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ZDNET’s key takeaways
- The brand new yr has introduced new bugs to Home windows.
- Lots of the newest bugs had been brought on by the January replace.
- Some bugs have been fastened, however others stay unresolved.
A brand new yr, a brand new spherical of bugs to frustrate Home windows customers. The main perpetrator up to now? Microsoft’s personal January Patch Tuesday replace.
Launched on Jan. 13, the primary main Home windows replace of the yr had a transparent mission — to resolve the 114 safety vulnerabilities placing Home windows customers in danger. A number of of those had been rated vital, whereas one had already been exploited within the wild. Plus, the January replace fastened just a few excellent points in Home windows itself.
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OK, that is the excellent news. Now for the unhealthy. This new replace has additionally triggered a number of bugs of its personal. Some have been resolved, however others proceed on their merry manner. Let’s have a look.
Distant Desktop bug
In one glitch, some individuals ran into sign-in issues attempting to remotely connect with a Cloud PC by way of Microsoft’s Distant Desktop. Particularly, the difficulty affected the authentication required for varied Distant Desktop apps, together with the Home windows app. This one affected Home windows 11 25H2, Home windows 10 22H2 ESU, and Home windows Server 2025.
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To resolve this bug, Microsoft rolled out an out-of-band patch on Jan. 17. That patch will seem in Home windows Replace, however provided that your model of Home windows qualifies and is affected by the particular challenge.
Safe Launch bug
In one other glitch, some methods with Safe Launch enabled would restart as an alternative of shutting down or going into hibernation mode. Much like Safe Boot, Safe Launch protects your PC from bootkit malware that tries to contaminate your system earlier than Home windows hundreds. However whereas Safe Boot is meant for private and work computer systems, Safe Launch is designed for managed PCs in a corporation. This one impacted solely Home windows 11 23H2.
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The Jan. 17 patch additionally squashed this bug. Once more, the repair will seem in Home windows Replace provided that your Home windows model qualifies and your laptop is affected.
Traditional Outlook freeze
Additionally brought on by the Jan. 13 replace, the third bug clobbers the traditional taste of Microsoft Outlook. Making an attempt to open Outlook triggers a “Not Responding” message. You’ll be able to’t even try to open or reopen Outlook with out ending its course of in Process Supervisor or restarting the PC. If you will get into this system, emails do not seem within the Despatched Objects folder despite the fact that they have been despatched. Plus, Outlook retains redownloading the identical emails.
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This bug appears to have an effect on Outlook customers with PST information saved on OneDrive. The problem additionally impacts all kinds of Home windows variations, together with Home windows 11 25H2, Home windows 11 24H2, Home windows 11 23H2, Home windows 10 22H2, Home windows 10 Enterprise LTSC 2021, Home windows 10 Enterprise LTSC 2019, Home windows Server 2025, Home windows Server 23H2, Home windows Server 2022, and Home windows Server 2019.
Initially, Microsoft had no repair for this one however did counsel just a few momentary workarounds, corresponding to utilizing the online model of Outlook as an alternative of the desktop consumer or transferring your PSTs out of OneDrive and saving them in a distinct spot. However there’s now no want for these maneuvers, as the corporate has rolled out a repair by means of a second emergency patch for January. Putting in KB5078127 for Home windows 11 25H2 and 24H2 or KB5073455 for Home windows 11 23H2 resolves this downside.
Apps cannot deal with knowledge within the cloud
Here is one other bug associated to the Outlook glitch. Additionally triggered by the Jan. 13 replace, this challenge might trigger some apps to freeze or set off an error once you attempt to open information from or save them to cloud-based storage corresponding to OneDrive or Dropbox. This one impacts the identical variations of Home windows because the Outlook downside. Once more, putting in KB5078127 for Home windows 11 25H2 and 24H2 or KB5073455 for Home windows 11 23H2 fixes this one.
Home windows 11 bootup glitch
One other bug brought on by the January replace, this one has been stopping a restricted variety of Home windows computer systems from booting up. Impacting Home windows 11 25H2 and 24H2, the bug triggers a black display screen upon bootup and shows a cease code pointing to an unmountable boot quantity. In case you’re affected, you will not have the ability to launch Home windows and will have to make use of Home windows Restoration to revive your setting. Microsoft mentioned that it’s investigating the issue however has no repair at this level.
Home windows apps will not open
Here is one other inconsistent however annoying bug, as described by Sean Endicott at Home windows Central. Attempt to open sure apps, together with Notepad, the Snipping Device, the Armoury Crate software program on ASUS computer systems, or the Alienware Command Heart, and chances are you’ll obtain an error code dubbed 0x803f8001.
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Based mostly on a response from an impartial advisor named Harold Milan to a discussion board publish from an affected person, this error usually pops up when the Microsoft Retailer cannot validate a license. This may very well be because of a corrupted Retailer cache, a brief Microsoft account sync challenge, or a Retailer registration glitch, Milan defined.
Microsoft hasn’t chimed in on this downside. However Home windows Central senior editor Ben Wilson mentioned that the Jan. 13 patch really fastened this on his Home windows 11 laptop, permitting him to launch his apps usually.
The highway forward
Home windows 11 has confronted a tough highway, particularly with the discharge of 24H2 in October 2024. All through the primary half of 2025, Microsoft and Home windows customers needed to grapple with a bunch of bugs, nearly one after the opposite. Even worse, most of the glitches had been brought on by Microsoft’s personal Home windows updates. By attempting to repair one set of bugs, these updates created new ones.
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With the launch of 25H2 in October 2025, Microsoft appeared to have fastened many of the excellent points. That was particularly necessary, as that month marked the official finish of assist for Home windows 10. With just one supported consumer model of Home windows, the onus has been on the corporate to ensure the OS is as steady and dependable as attainable. However clearly that is not taking place, not when common Home windows updates which are supposed to repair issues find yourself inflicting new ones.
