Microsoft

The new nine-piece collection created as part of a collaboration with Microsoft debuted at Ikea’s physical stores at the beginning of the month. But if you don’t have easy local access to meatballs and flatpack furniture, the Yxstaby collection, which includes accessories and furniture that draw inspiration from Xbox controllers, is now available through Ikea’s online store, too.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said earlier this month that we should assume that all AI models are “compromised,” and now Microsoft is going one step further. “Unfortunately, frontier models, regardless of their origin, cannot be trusted,” says Hayete Gallot, executive vice president of Microsoft Security. Microsoft is naturally positioning its new Project Perception as a solution to securing AI models. It’s an agentic security system designed to help cybersecurity professionals secure and control AI agents.

Reuters reports that Microsoft pulled out of the deal with British company Nscale to build the AI data center after local electricity grid officials said the site won’t be supplied with power until the 2030s. Construction is still expected to go ahead without Microsoft’s support, and Nscale says it’s partnership with Microsoft on other projects “remains strong.”

It shared a prototype demo for “seamless updates” that wouldn’t require you to restart your browser. That feature’s still in development, but in the meantime Microsoft also says Edge users can opt-in for “Restart to update on idle,” which was previously called “Instant Updates.”

The collection celebrating Xbox’s 25th anniversary includes games like The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition, Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition, Minecraft Dungeons, and Gears of War: Reloaded. Microsoft says you can also play some of the free games on Xbox Series X/S with Xbox Play Anywhere.

NBA 2K27 is debuting on the Xbox store on PC this week, and as part of the launch it’s becoming an Xbox Anywhere title. That means if you purchased the game on an Xbox console already, you’ll get the PC copy free from the Microsoft Store and vice versa. Microsoft has been pushing Xbox Play Anywhere for years, and hit a milestone of 1,000 titles last year — ahead of the next-gen Project Helix console.

When Asus briefed me on the ExpertBook A7, reps told me the $899 entry-level config will launch in January with 8GB of RAM. Turns out, Asus decided to switch that to 12GB for the same $899 price — but failed to clarify that with us.

The app already lets you lock your Windows computer, but a beta version has a new Power menu with options to lock, sleep, shut down, or restart your PC, Android Authority reports. Could be handy if you need to power your computer down while you’re away from it.

I’m testing Microsoft’s new RTX Spark-powered laptop at the moment, and I’ll have some impressions on it later this week. I’d like to hear what you’d like to know about this particular laptop, so please drop a comment below and I’ll try and include answers in my initial impressions.

Apparently, after large language models and agents, we’re now in the age of “decision models,” as Microsoft has announced Microsoft-Decision-1 just days after OpenAI highlighted its new Decisions API.

Tomorrow’s event will announce more than $1 billion in commitments for the Trump admin’s “Genesis Project” AI push and investments from the NSF and Energy Department, reports Axios, including $100 million in credits from something called National Compute.

What if we had an incredibly easy to snap-on and snap-off magnetic USB-C port? It’s a joy in person. It might still be proprietary, though: Microsoft is patenting the thing and isn’t quite saying whether it’ll let other manufacturers use it. Either way, you can plug any ol’ USB-C cable into the laptop’s female port.

Tough typo spotted in today’s Surface Laptop Ultra event.

The new preview feature in Microsoft’s Experimental Preview Build 26340.9616 shows battery levels for wireless headphones, keyboards, mice, and other accessories in one spot. That would make checking to see if my mouse is about to die way less of a hassle, compared to digging through different settings or accessory apps.