processors (Alder Lake). Not only that, but the company also made several other changes to other components too, dubbed the "Uncore" portion of the processor, also referred to as the System Agent, which includes the Northbridge. One such change is apparently causing various latency issues and sluggish performance in general on Intel's hybrid chips according to a report by YouTuber Tech YES City (TYC). TYC, citing industry sources with knowledge of the matter, explains that the problem, apparently, is a consequence of the "I/O driver" of the uncore (System Agent) that was allegedly moved off the CPU on Intel's 12th Gen and 13th Gen chips. Using latency tests, TYC shows that the problem is especially pronounced on Windows 10 in most cases. Although Windows 11 is not fully immune to these performance quirks, Microsoft and Intel's combined efforts on optimizing Thread Director for the hybrid processors do pay off in some of these cases, even though past gaming performance numbers have not suggested the same. In the description of their YouTube video, TYC writes: I always thought Intel's CPUs were snappy, in fact that were the snappiest of snappiest, even vs Ryzen, where AMD have improved a lot over the years with their latency. However with the advent of 12th gen Alder lake and 13th Gen i9-12900k and 13900K CPUs respectively, Intel took something AWAY, and that was they moved the I/O driver directly off the CPU (that's what I was told from multiple sources), and this was the exact reason why latency issues have been occurring on these CPUs for windows users In order to test and understand the validity of the perceptive difference they felt, TYC compared their 10th Gen Core i9-10850K (Comet Lake-S) with the Raptor Lake-S i9-13900K (13th Gen). In some cases like DPC (Deferred procedure call) latency, the performance is bad on both Windows 11 and 10, though still, the Windows 10 system does do worse. This makes sense as DPC is directly related to driver handling efficiency and some part of the I/O is involved. Other cases like dragging and dropping MP4 files and rapidly opening MP3 files in Adobe Premiere Pro also exhibit poor showing on the part of the newer Raptor Lake CPU. Some of the performance differences seen here may also have to do with the core-to-core (c2c) latency differences in Raptor Lake compared to Comet Lake. As you can see in the images above, courtesy of AnandTech (1,2), the c2c latency varies quite a lot on the hybrid Intel 13900K compared to the 10900K. The c2c on the 10900K varies from as low as 5.6 ns to as high as 23.8, while that on the 13900K is anywhere from 4.0 ns to 53.9, and the latencies between the E-cores are especially bad. Source and images: Tech YES City (YouTube)
  8. hellowalkman
    Windows 11 vs 10: It's not just Intel's fault as Microsoft's latest OS is less snappy by Sayan Sen Update: Further testing was conducted on AMD Ryzen to see how it compares against 10th Gen and 13th Gen Intel running Windows 11 as well as Windows 10. Microsoft has time and again iterated how it believes Windows 11 is the best OS for gaming, and in general. For example, when DirectStorage became generally available on PCs, the company promised an "amazing experience" on Windows 11. However, tests, since the early days of the original Windows 11 21H2 release, have shown that certain features on the new OS do hurt the performance, at least when gaming, which is why Microsoft itself has recommended disabling them. General performance aside, there were bugs too, which the tech giant had to acknowledge and block the 22H2 feature update. This was later fixed with an update in December of 2022, and about a month after that, the company released a somewhat awkward video explaining, again, how Windows 11 (22H2 this time) was great for gaming. Ironically, this video was released just a week or so after a Windows 11 vs 10 evaluation showed that the former was not really better. There was barely anything much to separate the two. Gaming aside, Microsoft earlier this year, also summarized the general performance improvements and optimizations it delivered. The company claimed improved Shell performance, among various other things. YouTuber Tech YES City (TYC) recently published a video talking about the performance differences they observed when an Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake i9-13900K CPU was put up against a Core i9-10850K (10th Gen, Comet Lake). Interestingly, in a lot of scenarios, the older CPU pulled up a victory. The general trend showed better snappiness and lower latencies on the older chip. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Intel's collaboration with Microsoft seemed to help as the flagship Intel 13th gen (hybrid) processor was found to often be slightly better under Windows 11, due to special OS scheduler optimizations. To see if it was all down to the architectural shift on Intel's side, independent of the OS, the Comet Lake i9 CPU was once again pitted against itself on Windows 11; and the results suggested Windows 10 was mostly better, at least in the aspects of performance that deal with latencies. In CS:GO, for example, the load times were far superior on Windows 10, which is a poor start for the latest OS. And the mouse input latency was also noticeably worse. The general snappiness and responsiveness of Windows 10 was also better compared to that in 11: Opening .mp3 and .mp4 file locations using right-click context menu was also tested and Windows 10 seemed to have a slight edge in this case too: The one aspect that Windows 11 did score points was in idle power draw, where the Windows 10 PC was consuming around 10% more. However, in the latency department, which leads to a snappier experience, it looks like Windows 10 was the one that almost consistently came out on top. Source and images: Tech YES City (YouTube)
  9. hellowalkman
    Microsoft just can't catch a breath, another outage hit today after the recent DDoS attack by Sayan Sen Microsoft recently was the victim of a massive DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack which led to large-scale outages across Microsoft 365 services like Outlook, Teams, and OneDrive. After resolving the issues and looking more closely into the matter, the company explained that the attackers targeted Layer 7 or L7 (Application layer) of the OSI, though it assured that no customer data was compromised: Beginning in early June 2023, Microsoft identified surges in traffic against some services that temporarily impacted availability. Microsoft promptly opened an investigation and subsequently began tracking ongoing DDoS activity by the threat actor that Microsoft tracks as Storm-1359. These attacks likely rely on access to multiple virtual private servers (VPS) in conjunction with rented cloud infrastructure, open proxies, and DDoS tools. We have seen no evidence that customer data has been accessed or compromised. This recent DDoS activity targeted layer 7 rather than layer 3 or 4. Fast forward a couple of weeks, and Microsoft 365 services were once again affected today, though thankfully, the problem was resolved within a few hours. The details of the issue could be tracked under ID MO597504 in the Microsoft 365 admin center: We determined that the mitigations have helped resolve the underlying issue and our telemetry has confirmed that the impact to accessing files is now resolved. Further details can be found under MO597504 in the admin center. — Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) June 20, 2023 According to the official Microsoft 365 status Twitter handle, the issue was only affecting users in Western Europe: We're investigating an issue where some users in Western Europe are unable to access files within the Microsoft 365 Service. Further details can be found under MO597504 in the admin center. — Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) June 20, 2023 Some further investigation helped the company determine what seemed to be the root cause of the issue, which was a data center in Germany that was not performing optimally. As such, the tech giant applied the necessary mitigations by reducing the load on the affected center: We’ve identified a datacenter in Germany is not performing at optimal performance thresholds. We’ve applied mitigations to reduce the load on the affected infrastructure and are seeing improvements in availability. Further details can be found under MO597504 in the admin center. — Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) June 20, 2023 We will update the article if for some reason the issue returns. Update: Although the same exact issue did not recur, Microsoft confirmed that users in Germany were unable to access multiple Microsoft 365 services, which means Outlook, Teams, OneDrive, among others, were probably affected. Admins were able to track the issue on Microsoft 365 Admin Center via ID MO601910: We're investigating an issue where some users in Germany may be unable to access multiple Microsoft 365 Services. Further details can be found under MO601910 in the admin center. — Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) June 22, 2023 Earlier today, the company confirmed that the issues were indeed resolved by the mitigations it applied: We've confirmed that the issue is resolved after an extended period of monitoring. Further details can be found under MO601910 in the admin center. We will keep an eye on the situation and provide an update in case.
  10. hellowalkman
    Microsoft shares workaround for Outlook's slow startup or fail due to OST sync bug by Sayan Sen Microsoft has shared a workaround for Outlook being stuck on the startup splash screen before eventually opening. When this is happening, it appears that Outlook is syncing the entire offline data file (.ost) during the process. In some instances when users try the Airplane mode, Outlook the entire startup process will often fail. Microsoft explains the issue: ISSUE Sometimes Outlook appears to be syncing the entire OST all or most times it starts up. Outlook will be stuck at the splash screen for a long time before eventually opening and operating normally. Investigation of profile and OST file names will show new OST files are not being created (this would also appear in the Application Event Logs if it were the cause). Customers often report that if they cancel Outlook opening and try again, it will open up without delay. They may also note that if they have switched into Airplane mode, Outlook will sometimes refuse to start at all, giving this error: “Cannot start Microsoft Outlook. Cannot open the Outlook window. The set of folders cannot be opened. The attempt to log on to Microsoft Exchange has failed.” The company believes the issue could be a result of cache re-priming. If you are wondering, cache priming essentially means pre-loading the cache memory with the necessary data. To mitigate the issue, Microsoft has provided a workaround This issue happens because Outlook is having trouble determining the "default" state of the cache, with Outlook and non-Office MAPI apps like MFCMAPI coming to different conclusions. One workaround is to use the group policy setting in the article How to enable and disable the Outlook calendar sharing updates. This setting, when set to 1, will force REST on and avoid the issue: Location: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Options\Calendar DWORD: RestUpdatesForCalendar Value: 1 if Enabled, 0 if Disabled This setting is also available in non-policy form: Location: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Options\Calendar Another solution is to explicitly specify the REST state in the Outlook account settings. This is done by toggling "Shared Calendar Improvements" off and on: File/Account Settings/Account Settings Double click store More Settings Advanced Note that "Turn on shared calendar improvements" is on. Toggle it off, then immediately toggle it back on. Click OK. Outlook may warn about needing to restart. It doesn't, but you can if you want to. Click The X to close the Exchange Account Settings dialog. Click Close. Here's a picture of the dialog: You may find more details on the support page on Microsoft's site. In related news, Microsoft 365 servers suffered another outage today, though, thankfully, unlike the last time, this one was resolved within a few hours. The company's infrastructure was to blame.
  11. hellowalkman
    Latest Windows 11 22H2 Patch Tuesday (Moment 2) may be slowing down SSDs, boot times by Sayan Sen This past week, Microsoft released Patch Tuesday updates as it was the second Tuesday of the month. It was also with this cumulative update that Moment 2 got pushed to all users; and according to some users' feedback, the update may be slowing down SSDs or other boot drives. On a Reddit thread, a user "mesp21" says their NVMe SSD speeds were more than halved, going from the rated 7,000MB/s down to as low as 3,000MB/s. The issue seemed to get fixed when they reverted back. They write: Tanked my SSD nvme reading and writing speeds, like A LOT. Went from 7000 to 3000, sometimes 1000 using the balance energy profile in my Legion 5 2021. Just uninstalled the cumulative update and my SSD is reaching the 7000 read speed again and Windows is snappy again. This comment has quite a few upvotes implying that at least a few of the those users also experienced similar issues. Some of the others on the thread have responded to this comment saying how their game load times were "noticeably" slower, and that there was "stuttering" issues post-Patch Tuesday installation. Another user "Mrbigdog99" has also posted a screenshot showing CrystalDiskMark run before and after the update. The sequential writes do seem to suggest a massive slowdown: Another user writes they faced similar problems, like slower boot times, though this time, it was with the initial Moment 2 release (KB5022913). The user sebascq writes: Hello guys! so I updated my laptop to the 22H2 SO 22621.1344 and noticed that the boot up time increased by a lot it went from around 14 seconds to 31 seconds which is weird Microsoft has confirmed that a similar file copy slowdown bug has been fixed with Moment 2, and it is possible that this is a separate problem entirely. Interestingly, the NVMe speed issue isn't something new as Windows 11 has been impacted by such problems in the past too.
  12. hellowalkman
    Windows 11 AMD driver bug causing over 50% performance hit but luckily it's rare by Sayan Sen Earlier today, we published a deals piece on AMD's top end cards, the RX 7900 XTX, XT, and the 6950 XT, simply because how much better these are priced compared to their Nvidia counterparts. So while the hardware side is excellent and hard not to recommend, the software side can be a very different story, as quite often it is a one step forward two steps back for the GPU drivers. With the latest driver version 23.3.1, AMD fixed a major annoying issue that would cause the display driver to crash and timeout, leading to the bug report tool popping up, though older cards still remain affected which means such users will have to make do with the MPO workaround. While that is great, the latest driver is also apparently causing major performance loss by 50% or more, at least for a small subset of users. The performance issue was noticed on 3DMark Time Spy, which is a synthetic benchmark based on DirectX 12. Steam user "opinali" reported the performance drop on their Windows 11 22H2 PC running a Radeon 7900 XTX alongside a Ryzen 9 5900X. They write: I have a massive drop in the TimeSpy scores (both regular and extreme) in a Ryzen 5900X + 7900 XTX. Example: https://www.3dmark.com/compare/spy/35755350/spy/36463560 Both tests with same general config, CPU is auto-overclocked by Ryzen Master but GPU is stock. Important detail that I made this test after upgrading the Adrenalin driver to 23.3.1 released yesterday, so this could be a driver problem but I ran many other benchmarks, from 3DMark and others, also played some games, nothing else drops performance, only the TimeSpy which is a cataclysmic >50% loss. In response, a 3DMark developer stated that they were unable to reproduce the issue themselves, though they noticed that around 3% of the Time Spy users did have performance drop right after they updated to the latest 23.3.1 driver. Update on this: We have not been able to reproduce this in our test lab at this time. We're still trying, but nothing so far. So we know at this time that this is not a general issue that affects everyone with 7900XT/XTX. If this were such an issue, it would have also come up during driver approval testing but that process saw nothing odd with the latest drivers when they were tested. But we also looked at our database to compare results on the previous driver vs. new driver on any result using 7900XT or XTX and can confirm that this appears to be a real, if very rare issue. Among all results with the new driver, approximately 3% of the results show abnormal (very low) scores on Time Spy. No similar group of very low scores appear on the results with the previous driver version. This would lead us to believe that this is some kind of issue with the latest driver that requires some additional conditions to be true to appear. .. Since benchmark itself has not been modified for ages, our current view is that this is a rare driver bug that somehow causes the system to run in some kind of low power mode while Time Spy is running, which then tanks the performance to a very low level. UL benchmarks has confirmed that AMD were able to reproduce it and it does look like an issue on AMD's part. However, the issue may be present only on the Windows 11 Release Preview Insider channel which could explain the low number of affected user cases. Note that release preview channel Windows is not officially supported by us. We only test on it with a single system so any hardware-specific issues are not visible to us unless they occur with the "live" version of Windows. In other news, AMD has apparently reproduced this internally and it is starting to look more and more like a driver issue, so at this time I can only offer "rollback to previous or ignore and wait for future driver fixes". While this driver bug is known to affect only 3DMark for now, it is possible that some games may also be affected, although the performance hit in games is unlikely to be as bad since Time Spy is a synthetic workload. Nvidia are also not immune to issues as recently, it was found to increase CPU usage. Thankfully, it has since been fixed. Via: VideoCardz
  13. hellowalkman
    Samsung, Seagate, Hynix, Kingston NVMe SSDs may be suffering up to 53% performance loss by Sayan Sen Once upon a time, the WD SN550 suffered a similar issue While SSD shoppers have had a great time recently due to some of the super-enticing prices and deals, there has been plenty of negative news surrounding them. Most of the heat has been on Samsung as two of its most premium tier products, the 980 Pro and the newer 990 Pro, have been under fire lately due to some pretty serious issues. However, more bad news could be heading its way as a new test by PCPartPicker finds that the 970 Evo Plus suffers an alarming 64% slowdown in sequential read performance test. Some of the other tested Samsung drives weren't as terrible as the 990 Pro showed a 48% drop while the 980 Pro exhibited a 38% dip. However, Samsung SSDs aren't the only one showing these kinds of symptoms as other vendor's products were also showing similar performance degradation issues. Only the WD SN850X was unaffected as it showed just a 7% fall. In total, eight 1TB drives were tested. Here are the full results: Samsung 970 Evo Plus (64% Drop) Seagate Firecuda 530 (53% Drop) Samsung 990 Pro (48% Drop) SK Hynix Platinum P41 (48% Drop) Kingston KC3000 (43% Drop) Samsung 980 Pro (38% Drop) Crucial P5 Plus (25% Drop) Western Digital Black SN850X (7% Drop) The following test methodology which was used by PCPartPicker to carry out the evaluation. Ubuntu 20.04.4 LTS was the OS for this test and a ~200GB file was used for assessment: Test Methodology "NVMe format" of the SSD and a 10 minute rest. Initialize the drive with GPT and create a single EXT4 partition spanning the entire drive. Create and sequentially write a single file that is 20% of the drive's capacity, followed by 10 minute rest. 20 runs of the following, with a 6 minute rest after each run: - For 60 seconds, write 256 MB sequential chunks to file created in Step 3. We compute the percentage drop from the highest throughput run to the lowest. After running the tests and getting the results, PCPartPicker concluded the following: Results SSD High and low-performance regions are apparent from the throughput test run behavior. Each SSD that exhibits sequential write degradation appears to lose some ability to use the high-performance region. We don't know why this happens. There may be some sequence of actions or a long period of rest that would eventually restore the initial performance behavior, but even 2 hours of rest and a system restart did not undo the degradations. It is noteworthy here that TRIM wasn't enabled in the tests which has led some of the users on Reddit to speculate on the credibility of all the numbers produced. For those who don't know, the TRIM command tells the SSD that specific areas in an SSD contain data that is no longer in use which means they can be wiped. Hence, some believe the use of TRIM could have produced more accurate results that could have been vastly different from the ones we have here. Essentially, it means we may need further testing to verify these findings. Source: PCPartPicker
  14. hellowalkman
    Windows 11 22H2 KB5020044 finally fixes gaming performance issues, adds Moment 2 features by Sayan Sen Microsoft has released its new Windows 11 KB5020044 update (build 22621.900) and it is probably one of the biggest updates in a while. The release finally fixes the gaming performance issues that have plagued Windows 11 22H2 ever since its release. Alongside that, the new update also brings features that we are expecting with the Moment 2 release. Speaking of Moment updates, it looks like the development of Moment 4 may already be underway according to internal test IDs. You can find the full changelog of Build 22621.900 (KB5020044) below: Highlights New! It gives Microsoft OneDrive subscribers storage alerts on the Systems page in the Settings app. The alerts appear when you are close to your storage limit. You can also manage your storage and purchase additional storage, if needed. New! It provides the full amount of the storage capacity of all your OneDrive subscriptions. It also displays the total storage on the Accounts page in the Settings app. New! It combines Windows Spotlight with Themes on the Personalization page. This makes it easier for you to discover and turn on the Windows Spotlight feature. It addresses an issue that affects some modern applications. It stops them from opening. It addresses a known issue that affects the Input Method Editor (IME). Certain applications might stop responding. This occurs when you use keyboard shortcuts to change the input mode of the IME. It addresses an issue that causes File Explorer to stop working. This occurs when you close context menus and menu items. It addresses an issue that might cause certain apps to stop responding. This occurs when you use the Open File dialog. It addresses the suspension of daylight saving time (DST) in the Republic of Fiji for this year. Improvements This non-security update includes quality improvements. When you install this KB: New! It gives Microsoft OneDrive subscribers storage alerts on the Systems page in the Settings app. The alerts appear when you are close to your storage limit. You can also manage your storage and purchase additional storage, if needed. New! It provides the full amount of the storage capacity of all your OneDrive subscriptions. It also displays the total storage on the Accounts page in the Settings app. New! It combines Windows Spotlight with Themes on the Personalization page. This makes it easier for you to discover and turn on the Windows Spotlight feature. New! It adds a new mobile device management (MDM) policy for organizational messages. It gives your company the option to enroll tenant devices so that they receive custom messages from you. For example, you can use Intune to write the messages. They will render within Windows. It addresses an issue that affects some modern applications. It stops them from opening. It addresses an issue that affects some devices that are managed by an enterprise. We improve the reliability of app installations for them. It addresses the suspension of daylight saving time (DST) in the Republic of Fiji for this year. It addresses an issue that affects Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM) authentication hardening. We will automatically raise the authentication level for all non-anonymous activation requests from DCOM clients to RPC_C_AUTHN_LEVEL_PKT_INTEGRITY. This occurs if the authentication level is below Packet Integrity. It addresses an issue that affects Unified Update Platform (UUP) on-premises customers. It removes the block that stops them from getting offline language packs. It addresses an issue that affects process creation. It fails to create security audits for it and other related audit events. It addresses an issue that affects cluster name objects (CNO) or virtual computer objects (VCO). Password reset fails. The error message is, " There was an error resetting the AD password... // 0x80070005”. It addresses an issue that affects transparency in layered windows. This occurs when you are in High Definition remote applications integrated locally (RAIL) mode. It addresses a known issue that affects the Input Method Editor (IME). Certain applications might stop responding. This occurs when you use keyboard shortcuts to change the input mode of the IME. It addresses an issue that affects microphone streams that use the Listen To feature to route to the speaker endpoint. The microphone stops working after you restart the device. It addresses an issue that might affect applications that run on the Windows Lock Down Policy (WLDP). They might stop working. It addresses an issue that affects Microsoft Defender when it is not the primary antivirus. Microsoft Defender fails to turn off passive mode. This issue occurs when you turn off Smart App Control (SAC). It adds .wcx to the list of Dangerous Extensions that some app control policies do not allow. It addresses an issue that affects Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. Automated investigation blocks live response investigations. It addresses an issue that affects printing in landscape mode in Microsoft Edge. The print output is incorrect. This issue occurs when you use Microsoft Defender Application Guard. It addresses an issue that causes File Explorer to stop working. This occurs when you close context menus and menu items. It addresses an issue that might cause certain apps to stop responding. This occurs when you use the Open File dialog. It addresses an issue that sometimes affects File Explorer when you open a file. Because of this, there is high CPU usage. It addresses an issue that affects protocol activation of the Settings app. The app fails to open a page under the Accounts category. It addresses an issue that affects a computer account. Use of non-standard characters can stop the cleanup of the Out of Box Experience (OOBE) accounts. It addresses an issue that affects the CopyFile function. It might sometimes return error 317: ERROR_MR_MID_NOT_FOUND. It addresses an issue that affects the Windows Firewall service. It does not start when you turn on the Override block rules option. It addresses an issue that affects some games and applications. This issue is related to GPU performance debugging features. This lowers the expected game performance. It addresses an issue that affects cumulative update installations. They fail, and the error code is 0x800f0806. You can find the official blog post here.
  15. hellowalkman
    Microsoft removes Windows 11 22H2 upgrade block on some PCs suffering from gaming issues by Sayan Sen The bugs and issues on Microsoft's new Windows 11 22H2 OS keep mounting. For example, Printer problems forced the company to put in an upgrade block, though, it has now been removed after reaching a resolution. Most recently, there have been remote connectivity issues due to the malfunctioning Remote Desktop app. Gaming, too, hasn't been immune from the 2022 feature update as the Redmond company finally acknowledged gaming performance issues on the new Windows version after several user and reviewer complaints. This led Microsoft to put an upgrade block or safeguard hold on such devices. While the bug(s) leading to such problems have not been fully resolved yet, Microsoft has published an update on the matter partially removing the block. On its health dashboard, the company writes: November 22, 2022: The safeguard hold with the safeguard ID of 41990091 has been updated to only safeguard Windows devices which have one of the small subset of games and apps which are still affected by this issue. Hence, it looks like the upgrade block on at least some Windows 11 devices (which had the Safeguard ID 41990091) has been removed as Microsoft has been able to narrow in on a group of games or apps causing the issues. Initially, the company put up the safeguard hold for two IDs, 41766570 and 41990091. Finally, Microsoft adds that it could take about 48 hours before the Windows 11 2022 feature update is offered on your system.
  16. hellowalkman
    After all the Windows 11 security touting, Microsoft Defender comes last in AV-TEST's result by Sayan Sen Ever since Windows 11 came out, Microsoft has made a big fuss over why its new operating system is the most secure Windows OS ever. The company constantly nudges users who are on older Windows versions, like Windows 10 21H1 or Windows 8.1, to move over to Windows 11. However, anti-malware assessment firm AV-TEST found that the performance of Microsoft Defender was pretty mediocre in its latest August 2022 report. This was the first such test conducted on Windows 11 and Defender came in last place as it scored just 16 points. Thankfully for Microsoft, it was not alone here, as PC Matic also got the same score. You can view the full breakdown of the scores as well as the product certification they received in the images below: The results are certainly a little surprising since Defender generally did really well on Windows 10. In fact, it often came in first place with the full 18 points. Over on Windows 11 however, it received 5.5 out of 6 in "protection" and 4.5 in "performance". Only in the "usability" category did it manage to get the full 6 out of 6 points. As such, it got the AV-TEST Certified rating whereas previously on Windows 10, it generally received Top Product certification. According to AV-TEST, Defender saw the biggest impact when copying files, both locally and in a network environment. This is why it scored so low in the performance section of the test, and it is not the first time for Microsoft Defender either, as AV-Comparatives too had discovered similar issues before. Source: AV-TEST
  17. hellowalkman
    Despite AMD's denial, data suggests Windows 11 22H2 performance loss on Ryzen is real by Sayan Sen AMD recently published an official statement regarding its findings on Windows 11 performance loss when paired with Ryzen 7000 series CPUs. The company claimed in its statement that it did not encounter too much variance in performance when it compared the output across Windows 11 and Windows 10. AMD instead put the blame for differences on other factors that weren't quite in its control. The company was responding to reports from reviewers and users who had noted performance discrepancies on the latest gen Ryzen 7000 series CPUs. The big differentials were noted especially were fewer Zen 4 cores, via CCD disablement, were being deployed. One of the testers, CapFrameX, who had put out the original performance reports retested Windows 11 22H2 to see if AMD's claim was accurate. Two games - Cyberpunk 2077 (CB 2077) and Shadow of the Tomb Raider (SotTR) - were tested. This time, instead of a Ryzen 7000 chip, a Zen 3-based Ryzen 5900X was used. The data suggests there is certainly a lowered performance trend that goes away with a fresh reinstallation of the OS. In CB 2077, there is close to a 15.5% bump up in the average framerate. Meanwhile, in SotTR, the gap is even bigger with close to a 20% uplift. This suggests some hiccups are present, perhaps on Windows 11 22H2 itself, or else a clean installation should not cause such a large variation. To be fair to AMD though, the company's knowledge base (KB) document only mentions Ryzen 7000 series CPUs which means it's possible it is yet to test previous-gen parts. Regardless, AMD isn't the first company to be facing issues since the Windows 11 2022 feature update. Nvidia too has had quite a few performance and other bugs on it. For example, with its latest drivers, the company confirmed a Task Manager mis-reading issue, and this was after the bugs were supposed to have been fixed. Source and image: CapFrameX (Twitter)
  18. hellowalkman
    Microsoft finally acknowledges gaming performance issues on Windows 11 22H2, blocks update by Sayan Sen Almost as soon as the Windows 11 2022 update (version 22H2) went public in September, users began noticing gaming and other related performance issues on the new feature update. The first to complain were people who were running Nvidia graphics cards in their systems. Nvidia blamed Microsoft for the problems, as the former said new GPU debugging tools in Windows 11 22H2 were messing things up, leading to lower performance in games. And the problems have persisted despite Nvidia releasing drivers to resolve the issue. Fast-forward nearly two months, Microsoft has finally acknowledged the issues and has confirmed that Nvidia was right in its assessment of the underlying problem. On its Windows health dashboard, the Redmond company has published details about the issue and has blocked the update on affected devices. Microsoft writes: Some games and apps might experience lower than expected performance or stuttering on Windows 11, version 22H2. Affected games and apps are inadvertently enabling GPU performance debugging features not meant to be used by consumers. To safeguard your upgrade experience, we have applied a compatibility hold on devices affected by this issue from being offered or installing Windows 11, version 22H2. A workaround has also been provided, suggesting that users update their games and related applications: Workaround: If you are already on Windows 11, version 22H2 and are experiencing this issue, you might be able to resolve it by updating your games and gaming related apps to the latest version available. If you are unsure how to update the games and apps you have installed, you will need to consult the developer of those games and apps but most will update automatically through the store they were purchased from or directly when opening them. Finally, Microsoft has stated that it is working on a fix for the issue and has asked users not to manually update their OS: Next steps: We are working on a resolution and will provide an update in an upcoming release. Note: We recommend that you do not attempt to manually upgrade using the Update now button or the Media Creation Tool until this issue has been resolved and the safeguard removed. Aside from problems on Nvidia GPUs, reviewers and game testers have also been complaining of buggy performance on AMD's Ryzen CPUs. While AMD claimed it did not notice any such problems on its end, some of the testers continue stressing that the issue is indeed real, citing more tests. Source: Microsoft
  19. hellowalkman
    AMD explains what's actually causing Ryzen 7000 performance issues on Windows 11 by Sayan Sen AMD has come out today guns blazing taking down all reports of performance regression on its Ryzen 7000 when using Windows 11. Such reports came from independent seasoned testers who said they were seeing less than optimal performance on the new Zen 4 CPUs, typically on the new Windows 11 22H2 feature update. AMD says it tested against those claims and found nothing substantial as the performance across Windows 11 and Windows 10 was pretty much within the typical margins of error. The company writes: We have been made aware of reports of unexpected performance deltas in certain games with AMD Ryzen™ desktop processors as well as performance variances between Windows® 11 and Windows® 10 in certain game titles. We are currently investigating but based on testing to date have not observed a material difference in game performance between OS versions across a variety of operating scenarios and game titles. Additionally it believes that the differences noted may have to do with the games' optimizations themselves rather than something that AMD has messed up on its part. It says: Many factors affect gaming performance, including the game engine, CPU architecture, GPU selection and memory choices. As new architectures enter the market, we often observe performance anomalies which must be addressed by the component vendor or the game publisher. This is not a new phenomenon nor is it unexpected. Hence, what AMD is essentially saying is that future optimizations for Ryzen 7000 and the Zen 4 architecture will likely iron out these performance issues. For those that missed it, the reports indicated that disabling SMT was found to be more helpful, especially in cases when fewer CCD (CPU Compute Die) are deployed. Via: Tom's Hardware
  20. Alap Naik Desai
    Google TV is slow, admits co., and is working on fixing multiple performance issues by Alap Naik Desai Google seems to have admitted that its software for the Smart TV platform is slow, and it needs multiple improvements. The Google TV platform will receive quite a few updates which should reduce boot time, and enhance responsiveness, assured Google. According to a post on its support forums, Google claimed users of Google TV on both third-party TVs as well as its Chromecast streaming puck, should see an improvement in overall performance. Users should see a quicker Live tab, and scrolling through the home screen, or using a kid profile, should be quicker as well. Google has been fielding multiple complaints about limited storage on certified Google TV devices such as the Chromecast. The miniature device seems to have just 5 GB of free space, and that too without installing anything after the initial setup. Moving forward, Chromecast users will be able to free up a little more space using the newly added “Storage” menu. Users can access the menu through Settings > System > Storage. The Google TV platform should consume a little less RAM as well, which should, in theory, leave more memory for apps. Users have previously complained about poor performance, especially while switching between different screens. Optimized RAM usage could help address this issue. Besides reducing the RAM needed by the core Google TV platform, Chromecast devices running the latest version of the OS will have an “automated process that runs in the background” to free up space for apps. Simply put, Google may have tweaked the background RAM reclamation process to be more aggressive. Although the software tweaks are a welcome addition, it is high time Google and other makers of devices running Google TV OS, simply add more RAM and onboard storage. Software tweaks might help bring down the number of low storage error messages. However, adding more RAM and storage space could help alleviate several performance issues. Via: The Verge
  21. saurabhdua
    Hello folks! The specifications of my 'jinxed' HP AIO desktop have been listed here:- https://support.hp.com/in-en/document/c03977251 RAM-Upgrade to 8GB haven't helped in my case & the overall experience with this machine continue to remain 'jittery' thus far! So finally....is it possible to trash the default motherboard & replace it some 'Powerhouse' kind of configuration? Are the Motherboard Upgrades feasible at first place? My local technician claim otherwise!? Inputs will be sincerely appreciated. Thank you.