It's been more than two years since the last major Windows event, so Microsoft is heading to San Francisco next month to outline the future of Windows and Surface devices. At an event on October 7th, the company says it will host a "conversation on how local AI will shape the next chapter of the PC."

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella will be in attendance, alongside Windows and Surface chief Pavan Davuluri. Even Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang will be appearing at the event, which suggests that RTX Spark PCs could be the main focus of this event. If that's the case, don't be surprised to hear more about the Microsoft Surface Laptop Ultra pricing and avai …

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Microsoft is starting to test some new Xbox console features with Insiders. Testers will be able to try out custom Xbox boot animations from the past, more personalization options for badges, a new local search feature, improved Remote Play quality, the ability to download while you play on cloud, and clearer voice chat.

Xbox testers will be able to pick between the original Xbox One boot screen, the Xbox One X startup animation, the original Xbox Series X / S boot, and the new "we are Xbox" boot animation. Unfortunately you won't be able to select the original Xbox or Xbox 360 boot animations, it's only Xbox One onwards.

The new local sea …

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Xbox is closing down Ninja Theory, the studio behind the Hellblade series, a source tells The Verge. Staffers were told on a call on Monday about the closure, but they are hoping the studio will find a buyer. The closure comes as "several" Xbox studios at Microsoft, including Compulsion Games and Double Fine, are in "active negotiations" about spinning off, Bloomberg reports.

The closure and negotiations follow Xbox CEO Asha Sharma and chief content officer Matt Booty warning last week of a "reset" at Xbox, laying out several challenges facing Xbox's business - including that it had "over extended" with its studio system and the hardware c …

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Microsoft's Xbox division will be hit with significant layoffs next month, according to people familiar with Microsoft's plans.

The company has been preparing for the layoffs internally for weeks, with Xbox CEO Asha Sharma hinting about "making hard choices" last month. Sources suggest the cuts could even involve a studio closure, or changes to the Xbox studio lineup. In a recent Giant Bomb episode, rumors of 1,000 layoffs for Microsoft's Xbox division were mentioned. Bloomberg also reported today that the cuts would be "major," and involve budget cuts for marketing and other areas of Microsoft's Xbox business.

Moments before Bloomberg's r …

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Anthropic released Claude Fable, its first Mythos-class AI model, yesterday and it's already causing concerns inside Microsoft. Sources tell me that Microsoft is limiting the use of Claude Fable 5 for employees because of Anthropic's new data retention requirements.

While Microsoft quickly rolled out Claude Fable 5 to its GitHub Copilot and Foundry customers, I'm told the model isn't available in the model picker that Microsoft employees use for internal versions of GitHub Copilot. All other Claude models are still available internally at Microsoft, because they operate under Zero Data Retention (ZDR) rules.

I understand that Microsoft ha …

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The RAMageddon crisis has got Microsoft rethinking its Xbox console hardware business. Xbox CEO Asha Sharma and Xbox strategy chief Matthew Ball have both revealed this week that Microsoft is reevaluating plans for its next-generation Project Helix console and exploring "radically different" console business models in the meantime.

"We are working very hard to rethink everything that we can about Helix, which is a console we are committed to shipping, and we are very cognizant of the ways in which we need to change as a company to make sure it is affordable, to make sure that it's flexible," said Ball in an interview with The Game Business …

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Microsoft's Office 2019 apps for Mac will stop working next month, because the company isn't renewing a certificate that validates Office licenses. Owners of Office 2019 for Mac are being warned they'll have to purchase Office 2024 or a Microsoft 365 subscription if they want to continue editing documents.

Microsoft previously promised that "all your Office 2019 apps will continue to function," when it announced end of support in 2023. The company then quietly updated that support note last month to remove the mention of apps continuing to function, replacing it with "Rest assured that all your Office 2019 apps won't lose any data."

Starti …

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