Microsoft wins Advertiser of the Year award at Clio Awards 2016

The Clio Awards, esteemed international advertising, design and communications competition, announced Grand and "Of the Year" winners at its 57th annual award show held September 28 at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.

Microsoft's advertising has been honored with the prestigious Advertiser of the Year award by Clio Awards. In addition, Xbox was awarded numerous individual Clios, primarily for the Tomb Raider survivor billboard and Halo 5: Guardians Visualizer. Microsoft works closely with the global McCann Worldgroup agency team.

McCann received a total of 10 Awards at the Clios for the creative campaigns they have made possible for Microsoft, including four gold, five silver and one bronze. McCann reaped several additional awards for Microsoft's campaigns this week, including winning two golds and receiving special mention for "Technology – Re-imagined" for their work on "The Field Trip to Mars" at IAB Mixx, as well as two prestigious "pencils" at the D&AD Impact Awards for the #MakeWhatsNext campaign in the Industry Evolution and Community categories.

Read more about it here.

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Amazon India Deal: Get Xbox One with Kinect – Halo: The Master Chief Collection Bundle For Just Rs.24,990

Amazon India is now selling Xbox One with Kinect – Halo: The Master Chief Collection Bundle for just Rs.24,990. If you order using HDFC Bank Credit or Debit cards, you can get an additional cashback of up to Rs.1,500. Effectively you can get this bundle for just Rs.23,490.

About Xbox One,

• Experience the next generation in entertainment with the Microsoft Xbox One games console
• Powerful hardware provides stunning, true-to-life graphics
• Play with millions of other gamers across the web with Xbox Live
• Jump seamlessly between your favourite game, TV show or movie
• Includes a wireless controller, chat headset, HDMI cable and power supply adapter

You can order it here from Microsoft. You can also get great deals on various Xbox One games here and Windows PC games here.

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Windows developer virtual machines September 2016 build now available for download

Microsoft today announced the release of a developer ready, licensed virtual machines. Based on the feedback from developers, they have now released a fully configured Windows 10 development environment that won't expire. Developers can just use their Windows 10 Pro license key and instantly start developing without having to worry about installing all the tooling.

These installs contain:

• Windows 10 Pro, Version 1607
• Visual Studio 2015 Community Update 3 (Build 14.0.25425.01)
• Windows developer SDK and tools (Build 14393)
• Microsoft Azure SDK for .NET (Build 2.9.5)
• Windows Bridge for iOS (Build 0.2.160914)
• Windows UWP samples (September 2016)
• Windows Bridge for iOS samples
• Bash for Windows

If you just want to try out Windows 10 and UWP, use the free evaluation version of the VMs. The evaluation copies will expire after a pre-determined amount of time.

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‘Paladins: Champions of the Realm’ Closed Beta now live for Xbox One

Developer Hi-Rez Studios announced today that 'Paladins: Champions of the Realm', a free-to-play fantasy-themed team-based shooter, is now allowing gamers to sign up for closed betas for both Xbox One and Playstation 4. The title is already available in open beta on PC, where it saw more than one million players sign up in the first 10 days.

'Paladins: Champions of the Realm' is a team-based shooter with deep strategy elements and in-match character progression through decks of collectible cards. These cards amplify and augment a character's core set of abilities in many interesting ways. Players can choose from a roster of Champions to play as during each match. Each Champion boasts different play styles and strengths to bring to your team. Champions have five different skills: a weapon to fight with, three abilities, and an Ultimate ability.  There's also a $20 Founder's Pack that gives immediate access to every Champion available, although all are unlockable through regular gameplay.

"From day 1 of development, Paladins was designed with console in mind. We've enlisted some big-name console gamers to make sure the control scheme feels just right. Name any big-time multiplayer shooter that you enjoy most on console and Paladins stands right there alongside them. Except Paladins will continue to be FREE on console, just like it is on PC and Mac!"

You can sign up for the closed beta for Xbox One here. You can also download the title for Steam and Windows here.

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Both Axiom Verge and Zenith are now available for the Xbox One

Axiom Verge's Xbox One release was announced a little over two weeks ago, but it isn't the only Xbox One game to release today. It's joined by Zenith, a comedic action RPG from BadLand Games.

Axiom Verge is a pretty big throwback to the original Metroid, but it's still its own game. It's one of many games in the "Metroidvania" genre, and its visuals mix retro styled pixel art with fantastic (and often surreal) art design.

While the Xbox One might be the final console to get the game, that wasn't always what was planned, according to developer Tom Happ. It was originally intended to be an Xbox 360 title in the Xbox Live Indie Games service, but development went on much longer than expected, leaving the game unsupported on the Xbox One – until the system got MonoGame support.

Axiom Verge can be found in the Xbox Store for $19.99 usually, but there's currently a 10% launch discount, which brings the game's price down to $17.99. It's located in the store here.

Zenith is another $20 indie game, and stars Argus, a hero who's tired of being a hero and just wants to settle down. The game's description boasts of its humor and parody, and it seems like a solid title. If you'd like to check it out in the Xbox Store, you can find it here.

Are you excited to play either of these games on your Xbox One? Let us know in the comments below!

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Deal: Save $1000 on Alienware 15 Touch Gaming Laptop

You can now get the Dell Alienware 15 Touch gaming laptop for just $1499 (was $2,499.00). Alienware 15 laptop is powered by NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M graphics and a 6th Gen Intel Core i7 processor. It's heavy on memory with 16GB for lightning-quick performance and has 10 customizable lighting zones on the keyboard for countless color combinations. With a resolution of 3840 x 2160—four times that of Full HD—the razor-sharp 15.6-inch touchscreen shows every last detail with lifelike accuracy. It also includes USB Type-C with Thunderbolt support, which enables fast data transfers over Thunderbolt.

Key Specs:

• 15.6-inch 4K UHD touchscreen
• Intel Core i7-6700HQ
• 16GB memory/256GB SSD + 1TB HDD
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M graphics

Find the deal here from Microsoft Store.

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Microsoft announces Ignite 2017, pre-register now

Get a head start on #MSIgnite 2017, Sept. 25–29 in Orlando—pre-register now! https://t.co/v7g9JeEhC7 http://pic.twitter.com/REU3kN1WQ0

— Microsoft Ignite (@MS_Ignite) September 30, 2016

Microsoft yesterday announced the Ignite 2017 event. Microsoft Ignite is headed to Orlando, Florida September 25-29, 2017. They have also opened the pre-registration. Sign-up now for early registration access and have first choice of hotels in March.

You can read about everything Microsoft announced at Ignite 2016 here.

Sign-up here.

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September Power BI Desktop update released with several new features

Microsoft today announced the release of the September Power BI Desktop update with several new features and improvements. This update includes ESRI map integration, DirectQuery support for the Snowflake Connector, new forecasting features, and the ability to create a mobile report layout. This update also allows you to edit R visuals in your favorite R IDE. Watch the video below to see the new features in action.

Here's the complete list of September updates:

Report View

• ArcGIS Maps for Power BI (Preview)
• Mobile report layout (Preview)
• Updated drill behavior

Analytics

• Forecasting (Preview)
• Use your own R IDE

Data Connectors

• Snowflake Connector DirectQuery Support
• ProjectPlace Connector
• Oracle Connector – Improved Navigator Previews Performance
• OData Connector – Support for "Select Related Tables" option
• SAP BW and SAP HANA Connectors – Enhancements to parameter input UX
• Web Connector – UX Support for specifying HTTP Request Headers

Query Editing

• Query Dependencies view
• Show Errors experience
• Query Editor Ribbon Support for Scalar Values
• Add Function Invocation Column
• Expand & Aggregate Columns – Support for "Load More" values
• New Transform – Convert Table Column to a List
• Keyboarding – Support for "smart typing" in dropdown menus

Other Improvements

• In-product links to the Power BI Community

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FYI: Latest Windows 10 Cumulative Update may fail to install on your PC

Microsoft released a new Cumulative Update for Windows 10 PCs recently with a number of fixes and improvements for the OS. The update, KB3194496 brings the OS version number up to 14393.222 and it was released to all Windows 10 users running the Anniversary Update. The update was also available to Windows Insiders in the Release Preview ring earlier this week.

Now, if you are unable to install the update on your Windows 10 PC — you are not the only one. Several users have reported issues while installing the update on their Windows 10 PC, and Microsoft has also confirmed the issue. In a Microsoft Answers thread, a Microsoft employee stated:

Teams have dug into this issue and do believe the cause has been identified. Looks like this will only be hitting a subset of Insiders.  The correct team is developing a fix/workaround and once we have the full details, we'll be posting that information. For your affected machines, there's no need to keep attempting the install. It'll keep failing.

In the mean time, hold tight!  We're all over this and will keep sharing information along the way.

As mentioned above, if you try to run the installation again, you still won't be able to install the update. Microsoft states the company is working on a fix, so it should be available fairly soon for all users. We'll make sure to let you know once the issue is fixed — in the meantime, let us know if you're also facing the same issue in the comment section below.

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Big Matrix fan? Time to buy a HoloLens (video)

The future is now if you re a big fan of the Matrix movies and have $3000 to spare.

360World's The Red Pill app will let you enter the Matrix for free, and let you be the Chosen One who can see the code behind the "real" world!

The Red Pill connects your HoloLens to the Matrix, and lets you see the code that makes up the walls, tables and other objects you believe are real. Be careful though, the agents are close!

This application is the winner of the first HoloLens Challenge. It uses Spatial Mapping to analyze the environment around you and apply the Digital Rain effect to the resulting Mesh.

See another video demo below:

Find the app in the Windows Store here. The HoloLens is currently on sale to enterprise, developers and power users and can be found at the Microsoft Store here.

WP-Appbox: The Red Pill (Free, Windows Store) →

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Discuss: Are you using Skype as your SMS client?

Why beat them, when you can join them? With Microsoft's latest update to the Windows 10 Skype app which has added support for SMS Relay for some users, It has become just like iMessage, complete with green bubbles for the uncivilised savages, and blue bubbles for blessed users.

I've been using it off and on for a while, and I'm going to express my thoughts on it briefly here. Its a cool concept, even though I can't say I'll be using it much. SMS and Skype for personal messaging may as well be snail mail and telegram -but I digress.

As an SMS client, the Skype app is somewhat unwieldy. It doesn't load as fast as the native messaging app does, it takes a while to populate messages, and it still has some design quirks where it sometimes doesn't even load sent messages until the app is sent.

On the side of the integration however, mixing SMS and Skype messages is cool in theory, allowing you to have an iMessage like experience, until you give it some further thought.

Imagine 3 people are texting.Two of them have Windows Phones (you're supposed to imagine),one of them has an iPhone. User A uses Skype preview for SMS. User B uses the Windows messaging and Skype apps separately, and user C has a Skype account, but doesn't actively use it.

Now if user A is texting user B on Skype, then switches to SMS to save data, then back to Skype when they are at home. They get a single unbroken stream of texts. User B on the other hand, is hopping from the Messaging app to the Skype app and back again.

If user A were to attempt this with user C, the latter wouldn't receive any of their Skype messages, despite being a Skype contact because the Skype app has no way of knowing if someone is away because they haven't logged in for a while, or they've switched Skype IDs or something else.

The bottom line is, without Apple's SMS fallback feature (a system which intelligently decides whether to use iMessage or SMS at any given time) as well as absolute control over the way both SMS and Skype messages are received on all devices in question, using Skype as a primary texting app will get messy, and fast. I believe that is probably why Google Hangouts and Facebook Messenger – despite both supporting SMS on Android – do not "cross the streams" with their respective services so to speak. I can't help but think that building a great Skype client as well as a great SMS one would be a worthwhile task.

Have you started using Skype as your primary messaging app? Let us know your experiences in the comments below.

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Microsoft adds a dark theme and traffic hub to Windows maps for non insiders

Microsoft is rolling out another set of updates from the Insider preview rings to the general public's production ring.

Microsoft is updating the Windows Maps app for the public branch of Windows 10, with new features in tow.

First of all, there's a new dark theme packaged with the app for dark theme lovers and users with OLED screen. Microsoft offers the option to either use the system theme (either light or dark) or pick a light or dark theme independent of the system theme for users who like to live dangerously.

There's also support for checking traffic enroute to either home or work with colour coding from green to amber indicating the severity of the road traffic. For locations where there are live cameras, Microsoft is also adding support for that too.

Here#'s the full changelog:

• Enjoy dark or light app colors—they now change to match your system settings. If you prefer your apps to be dark rather than light you can now have the Maps app follow your system setting for theme preference or always be light/dark. Plus you can choose to change the map theme too!
• Quickly check traffic for your commute, including live cameras, where available. We have always treated your Home and Work places special and now you can check the traffic to your Home or Work locations at any time. Just tap on Traffic in the app bar and you can see traffic conditions to Home and Work and your most recently viewed traffic cameras so that you can stay on top of the road conditions along your route.

Microsoft's map app has never been better for Windows 10 Mobile users. While Here Maps used to be the defacto standard on the platform, the absence of Here and any other mapping competitors quickly forced Microsoft to develop its own maps app to match the likes of Apple and Google, so far, its doing a great job.

Get it here.

WP-Appbox: Windows Maps (Free, Windows Store) →

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Xbox One S Gears of War 4 bundles also available for pre-order in UK

We earlier reported on the Xbox One Gears of War 4 Edition 1 TB Bundle becoming available in USA and Australia.

Now we can report that the deal is now also available in the UK, with availability from the 11th October 2016 at £299.99 including VAT.

The Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle features:

• Xbox One S 1TB console
• Xbox Wireless Controller
• Gears of War 4 full game download
• 14-day Xbox Live Gold trial

Also for a limited time, when you purchase the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle or the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Special Edition Bundle, you'll get the entire Xbox 360 Gears of War collection for Xbox One at no additional cost.

Find the deal in the Microsoft Store here.

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Your Lumia devices are still supported in the US, Canada and Australia

Earlier this week, while Microsoft was reassuring business users that they planned to support Lumia devices in the present, with updates and new devices, another message was being sent to users who were using Microsoft's device registration portal. The message which still sits on a bright yellow banner on Microsoft's page reads "Lumia Phones are not supported in Canada, US, and Australia".

Gallery

Clearly, this makes no sense. Microsoft cannot not support its devices in the UK, Canada, and Australia considering it sells them there and still does at this very point in time.It also cannot refuse to support devices before a year's period, so something was definitely screwy. We got in touch with Microsoft support as soon as it was brought to out attention, and oddly enough, they too didn't know what happened. Microsoft "definitely" support its Lumia devices in those regions, so the incident was logged and escalated.

That phrase actually pertains if you want to have your phone a repair. For US, Canada and Australia there is different website where you can ask a repair that's what the statement on the website trying to tell to the customer.

Poor communication kills. The website Microsoft intends Lumia users in those regions to go to for support is actually this one, which is accessible from the other Lumia support website should you want to troubleshoot your device. However, it doesn't actually say that it doesn't tell users anything. It offers them information that their devices are not supported by Microsoft, and nothing else. I would have expected a link to the alternative website, but that was just too much effort.

The bottom line is, Microsoft still supports their mobile devices, even if it doesn't look that way at first glance.

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You can now use Spotify in Japan on your Windows 10 PCs and phones

Spotify for Windows phones received an update late last night, with a new in-app message announcing the arrival of the service to Japan.

The service, which was previously available in 59 countries till date, is now available in Japan to a limited number of users pending a full roll-out.

For Windows Phone users in Japan – of whom there are now users more than last year due to an improved device selection – this is good news as they can now access Spotify's large library of music without having to go to other platforms. While Spotify still hasn't provided Release Radar, Discover Weekly, Daily Mix or any of its newer features to the Windows Phone app, at least users of Windows phone in those countries will be able to enjoy the social aspects of Spotify.

For Windows PC users, you get the full gamut of Spotify features, as well as the new lyrics feature which allows you to sing along to your favourite bands (assuming you have a compatible supported mobile device running iOS or Android)

Spotify coming to Japan is not just huge for music lovers but also highlights a market gap that Microsoft could have filled. By offering an integrated music service which would have served the underserved Japanese and J-Rock market – with all the features that were expected, Microsoft could have given their Windows phones and Xboxes, and their Groove service, a small foothold in the Japanese market.

Idle musings aside, you can download Spotify for Windows here and Windows phone from the link below:

WP-Appbox: Spotify (Free, Windows Store) →

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Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered’s launch trailer arrives

Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare isn't launching until November 4th, meaning that the remaster of Modern Warfare, which comes packaged with special editions of the game, isn't launching until that date either. That's not going to stop a launch trailer for Modern Warfare Remastered from showing up, though. The new trailer shows plenty of memorable moments from the original game, but with significantly better visuals. If you'd like to have either enjoy a bit of nostalgia or just spoil the game's ending for yourself, you can find the trailer below.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare came out back on November 5th, 2007. That's almost nine years ago, and while the franchise has changed significantly with recent titles like Advanced Warfare, this was still a huge change, too. The Call of Duty series was originally a handful of shooters set during World War II, which was an incredibly popular setting for a while. The fourth main game in the series changed that, bringing it to the modern day. It took the series in a whole new direction, and was immensely popular. The Xbox 360 version of the game remained the best selling game in the United States for a solid three months, which was an impressive feat.

Oddly enough, Modern Warfare Remastered isn't being sold on its own. Despite all the work that's been put into it, you can only get it with either the Legacy or Digital Deluxe editions of Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. It's unknown – and unlikely – if it'll ever be sold on its own in the future, meaning that you'll probably have to pay at least $79.99 to get it.

If you feel like paying that $79.99 (or $99.99) admission fee, you can find the Legacy Edition of Infinite Warfare here, and the Digital Deluxe Edition here.

Are you going to buy Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare just to play Modern Warfare Remastered, or are you interested in both? Let us know in the comments below!

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Microsoft helps deliver wifi to schools and churches in Malta

Microsoft may be a big consumer and enterprise tech company, but they also offer services to communities as well.

The Times of Malta today reports that Microsoft's Skype Communications team travelled to Malta to help upgrade internal classroom infrastructure in 36 churches and independent schools.

The firm is helping the Maltese Education ministry to equip these locations with wifi so as to "equip the students"with skills that make them employable. While Microsoft will be handling the program for the first 3 years of its life and taking care of maintenance, the firm will be handing out over the education minister once the three years are up for continued management and support.

While the internet has long since been ann equalizing factor in the modern age, more than half of the population of the planet has yet to come online and benefit from the internet revolution.According to a report by Facebook, some of the main reasons are availability, affordability, relevance, and readiness. While the internet is freely available and accessible in most western countries, due to the infrastructure not being ready in developing nations, internet access is often limited to big cities and even then is more expensive than the equivalent services. There is also the language barrier issue, with most of the internet being written in English while many people still do not find English as a first language, nor do they find it relevant to them.

Whatever the reason, having access and experience to the internet is a great asset to have in the modern world, and Microsoft and other tech companies helping in this is no small thing.

Read more at the source link below.

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Microsoft announces two new Xbox One S Gears of War 4 bundles, Pre-order it today

Back in July, Microsoft first announced Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Edition 2TB Bundle. Today, they announced two more bundles in the same series. The Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle will arrive in stores worldwide starting Oct. 11, and customers in the US and Australia will also have the option to get an Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Special Edition Bundle starting Nov. 1. Both bundles are available for pre-order starting today.

Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle:

To commemorate the upcoming Oct. 11 launch of Gears of War 4, we're offering fans worldwide the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle. Priced at $349 USD, the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle comes with a 1TB hard drive to play all the biggest blockbusters in Xbox history, a matching new Xbox Wireless Controller with expanded range and Bluetooth support for Windows 10 PCs and a full-game download* for Gears of War 4. As an Xbox Play Anywhere title, owning the digital copy of Gears of War 4 lets you play across both Xbox One and Windows 10 PC, as all game progress, Gamerscore and Achievements are saved on and accessible through Xbox Live. Gears of War 4 also supports High Dynamic Range (HDR) on Xbox One S, so fans will experience richer, more luminous colors and a higher contrast ratio between lights and darks, bringing out the true visual depth of the battle against the Swarm.

Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Special Edition Bundle:

In addition to the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle, we're also offering a special edition deep blue console bundle with a 500GB hard drive and matching new Xbox Wireless Controller with expanded range and Bluetooth support for Windows 10 PCs. Exclusively available at GameStop and Microsoft Stores in the US (and at EB Games and Microsoft Stores in Australia) for $299 USD, the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Special Edition Bundle also comes with a copy of Gears of War 4 (as a physical copy in the US, and as a download token in Australia).

Also for a limited time, when you purchase the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Bundle or the Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Special Edition Bundle, you'll get the entire Xbox 360 Gears of War collection for Xbox One at no additional cost.

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MSPoweruser Podcast 15: Ignited

During this week's episode of the MSPoweruser Podcast, Vernon E. L. Smith and Andrew Bennett cover some of the week's Microsoft news. This week's a special one, as Vernon just got back from Microsoft Ignite! Because of that, the flow's a little bit different than usual.

You can check out some of the articles relevant to what we talked about here:

• Everything Microsoft announced at its 2nd Ignite Conference today
• Microsoft announces Windows Defender Application Guard to make Microsoft Edge more secure for the enterprise
• Microsoft announces new Office 365 Threat Intelligence
• Outlook's mobile apps are now fully powered by Microsoft Cloud
• Microsoft: Secure Productive Enterprise and Enterprise Mobility + Security E5 will be available on October 1
• Office 365 gets new cloud-powered features, Bing Maps integration
• Microsoft renames Delve Analytics to MyAnalytics, announces new features
• Microsoft announces partnership with Renault-Nissan Alliance to develop next-gen services for cars
• Microsoft and Adobe announces partnership, Adobe to deliver its cloud services on Azure
• Microsoft announces the general availability of Windows Server 2016 and System Center 2016

You can watch the video here:

You can also subscribe to the MSPoweruser Podcast below:

• RSS
• iTunes
• Pocket Casts
• Google Play Music
• SoundCloud

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Game Troopers launch new Pebble Minigame for Windows phones

If you're a fan of puzzle mini-games on your Windows phone, the developer team Game Troopers has got you covered with their new "Pebble Minigame"

This game is a cute colourful little game whose objective is to get players to match the colours of falling "pebbles" to the center circle. For instance, if the center circle is purple, your goal should be to grab all the purple pebbles and match them to the center circle. Of course, the center colours keep changing, and the challenge in the game is testing the adaptability of players as co lours may change sporadically or not at all.

Here's the game description, in their own words

This minimalistic game with a stunning design, beautiful animations and great music will give you a lot of fun and knead your fingers! Drag pebbles of the right colour to the centre circle. But be careful: if colours don't match, the game is over. Buy and upgrade boosters, accomplish missions, play with friends and move up in the leaderboard.

Does this sound like something you'll be interested in? Grab it from the Windows 10 and Windows Phone 8.1 stores from the store link below.

The game is free to play, but it does have optional in-app purchases for boosters and score multipliers. Users who would be handing the game over to children to play should be aware that the IAPs can be disabled in=app, lest they experience bill-shock at the end of the month.

The app was not found in the store. #wpappbox

Links: → Visit Store → Search Google

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HP ELite x3 launch in South Korea

HP has launched the HP Elite x3 in South Korea.

Asia Pacific Mobile Business and Business solutions director Wong Chi-ming said: "Today, we work in an increasingly high demand environment for mobility, requiring a set of phone, tablet, laptop, or even desktop PC experience in a mobile device that can reduce the need to carry multiple machines, also taking into account the current work and life integration between the new standard . HP Elite x3, in a business IT environment with Windows 10 operating system, and software from Office 365, offers seamless handover to the working platform, and with cloud HP Workspace app and service it is no different from a desktop computer to receive the full experience. "

The HP Elite X3 is of course designed to replace both your phone and PC and Huang Hao Zhang, director of personal systems business unit HP Inc. in Hong Kong, said: "I am responsible for new product launches HP for many years, and I have  never tried to do presentations without a laptop but this time I was able to easily connect, all because of this Elite x3."

He also said: "the HP solution partner Yi new technology (EBSL) and Schmidt-soft (SCHMIDT-iSOFT) will offer the Eilte x3 as a platform for multiple industry-specific solutions extend to Windows 10 operating system, to ensure that retail, logistics, hotels, shopping malls and facilities management industries to provide innovative technologies and convenient one-stop management solution. "

It is expected that the HP Elite x3 will be available in November, priced at HK $ 6,499. HP Desk Dock is priced at HK $ 1,199. HP Lap Dock is priced at HK $ 4,899.

The HP Workspace cloud service subscription price is expected to be released in November 2016.

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Microsoft talks about the hardware design and development of Surface Hub (video)

Surface Hub is a powerful team collaboration device designed to advance the way people work together naturally. Surface Hub enables engaging and productive meetings with its large multi-touch display, responsive pen and inking experience, built-in video conferencing and on-board Office apps. You can walk up and join a Skype for Business meeting with a single tap, and share content effortlessly so that you spend your time connecting with people rather than technology.

At an Ignite session, Paul Barr from the Surface engineering team goes under the hood to explain the components of the hardware design, development, and management of the specialized Windows operating system, and tailored user experiences with Surface Hub. Watch the session video embedded above.

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Fitbit for Windows 10 updated with better celebrations, HoloLens support

Fitbit today released an update for their official app for Windows 10 devices. This v2.14.711 update brings some new features including:

Change log:

• Adventures: Unlocking a landmark now gives you the option to set the image as a background or wallpaper on your device
• Fitbit for Windows 10 now works on Hololens
• Improvements to performance of Dashboard celebrations
• Improvements to Graph pagination for touch and mouse control
• General bug fixes and improvements

You can get the updated Fitbit app for Windows 10 from the Store link below.

WP-Appbox: Fitbit (Free, Windows Store) →

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Microsoft responds to Salesforce’s concerns on LinkedIn deal

Last night, we reported that Salesforce has raised its concerns on Microsoft's proposed LinkedIn acquisition. Salesforce chief legal officer Burke Norton said that Microsoft's proposed acquisition of LinkedIn threatens the future of innovation and competition. By gaining ownership of LinkedIn's unique dataset of over 450 million professionals in more than 200 countries, Salesforce thinks that Microsoft will be able to deny competitors access to that data, and in doing so obtain an unfair competitive advantage.

Salesforce believes this raises significant antitrust and data privacy issues that need to be fully scrutinized by competition and data privacy authorities in the United States and in the European Union. We intend to work closely with regulators, lawmakers and other stakeholders to make the case that this merger is anticompetitive.

Microsoft's chief legal officer Brad Smith gave the following statement late last night regarding this issue,

Salesforce may not be aware, but the deal has already been cleared to close in the United States, Canada, and Brazil. We're committed to continuing to work to bring price competition to a CRM market in which Salesforce is the dominant participant charging customers higher prices today.

Microsoft is yet to get the approval for their LinkedIn acquisition from European Commission. After Salesforce's complaints, it will be interesting to see whether European Commission will approve the deal as it is.

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Deal: Xbox One S 500GB Console Minecraft Favorites Bundle + Four Bonus Games for $300 today

As if they didn't have enough Xbox One S deals on the market as is, another deal has just presented itself in the form of a 500 GB Xbox One S Minecraft Favorites Bundle console, plus 4 more bonus games, and $6 shipping from online retailer NewEgg. The four games included are Titanfall, NBA 2K15, Pro Evolution Soccer 2015, and Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag & Assassin's Creed Unity. All of this for only $306.

Microsoft just recently released the Minecraft Favorites Bundle, which includes:

• Xbox One S 500GB Console, full game downloads of Minecraft for Xbox One and Windows 10, Xbox Wireless Controller, HDMI cable (4K Capable), Power cable and 14-day Xbox Live Gold Trial.
• Comes with the Favorites Pack, featuring seven fabulous, community-favorite content Packs such as Halo Mash-up and Festive Mash-up.
• Also includes the Builder's Pack, featuring six additional content Packs like the Biome Settlers Pack 1 and Greek Mythology Mash-up.
• Watch 4K Blu-ray movies or stream Netflix and Amazon Prime in 4K Ultra HD.
• Play over 100 console exclusives and a growing library of Xbox 360 games on Xbox One.

You can take advantage of this deal here, but act quickly, as this deal is only good until September 30 (today).

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Logitech announces the new C922 Pro Stream Webcam

Logitech has finally announced the successor to its popular Logitech HD Pro Webcam C920. The new Logitech C922 Pro Stream Webcam allows you to record and stream true-to-life HD 1080p video at 30fps or 720p at 60fps, features dynamic background replacement software, powered by Personify, and a 3-month XSplit recording and streaming premium license.

The dynamic background replacement feature uses intelligent shape recognition to separate the gamer from their background, without the need for a cumbersome green screen. Gamers can then overlay the video of themselves on the gaming stream with popular broadcasting apps such as OBS and XSplit.

With automatic low light correction and sharp autofocus, the C922 webcam adjusts to flickering room lights or multiple computer screens, so you can stream clear video even in dim lighting. It also features two omnidirectional noise cancelling microphones to enable a crisp stereo audio with no-drop streaming and recorded video.

The C922 webcam comes bundled with a 3-month XSplit Premium license, which includes complete access to the professional-grade tools and features of both XSplit Broadcaster and XSplit Gamecaster, so you can quickly and easily start streaming any type of content right out of the box.

The Logitech C922 Pro Stream Webcam is available today at Logitech.com for a $99.99.

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A Bulletstorm Remaster once again leaked for Xbox One and PC

Earlier this year at its E3 expo, Microsoft gave various media outlets USB drives with a folder containing images for a remastered version of the grotesque 2011 shooter 'Bulletstorm'. This seemed to suggest that the title was actually coming to current gen platforms sometime soon, and now there's more proof that the remastered title may be making its way to us sooner than we may think.

The Brazilian rating board for games shows a rating for a game by the name of 'Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition' coming to Xbox One, Windows PC, and Playstation 4 in 2017. Gearbox Software is listed as the publisher, as opposed to original publisher Electronic Arts.

For those who aren't familiar, the original 'Bulletstorm' was a first person shooter launched in 2011 Xbox 360, Windows PC, and PS3. The game is set in a futuristic utopia, an elite peacekeeping force thwarts the rumblings of civil war. But deception within the ranks has caused two members of the most feared unit to strike out on their own. Now stranded on an abandoned paradise, Grayson Hunt and Ishi Sato find themselves surrounded by hordes of mutants and flesh eating gangs. They survive on two objectives: get off the planet alive and extract revenge on the man who sent them there.

As more information becomes available, we'll keep everyone updated.

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Xbox One sales increase 1000% following Xbox One S launch in the UK

Microsoft released its incremental upgrade Xbox One S in early August to much fanfare, with features such as 4K Blu-ray, 4K video streaming, and HDR, all while coming in at 40% smaller than the normal Xbox One. To get the ball rolling Microsoft has offered multiple deals and bundles, in hopes of getting people interested and maybe picking up a little steam on the way. Well it appears that Redmond's strategy may be paying off, as its sales numbers are looking a lot better than this same time last week.

According to data collected by MCV, Xbox One sales in the UK have jumped to 71% for the week ending September 24, a year-on-year increase of 76%, and a whopping 989% week-on-week following the release of the Xbox One S in the UK. This is in contrast to Sony, with its release of the new Playstation 4 Slim, with the original PlayStation 4 taking only 19% of last weeks sales, with a week-on-week increase of 22%, but a 66% decrease year-on-year. Comparing the launch weeks of both consoles puts Microsoft sales up by 361% over Sony.

This is good news as PS4 has largely dominated the console market since its launch, with Xbox always lagging behind, despite having a few good months.  In a statement, Xbox UK marketing director Harvey Eagle said: "It's great to see how popular both the Xbox One S and the FIFA 17 Xbox One S consoles are with fans, not just over the last week but since the Xbox One S was released in August. 4K video streaming and 4K UHD Blu-ray have been extremely well received by gamers and critics and we believe there is no better value right now for those looking to upgrade their console."

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Gameloft updates Modern Combat 5, Gods Of Rome & March of Empires

Gameloft, one of the best supporters of the Windows Store, has updated 3 of their most popular titles in the Windows Store.

Fans of first-person shooter "Modern Combat 5: Blackout" can look forward to the debut of its most strategic game mode so far: Conquest and Kill, a best-of-five rounds, attack/defend game mode. New content includes Vulcan and Shibing armor, a new shotgun turret weapon, new multiplayer and game modes, weapon rental, an improved league system and more.

In "Gods of Rome," war god Ares has returned to challenge our heroes. This update includes alliance events and shard fragments that allow you to unlock high-ranked gods more easily.

And in the latest version of "March of Empires," grow your kingdom even faster by constructing two buildings at a time. Icons help you stand out from the crowd. There's even time-limited Halloween content that puts a Headless Raider in your midst – can you banish him from your land?

Find the links below:

The app was not found in the store. #wpappbox

Links: → Visit Store → Search Google

The app was not found in the store. #wpappbox

Links: → Visit Store → Search Google

The app was not found in the store. #wpappbox

Links: → Visit Store → Search Google

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Check out Minecraft in Virtual Reality at your local Microsoft Store

Minecraft is Microsoft's coolest property and VR this year's coolest development. Fans of either can now experience both at your local Microsoft Store where Microsoft is offering a fully immersive virtual reality demo experience exclusively at select Microsoft Stores.

Team Minecraft at Mojang and Microsoft have been working with their partners at Oculus to develop Minecraft for VR (explained in the video above) and now they're ready to have everyone experience Minecraft through virtual reality on Oculus Rift.

Fans of the game can now demo for free with no appointment needed at their local Microsoft Store.

Full list of participating Microsoft Store locations listed below with demos rolling out in all Microsoft Stores in North America by Oct. 3.

Ala Moana Center (Honolulu)
Aventura Mall (Aventura, Fla.)
Beachwood Place Mall (Beachwood, Ohio)
Bellevue Square (Bellevue, Wash.)
Bridgewater Commons (Bridgewater, N.J.)
Burlington Mall (Burlington, Mass.)
Christiana Mall (Christiana, Del.)
City Creek Center (Salt Lake City)
Dadeland Mall (Miami)
Danbury Fair Mall (Danbury, Conn.)
Fashion Valley (San Diego)
Flagship Microsoft Store New York
Freehold Raceway Mall (Freehold, N.J.)
Garden State Plaza (Paramus, N.J.)
Houston Galleria (Houston)
International Plaza (Tampa, Fla.)
Kenwood Towne Centre (Cincinnati)
Lenox Square (Atlanta)
Mall at Millenia (Orlando, Fla.)
Mall of America (Bloomington, Minn.)
Natick Mall (Natick, Mass.)
Oakbrook Center (Oak Brook, Ill.)
Oak Park Mall (Overland Park, Kan.)
Park Meadows (Lone Tree, Colo.)
Penn Square Mall (Oklahoma City)
Pioneer Place (Portland, Ore.)
Prudential Center (Boston)
Roosevelt Field (Garden City, N.Y.)
Scottsdale Fashion Square (Scottsdale, Ariz.)
Somerset Collection (Troy, Mich.)
Southpark (Charlotte, N.C.)
South Coast Plaza (Costa Mesa, Calif.)
St. Louis Galleria (St. Louis)
St. Johns Town Center (Jacksonville, Fla.)
Stanford Shopping Center (Palo Alto, Calif.)
Stonebriar Centre (Frisco, Texas)
Streets at Southpoint (Durham, N.C.)
The Domain (Austin)
The Fashion Centre at Pentagon City (Arlington, Va.)
The Fashion Mall at Keystone (Indianapolis)
The Florida Mall (Orlando, Fla.)
The Mall at Rockingham Park (Salem, N.H.)
The Shops at La Cantera (San Antonio)
The Shops at Mission Viejo (Mission Viejo, Calif.)
The Village at Corte Madera (Corte Madera, Calif.)
The Woodlands Mall (Woodlands, Texas)
The Westchester (White Plains, N.Y.)
Tysons Corner Center (Tysons Corner, Va.)
University Village (Seattle)
Walden Galleria (Buffalo, N.Y.)
Walt Whitman Mall (Huntington Station, N.Y.)
Westfarms Mall (Farmington, Conn.)
Westfield Century City (Los Angeles)
Westfield Valley Fair (Santa Clara, Calif.)
Woodfield Mall (Schaumburg, Ill.)
Woodland Hill Mall (Tulsa, Okla.)

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Pinball FX2 Windows 10 Edition Updated With Two New Tables

Pinball FX2 is the premier pinball platform, offering an exciting library of original pinball tables featuring the hottest brands in entertainment like Star Wars, Marvel, and more. It comes with 1080p/60FPS graphics, new achievements, and a slick menu interface. The latest update to this game includes two new tables which delivers powerful superhero punches.

• Wage an epic battle in an alternate Soviet-dominated reality in the A-Force table, featuring an all-new storyline where you keep Cosmic Cube balls alive by controlling Black Widow and Madame Masque.
• In the Champions table, fight to defeat Bombshell with Ms. Marvel, following a daring bank robbery – also an original storyline.

Features:

• 1080p Full HD resolution at 60 frames per second.
• Hotseat multiplayer action!
• Compete against other players online to achieve the highest Super Score.
• Team up with your friends to increase your Wizard Score.
• Tons of table stats for all you statisticians!
• In-game challenges.
• Achievements for each table!
• New tables are released constantly, featuring the biggest and most exciting brands in entertainment, along with original creations from Zen Studios.
• The most advanced and accurate ball physics simulation available!

Download it from Windows Store here.

The app was not found in the store. #wpappbox

Links: → Visit Store → Search Google

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Lumia 650 gets a new OTA firmware update, brings Double Tap To Wake in the UK

We recently reported that the Lumia 650 picked up support for Double Tap To Wake. The update wasn't available over-the-air for many Lumia 650 users all around the world, but it seems like users in the UK have started receiving the feature with the new OTA update on their Lumia 650. Alongside Double Tap To Wake, the update brings:

• Wi-Fi connectivity improvements, including fixes for Wi-Fi connection dropping randomly and Wi-Fi scan occasionally not returning any results.
• Support for double tap to wake enabled.
• Bluetooth connectivity improvements.
• Stability and reliability improvements.
• Camera improvements, including improved image and video quality, improved Auto-focus and fix for a problem that was causing slow motion capture to skip frames for some users.
• Cellular connectivity improvements, including fix for a problem that caused occasional network loss for some users.
• Audio quality improvements, including fix for a problem that caused voice call audio to get scrambled for some users

If you own a Lumia 650 and live in the UK, just head over to Settings > Update & Security and check for updates — after that, you should see a new update titled "MICROSOFTMDG Update for Windows Phone..". Once installed, just open up the Settings app, head over to Personalization > Lockscreen and enable Double Tap To Wake.

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Deal: Get Forza Horizon 3 game for free when you buy an Asus G-Series laptop or desktop

Early this week, Microsoft launched Forza Horizon 3 game for Xbox One and Windows 10 PCs. Today, they announced their partnership with ASUS Republic of Gamers (ROG) to offer this game for free with its next generation of gaming notebooks and desktops. Forza Horizon 3 PC version features support for 4K and 21:9 Ultrawide resolutions, and more. The following ASUS ROG laptops are eligible for this deal,

G752VS, G752VM, GL502VS, GL502VM, G701VI, GL702VM, GT51CA, G11CD, G20CB and more.

If you'd like to purchase Forza Horizon 3, you can find it on the Windows Store here. If you'd like to buy a physical copy of the game, it can be found on Amazon here. Find more details on this offer here.

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Facebook brings Osquery to Windows

Earlier this week, Facebook announced that it is bringing its Osquery to Windows. The company launched Osquery back in 2014 for macOS and Linux, but it is finally bringing it to Windows devices. Osquery is mainly for system admins — it allows users to search for process details and manage other parts of the system using SQL queries. Facebook stated:

Today, we're excited to announce the availability of an osquery developer kit for Windows! Security teams can now build customized osquery solutions for their Windows networks. In 2014, Facebook open sourced osquery, an SQL-powered detection tool for Linux and OS X that provides real-time insight into the state of corporate infrastructure. osquery allows you to write SQL-based queries that explore operating system data. With osquery, SQL tables represent abstract concepts such as running processes, loaded kernel modules, open network connections, browser plugins, hardware events or file hashes. Having timely, reliable visibility into operations running throughout your network is critical to quickly identify and investigate anomalies.

Facebook's OSquery is only available for those on Windows 10. If you are interested in trying out Osquery, you can find the documentation for getting started on Windows 10 here.

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Gfk: Xbox One S launch trounce PS4 Slim launch by 361% in UK

When Microsoft designed the Xbox One they envisioned the device as much as a home entertainment console as a gaming machine. They had to rapidly step back from this idea after an extremely lukewarm reception by gamers leading to the PS4 having double the sales of the Xbox One.

It is therefore ironic that it was exactly this media and entertainment focus which may have caused the Xbox One S to trounce the launch of the PS4 Slim in UK this September, with the Microsoft gaming console having 361% more sales than the PS4 Slim during their respective launch weeks this month.

In fact the Xbox One had 71% market share in the week ending September 24th according to Gfk, with the PS4 only managing 19% share. The PS4 was 66% down Year on Year though sales were up 22% week on week. Week on Week however the Xbox One was up nearly 1000% at 989% WoW and 76% up YoY.

Microsoft attributes the success in part due to the Xbox One S featuring 4K HDR Blu-ray support, something the new PS4 Slim oddly lacks.

"It's great to see how popular both the Xbox One S and the FIFA 17 Xbox One S consoles are with fans, not just over the last week but since the Xbox One S was released in August. 4K video streaming and 4K UHD Blu-ray have been extremely well received and we believe there is no better value right now for those looking to upgrade their console," Xbox UK marketing boss Harvey Eagle told MCV.  "It's a fantastic time for gamers with the range of upcoming titles appealing to all audiences, from Gears of War 4 to Skyrim Special Edition and the release this week of the acclaimed Forza Horizon 3. There's never been a better time to own an Xbox One."

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Microsoft announces new updates to Azure HDInsight with up to 25x faster query performance

Microsoft today announced no.of updates to Azure HDInsight that make Hadoop enterprise-ready in the cloud. Azure HDInsight is a managed Hadoop and Spark cloud services from Microsoft. It now offers the most security capabilities of any cloud Hadoop solution, big data query speeds that approach data warehousing performance, and new notebook experiences for data scientists all on the latest Hortonworks Data Platform 2.5 and Spark 2.0 platform.

• Advanced security features – New security features such as Authentication and Identity Management, Central Security Policy Administration,  and Encryption for data protection will give customers increased levels of security for authentication, authorization and encryption.
• The first Cloud Hadoop solution to onboard LLAP (Long Lived and Process) from the Stinger.Next initiatives, which promises sub-second querying on big data, which is 25x faster query performance than existing Hive.
• Microsoft has partnered with Simba to deliver an ODBC driver for Azure HDInsight that can be used with world-class BI tools like Power BI, Tableau and QlikView. Together, this allows business analysts to gain insights over big data using their tool of choice.
• Real-time streaming ingestion for IoT scenarios with Apache Kafka – Azure HDInsight support for Apache Kafka works with Spark and Apache Storm for a combined solution that can ingest large, fast streams of data, ideal for a variety of IoT scenarios.
• New notebook experiences for data scientists on the latest Hortonworks Data Platform 2.5 and Spark 2.0 platform

Read about these updates in detail here.

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Microsoft’s Chief Envisioning Officer sees a future without keyboards

Microsoft regularly post videos showing their vision of the future of technology, and while the result is always varied, one common factor is the absence of mechanical keyboards, and it appears the reason for this is that Microsoft just does not see a future for this long-lived technology, created in 1860.

Dave Coplin, Microsoft's Chief Envisioning Officer predicted the QWERTY keyboard is set to die out in the face of emerging input methods such as voice input, gesture tracking and facial recognition.

"We have these amazing computers that we essentially use like we're still Victorians," said Coplin. "The QWERTY keyboard is a great example of an old design being brought forward to modern day. We've not really evolved. We still use this sub-optimal design."

Coplin noted that even touch screen users still used QWERTY keyboards, but felt the rise of digital assistants such as Cortana was the real threat to the outdated input method.

Coplin felt voice recognition was now improving rapidly and that voice dictation would be much bigger in the future, particularly now that Microsoft is able to achieve near human levels of speech recognition.

Microsoft also saw scope for features such as facial tracking, which allowed Surface users to ditch the keyboard for logging in.

"We're looking at technologies now like voice and gesture recognition, and facial tracking that may make the keyboard redundant," Coplin said. "We think that computers in the not-too-distant future will be able to understand all of those things and infer on my behalf my intent, meaning and objective that I'm trying to do."

Of course office workers are unlikely to write long report by voice, but Coplin felt for task-based scenarios, such as checking the weather, ordering a taxi or writing a quick email to a colleague speech, gesture and face tracking will soon replace the venerable 108 keys.

Do our readers think Voice will ever kill the Keyboard? Let us know below.

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Watch multi-window support for Continuum in action on Windows 10 Mobile

Recently, we reported about some of the upcoming features coming to Continuum on Windows 10 Mobile. With the upcoming Redstone 2 update, Windows 10 Mobile's Continuum feature will pick up a handful of new features including things like support for multi-window, the ability to keep using Continuum while your phone is locked and more. In addition to these features, Microsoft is also working on offering a more PC-like experience on Continuum, adding support for better toast notifications, ability to pin apps to the taskbar, support for system tray, and support for app jumplists on the taskbar. At Ignite, Microsoft showed a demo of the biggest new feature that's coming to Continuum — and that is, obviously, support for multi-window. In the video below, you'll be able to see the multi-window mode in action where we get to see the Windows Store working alongside Microsoft Edge:

As you can see in the above video, multi-window works just like you would expect it to — for instance, you can resize the windows, and you can also snap the windows which is going to be really useful. This is a really important feature for Continuum on Windows 10 Mobile — at the moment, Continuum's multi-tasking capabilities are quite simple when compared to the full-fledged Windows 10 PC experience. With the introduction of multi-window support, Continuum definitely looks like a very neat and useful feature.

Multi-window support and the other improvements should be coming to Continuum with Redstone 2 on Windows 10 Mobile. Redstone 2 is expected to arrive in 2017, and it should bring a range of other new features and improvements to Windows 10 Mobile. Things should get a lot more interesting and exciting in 2017, so make sure to keep an eye on MSPU!

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Titanfall 2’s new cinematic trailer shows off pilots’ abilities

Respawn Entertainment is addressing the lack of a single-player campaign in Titanfall with its sequel, and it looks like they're going to make an explosive debut. Two months back we got a quick look at the game's campaign, but that was more of a teaser than anything. There was also what seemed to be a tutorial from the campaign back in the Tech Test, but that also wasn't much at all. Now that we only have under a month until the game's release, it seems like we might see a few bigger trailers – and way more information – related to the campaign, though. A new cinematic trailer (which released today) not only gives us some lines from the game's protagonist, but it also shows off just what pilots are capable of. If you'd like to check it out, you can watch it below.

As mentioned before, this trailer's about the pilots' abilities. They're separated from the grunts in both the IMC and the Militia by strength, skill, speed, and most importantly: their Titans. It's a good watch, and shows off plenty of the tricks you'll be able to pull off in the game, even if there's no gameplay here.

Titanfall 2 is coming on October 28th, and if you'd like to pre-order the game for your Xbox One, you can buy it digitally here. Alternatively, you can pick up a physical copy from Amazon here.

Are you excited for Titanfall 2? Do you like the trailer? Let us know in the comments below!

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Skype for Salesforce now available in beta

Microsoft's Skype Web SDK enables developers to build web experiences that seamlessly integrate presence, chat, audio and video by leveraging Skype for Business services and the larger Skype network. Skype for Salesforce brings features of Skype for Business Online directly within Salesforce to give sellers the ability to communicate in real-time with colleagues straight from the Salesforce Lightning Experience.

• Simply hover your mouse over a name in the activity timeline, a record or a list and you can immediately see whether a coworker is online and available. The ability to see a person's status, within the context of a CRM activity, allows you to choose the most effective form of communication.
• For example, if you need feedback on an action and that person is on a call, an email may be appropriate, but if that person is available, you could get an instant response via chat. You can start a chat, voice call or video call with a single click and without the need to switch to a different application.

Microsoft today announced that Skype for Salesforce is now available beta to all customers with Skype for Business Online and Salesforce Enterprise or Unlimited Edition. Users can chat using Skype for Salesforce on any supported browsers for Lightning Experience, but audio and video calls are currently only supported for Microsoft Edge and Apple Safari. Microsoft is working on support for additional browsers, including Chrome and Firefox.

Find more details about enabling this feature here.

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Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff slams Microsoft’s plans to deny LinkedIn data access to its rivals

Back in June, Microsoft announced their biggest acquisition to date. Microsoft said that it will acquire LinkedIn for $196 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at $26.2 billion. The final acquisition price was a result of a bidding war between Salesforce and Microsoft. LinkedIn's regulatory filing revealed that Salesforce would have bid much higher and made changes to the stock/cash components of its offers, but it was acting without communications from LinkedIn. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff also confirmed that they were very much interested in acquiring LinkedIn, but Microsoft won the deal. Microsoft has not yet closed the LinkedIn deal as it is seeking regulatory approvals. Salesforce CEO today tweeted that Microsoft is planning to lock down LinkedIn data from its rivals.

Amazing @Scottgu says @Microsoft 2 use @LinkedIn data 4 anticompetitive bundles & denying access the data to rivals. https://t.co/yxBjN4ceWz

— Marc Benioff (@Benioff) September 29, 2016

He also tweeted it to FTC and European Commissioner for Competition. Microsoft should get approval from both these agencies to close the deal and he wants them to look into this comment from Microsoft executive Scott Guthrie.

I hope @ftc and @vestager have an oppty to read the anticompetitive bundling plans of @scottgu against rivals. https://t.co/ZA6hRYSmjH

— Marc Benioff (@Benioff) September 29, 2016

I read whatever Scott said in the Deutsche Bank Technology Conference interview and I don't understand what is anti-competitive about it. He said Microsoft will integrate LinkedIn into Dynamics to offer great insights and it will be a big advantage for Microsoft as other can't provide the same. To be honest, Microsoft is paying $26 billion for LinkedIn mainly because of its data. I don't understand why Microsoft will give it away for free to Salesforce. Salesforce asking access to LinkedIn data is like Google asking Facebook to give access to its social graph. I hope Marc actually clarifies what he really meant. I won't be surprised if Salesforce formally raises its concerns to FTC and EU.

I've included the whole transcript of Scott's interview below.

KARL KEIRSTEAD:  Good.  And maybe just in our last minute, the other business under your responsibility is Dynamics, and I think everybody in the room, their eyes popped a little bit a couple of days ago you announced a win at HP Inc.  And that's significant in a number of respects, and perhaps you're limited from giving us too much detail, but we all thought HP Inc. was a Salesforce client.  So is this a takeaway, and what does that say about Dynamics CRM because I think there's been a general perception that that's more the mid-market product.  And I wonder if this win with HP Inc. is perhaps a harbinger of Microsoft having a little more success up market against Oracle and Salesforce?

SCOTT GUTHRIE:  Yeah.  I think the HP Inc. takeout yesterday — Salesforce takeout.

KARL KEIRSTEAD:  It was?

SCOTT GUTHRIE:  Yeah.  They were a very large Salesforce shop or were until yesterday.  And they're planning a massive migration and a big bet on Dynamics.  And it's one of the more public ones that we've had, but we're starting to see some really good success in the market at a broad level, in particular around enterprise.  And I would say for CRM in particular enterprise is our sweet spot. Other parts of the Dynamics is maybe a little bit more mid-market in the ERP space, but in particular for customer engagement solutions I think we've got a very strong enterprise product and we're growing very, very fast.

I think we've kind of talked about the cloud growth that we've had obviously with Azure and Office 365, Dynamics has been on an absolute tear as well.  And we see huge upside with that.  And the exciting part, we've announced plans to acquire LinkedIn.  It's not complete yet, so kind of all the standard caveats there.  But the interesting thing, assuming regulatory approval and all the right caveats Zack wants me to say, the signal that you get from a professional graph, say for example from LinkedIn, where you know who knows who, each other, you know the relationships, you know their skill sets, you know who they worked with in the past.

The insight you get from a sales reps' or customer service reps' inbox with Exchange and what we have in Office 365, the insight you get from someone's calendar, and even with Skype all of their phone and voice communications and IM traffic, you take all that together and have a cloud that can do deep insight and analytics and machine learning and AI on top of that.  You create the ultimate selling tool, the ultimate customer support tool in the industry because you have so much insight that can assist a sales rep or assist a customer service rep that no one other vendor can provide.

And we're very excited in terms of over the next year or so to make that really come to market.  And you'll see a lot more announcements and demos of that type of technology even in the next couple of weeks.

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Lost Odyssey (and more) come to Xbox One via Backwards Compatibility

The Xbox One Backwards Compatibility program lets you play a variety of Xbox 360 games on your Xbox One, and it keeps on growing. The last addition to the program was Call of Duty 3, and now three more games are joining the fray. The most important (and most requested) one of today's batch happens to be Lost Odyssey, a Japanese RPG which initially came to the west back in 2008. The other titles in today's lineup are Toy Story 3 and Guwange, which should be nice for anyone who owns Guwange.

Lost Odyssey stars Kaim, an immortal being suffering from amnesia. It's a traditional turn based JRPG, and like a good deal of those, it'll take you a long, long time to get through it. It's a game that will definitely appeal to most people who enjoy some good, lengthy turn based fun. Sadly, though, it's disc only, and will run you over $70 for a new copy on Amazon.

Toy Story 3 is a movie tie in game, and it's probably the least interesting of the bunch. That being said, though, for a movie tie in game, it's generally considered a good movie tie in game. It's a platformer that follows the plot of the movie, and might be a nice game to play if you're either a big fan of the movies or have kids. If you'd like to buy it from the Xbox Store, you can find it here.

Guwange is a classic shoot 'em up Cave, a company famous for making games in that genre. It's a port of the 1999 arcade version of the game, and you can find it in the Xbox Store here.

Do you already own any of these games, or are you going to buy them now? Are you excited to play them on your Xbox One? Let us know in the comments below!

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Microsoft’s Rajesh Jha joins the Senior Leadership team, will lead the new Office Product Group

Microsoft today announced some changes to its Senior Leadership Team, following the departure of Qi Lu, who has the Executive Vice President of Applications and Services Group at the firm. The company today announced a new AI & Research Group which will be led forward by Harry Shum, who was previously Executive Vice President of Microsoft Research. In an internal email, Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella stated that the new AI and Research Group will include some key engineering teams from the Applications and Services Group, including Microsoft Research, Robotics, Ambient Computing, Cortana, and Bing. Nadella stated:

"To accelerate this vision, I have asked Harry Shum to lead the Microsoft AI and Research Group, bringing together for the first time our world-class research organization alongside all our AI product efforts. David Ku and the Information Platform Group along with Derrick Connell and the Bing and Cortana Engineering Group will now report to Harry. Vijay Mital and the Ambient Computing and Robotics Team will also be joining Harry's team."

Now, Nadella has also announced that Rajesh Jha is joining the Senior Leadership Team at Microsoft today. Jha is also going to be leading the new Office Product Group — where he'll be reporting to Satya Nadella. In addition to this, Microsoft's Gurdeep Pall is transitioning the Skype team to Rajesh Jha's Office Product Group as well. Interestingly enough though, Nadella is yet to reveal where Skype's previous leader Gurdeep Singh Pall will be heading — but we'll likely know more about Gurdeep's new role pretty soon. Nadella added:

"Rajesh Jha will step into the role of leading the Office Product Group reporting directly to me and joining the SLT starting today. Julie Larson-Green and Eran Megiddo will continue in their current and existing charters, reporting to Rajesh. Gurdeep Singh Pall and I have decided this is the right time for him to transition to his next role. Gurdeep will transition the Skype team to Rajesh over the coming weeks."

Microsoft is putting a lot of focus into artificial intelligence, and the company's new Microsoft AI and Research Group is a perfect example of that. 5 thousand of Microsoft's employees will be working on the AI and Research Group, and that's quite a huge investment, to say the least. It's clear Microsoft's Satya Nadella is betting big on artificial intelligence, and the outcome could potentially have a huge outcome for the software giant's future.

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Satya Nadella’s email to Microsoft employees regarding the new AI and Research group

Microsoft today announced that it has formed the new Microsoft AI and Research Group to expand its AI efforts. They are bringing together Microsoft Research with more than 5,000 computer scientists and engineers focused on the company's AI product efforts. They also confirmed that Qi Lu, Executive Vice President of Applications and Services Group inside Microsoft is leaving the company due to health issues. Satya Nadella today sent an email to Microsoft employees about this announcement.

AI and Research Group is formed out of teams from Microsoft Research, Bing and Cortana enginnering, Information Platform Group and Ambient Computing and Robotics team. The rest of the Application and Services Group is now called Office Product Group which includes Office apps, Skype and few others. Rajesh Jha will step into the role of leading the Office Product Group reporting directly to Satya. Gurdeep will transition the Skype team to Rajesh over the coming weeks and he will moving to a new role soon.

Read his full email below.

From: Satya Nadella
Sent: Thursday, September 29, 2016 6:01 AM
Subject: Senior Leadership Team Update

Today, I want to share key senior leadership changes.

First, my friend and colleague Qi Lu has made a difficult and very personal decision to leave Microsoft to focus all his time on recovering from health conditions caused by a prior injury. Once Qi recovers, he will continue to serve as a personal advisor to Bill Gates and me. I wish Qi a full and fast recovery in the coming months, and want to thank him for all he has done for Microsoft.

Over the years, I've worked closely with Qi – first as an engineering leader within Bing, later as fellow members of the SLT, and most recently as he led ASG to new heights. The groundbreaking work Qi led during his eight years resulted in many product advances and built the foundation for future innovation across Microsoft. Qi exemplifies what it means to have a deep sense of mission, purpose and authenticity in everything one does. His greatest impact is the people he has inspired. I count myself among them.

As we look ahead, this week at Ignite I focused my keynote on democratizing AI for every person and every organization on the planet. We are on the cusp of a paradigm shift in computing that is unlike anything we have seen in decades. This will lead to artificial intelligence (AI) being infused broadly into our computing platforms and experiences. Advanced algorithms, hyper-scale compute capacity, and the ability to work across massive data sets are what enable us to drive this change in everything we do for customers.

To accelerate this vision, I have asked Harry Shum to lead the Microsoft AI and Research Group, bringing together for the first time our world-class research organization alongside all our AI product efforts. David Ku and the Information Platform Group along with Derrick Connell and the Bing and Cortana Engineering Group will now report to Harry. Vijay Mital and the Ambient Computing and Robotics Team will also be joining Harry's team.

Rajesh Jha will step into the role of leading the Office Product Group reporting directly to me and joining the SLT starting today. Julie Larson-Green and Eran Megiddo will continue in their current and existing charters, reporting to Rajesh. Gurdeep Singh Pall and I have decided this is the right time for him to transition to his next role. Gurdeep will transition the Skype team to Rajesh over the coming weeks.

We have great momentum with Office 365 in both our business results and product innovation and have made dramatic strides in our evolution to offer productivity and communications as a service. We have much to do in support of our ambition to reinvent productivity, and I am counting on this team to move forward with boldness and urgency.

We live in a time when digital technology is impacting, and indeed transforming, every human endeavor and each of our customers. Our mission to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more continues to guide all we do. It is through our mission and activating a growth mindset culture that will enable us to accelerate digital transformation both within our own company and in partnership with our customers.

Finally, I hope you join me for a special Monthly Q&A today at 9:00 a.m. PT. Harry, Rajesh and I look forward to sharing more and taking your questions.

Satya

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Quantum Break will be available on Steam today

It was announced a few months back that Remedy Entertainment was bringing Quantum Break to Steam (and by extension, both Windows 7 and Windows 8.x), and the wait's almost over. The game will be out just a little bit later today, and it'll only cost $40 when it does.

This isn't the first time that Quantum Break's gotten a PC release. It originally launched for both the Xbox One and Windows 10, and was essentially a trial run for what became the Xbox Play Anywhere program. Xbox One copies of the game came with codes to redeem for the Windows 10 version, which some saw as an attempt to increase the popularity of gaming on the Windows Store.

Phil Spencer promised that more Microsoft games would start showing up on Steam a while ago, and Quantum Break's hopefully just the first. Spencer said that Steam was "an important independent software vendor for us on Windows", and that "I think it (Steam) will be bigger a year from now than it is today. And five years later it will still be bigger again."

Those are certainly positive words, and they're still very accurate ones. Steam is quite possibly the biggest force in PC gaming, with any attempts to compete against it (including Microsoft's own) failing to gain the same amount of momentum.

Quantum Break's system requirements aren't too different between its Windows Store version and the Steam release, which is to be expected, but there's one glaring difference: DirectX12 is no longer required. The Steam version simply requires DirectX11, which allows users on Windows 7 or 8 to play the game.

If you'd like to purchase Quantum Break on Steam, you can find it here. At the time of writing, however, there's an hour left until you can do that.

Are you excited to play Quantum Break on Steam, or have you already beaten the Xbox One or Windows 10 versions enough times? Let us know in the comments below!

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Microsoft to collaborate with Toyota in the 2017 FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) series

At the Paris Motor Show today, Toyota announced collaboration with Microsoft to collaborate in the 2017 FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) series. Microsoft will serve as a "technology partner" for the TOYOTA GAZOO Racing WRC rally team.

 Microsoft will support TOYOTA GAZOO Racing in three key areas:

• Development of a data analysis platform to gather, visualize and analyse various data related to driving which will be utilised in race activities.
• Creation of a team information-sharing system to allow team members to collaborate and share various materials such as images and videos efficiently and effectively using a cloud service.
• Enhancement of communication with fans through providing services utilizing the cloud and using Microsoft's display devices to provide them with a front-row motorsports experience.

It is important to note that Toyota and Microsoft already has partnership in developing Toyota Connected, a new user experience and product-development company aimed at expanding, collecting and analysing large amounts of vehicle data to help further improve quality, safety and the driving and ownership experience for Toyota customers.

Toyota President Akio Toyoda said: "I believe that, like Toyota, Microsoft aims to enrich society in meaningful ways. Based on the on-going partnership, we aim to further develop our people and enhance our cars through the use of IT in motorsports to promote 'ever-better cars'."

Toyota also mentioned that the Toyota Research Institute, Toyota Connected and Microsoft are united in their efforts to use cutting edge technology to establish safer, cleaner and more convenient mobility.

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Microsoft forming new AI and Research Group to expand its AI efforts

Microsoft today announced that it has formed the new Microsoft AI and Research Group to expand its AI efforts. They are bringing together Microsoft Research with more than 5,000 computer scientists and engineers focused on the company's AI product efforts. The new group will be led by Harry Shum, a 20-year Microsoft veteran who previosuly had leadership roles across Microsoft Research and Bing. He will be responsible for driving the Microsoft's overall AI strategy and forward-looking research and development efforts spanning infrastructure, services, apps and agents. He will oversee AI-focused product groups — the Information Platform Group, Bing and Cortana product groups — and the Ambient Computing and Robotics teams.

In addition to Shum, several of other engineering leaders and teams across Microsoft will join the newly formed group including Information Platform, Cortana and Bing, and Ambient Computing and Robotics teams led by David Ku, Derrick Connell and Vijay Mital, respectively. All combined, the Microsoft AI and Research Group will encompass AI product engineering, basic and applied research labs, and New Experiences and Technologies (NExT).

Satya Nadella's message regarding formation of this new group,

"We live in a time when digital technology is transforming our lives, businesses and the world, but also generating an exponential growth in data and information," said Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft. "At Microsoft, we are focused on empowering both people and organizations, by democratizing access to intelligence to help solve our most pressing challenges. To do this, we are infusing AI into everything we deliver across our computing platforms and experiences."

"Microsoft has been working in artificial intelligence since the beginning of Microsoft Research, and yet we've only begun to scratch the surface of what's possible," said Shum, executive vice president of the Microsoft AI and Research Group. "Today's move signifies Microsoft's commitment to deploying intelligent technology and democratizing AI in a way that changes our lives and the world around us for the better. We will significantly expand our efforts to empower people and organizations to achieve more with our tools, our software and services, and our powerful, global-scale cloud computing capabilities."

Microsoft is taking a four-pronged approach to its initiative to democratize AI:

• Agents. Harness AI to fundamentally change human and computer interaction through agents such as Microsoft's digital personal assistant Cortana
• Applications. Infuse every application, from the photo app on people's phones to Skype and Office 365, with intelligence
• Services. Make these same intelligent capabilities that are infused in Microsoft's apps —cognitive capabilities such as vision and speech, and machine analytics — available to every application developer in the world
• Infrastructure. Build the world's most powerful AI supercomputer with Azure and make it available to anyone, to enable people and organizations to harness its power

The Microsoft AI and Research Group is hiring for positions in its labs and offices worldwide.

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