Build 14257 for Windows 10 hits fast ring with one big, nasty known problem

By Jon Martindale February 4, 2016

Windows 10 — Greg Mombert/Digital Trends

Not every Windows 10 build is going to be a game changer, but that doesn’t mean they’re any less important. Build 14257 is one such example, and it’s now been pushed out to fast ring Windows Insiders to get their early-adopting mits on.

Coming along with the update was a caveat by the head of the Windows Insider program, Microsoft’s Gabe Aul. He said that the reason there were no big changes in this release, is because it’s the beginning of a new developmental cycle.

“Teams are still early in their new feature work and changes in this build are mostly about laying the foundation for those features to start coming into builds,” he said.

This build also comes as part of the new, faster-fast ring developments, which does mean that incremental updates will be more common, and larger feature releases will happen less frequently.

This means that fast ring early adopters will have more to play with on a regular basis, which is always fun, and in turn means Microsoft can worry less about QA testing as the external testing rings can handle more of the leg work there.

But that also means testers in the fast ring will have to put up with more problems, and 14257 has plenty of them:

If you choose “Reset this PC in the recovery settings, it makes your copy of Windows unusable and must be reinstalled.

Sometimes a WSClient.dll error message appears on startup.

Front facing cameras are unusable on PCs with Intel RealSense, which also renders Windows Hello inoperable.

UI issues sometimes cause Airplane Mode to appear to be enabled even when it isn’t.

Although the first issue on that list is potentially the most damaging to your install, the lack of RealSense camera support is problematic for anyone using Windows Hello. Fortunately Microsoft has pledged to release fixes for all of these shortly, most probably in the next build.

Microsoft also released a ninja monkey to celebrate the year of the Monkey. This is apparently becoming a tradition — last year, Microsoft released several wallpapers featuring a ninja cat. You can download the wallpapers here to give your rig some Windows 10 street cred.

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