The next release of Windows 10 is Windows 10 Version 2004, and it is basically done. The build number stopped incrementing back in December, and ISOs were released in late February. Because the version number refers to April, I assume that the general public will need to wait at least a month. Usually updates would list March but launch in April or May, and list September but launch in either October or November.
Windows Central has a walkthrough video of the new, visible features. That is available below.
Beyond these points, developers may also like the upgraded Windows Subsystem for Linux.
One of the core reasons for Windows 10 is that it cannot have weird permutations of installed updates. The OS continually rolls forward with (now) six months between major updates, and patches that roll the previous milestone(s) ahead. This should theoretically make it easier for Microsoft to know the state of any given machine – it’s some base with some most-recent patch date.
Interestingly, Ed Bott seems to suggest that users can keep older versions of Windows 10 hanging around. The two 19xx releases, 1903 and 1909, have until December 2020 and May 2021, respectively, although I’m not sure if they will be pushed into updating before that time.
I was under the impression that spring updates would be considered canonical, but autumn releases would be optional, and the two would share hotfixes. That appears to be some level of incorrect, and users might be able to choose to stay on the earlier versions until they go end of life.
That said, I will be keeping up with the new features as they are made available.
While yes, it could be released to everyone* in April, and it was delayed last year, according to Windows Weekly (which might not necessarily be correct), it was given “2004” to help keep away confusion with Windows Server 2003.
That’s what I read, too.
This video doesn’t mention WDDM 2.7 launching in 20H1/2004 and its benefits for high refresh rate monitors.
Spent a hearty 40% on the Start Menu, though. ☹️
Some info here: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Windows-10-2004-20H1-finally-gets-multi-monitor-refresh-rates-right.454143.0.html
Oh snap that issue drives me nuts. I thought it was driver-related, not driver model-related. Nice!
I have been around Windows since ver.. 1. It was flakey then and is still flakey today. I have seen numerous underhanded practices committed by Microsoft; such as holding back proper API’s to third party developers to decrease the performance of their software. Even to this day, why does the hard drive sound like it is downloading the whole hard drive while using Windows 10?
I am waiting for the day when Windows will become a monthly subscription base OS.
So, Win10 versions come with roughtly 18 months of support?
I updated to 2004 today and had no start menu and no notifications. Control Panel was not accessible. Tried 5 different ways to roll back and ended up resetting my PC and removing everything except data. Still no Start menu and Explorer completely broken. Am now installing 1909 from scratch and then all my apps again, I guess. Beware. Never had it this bad before