Late yesterday afternoon, the Windows Insider team pushed out Build 16291 for Windows 10 Redstone 3 testers in the Fast Ring.
This build, like the last couple before it, is focused on system stability and performance as the company closes in on its global release of the Fall Creators Update on 17 October 2017.
In this build they activated a capability to resume web browsing from iPhone and Android devices using the Cortana app. This is in addition to the other sharing methods that exist for reminders, notifications, and SMS from your phone to Windows 10 devices.
There are six fixes in this build as well which continue the companies efforts to get the final code ready for public consumption.
Last week, when the company released Build 16288 to the Fast Ring and then a few days later to the Slow Ring an issue started to impact Surface Pro 3 users.
What would happen is that those devices would become unbootable after a shut down and would simply sit on the spinning dots progress screen. Many users opted to reformat/reset their device in the pursuit of correcting this issue but it appears that had mixed results.
Today, alongside of their announcement for the release of Build 16291, the Windows Insider team has provided a workaround that will allow those Surface Pro 3 users to get their systems booting again.
The workaround, which involves creating a bootable USB image from a working PC and executing a patch on your SP3 device, provides a clue about future Fast Ring builds of Redstone 3 prior to the Fall Creators Update's availability:
"We have a permanent fix for this issue in the build pipeline already. If your device has not hit this bug, it is still possible to in the short term if you have not run the above script. We will have a permanent fix with no required workaround steps in our next flighted build that is 16294 or greater."
So there is at least one more release coming to Fast Ring Insiders over the next couple of weeks to ship out and test that Surface Pro 3 patch on a broader scale.
That build will be at least 16294 or higher. Of course, from 16291 that could happen in one release or they might go to 16292 or 16293 as interim updates but they would require the workaround ahead of 16294's release. I expect they will avoid asking users to perform the workaround multiple times.
In order to get upgraded to Build 16291, you will need to perform this workaround on 16288 then upgrade to 16291. After that upgrade is complete you will need the workaround one more time to stabilize 16291. At this point you should be good until 16294 or higher is released in the next week or two.
However, something tells me they will likely flight 16294 as the next build for Windows Insiders and if that fixes up the Surface Pro 3 issue then it could be almost time to consider that build as a candidate for the final bits of the Fall Creators Update.
I am also a fan of this sequence of builds because it keeps my own prognostication intact:
"I will be sticking with my prediction that the final Fall Creators Update build will be in between build 16290 and 16300."
Did you experience issues with your Surface Pro 3? let us know how the workaround worked on your system.
----------
But, wait...there's probably more so be sure to follow me on Twitter and Google+.
