Windows 10 continues to incorporate new features. 21H2 will arrive in the second half of the year, and Microsoft is introducing new features related to this version practically incessantly every week. This week we found changes related to the screen , the webcam , and the design of Sun Valley .
The first big change affects the adaptive brightness control function. This option is used to save battery in portable devices, reducing the maximum brightness of the screen if something is shown for example with a white background. This is only available for devices with the Content Adaptive Brightness Control (CABC) feature, and the problem is that its implementation was problematic. Among them, we found that color accuracy could be affected, causing photos not to be properly retouched.
Adaptive brightness and camera changes
Therefore, the 21H2 update will finally allow deactivating this option in the Display settings within the Configuration menu. There, we find a new box to deactivate the option to ” change the brightness automatically when the lighting changes “.
The second big change affects cameras. The Windows 10 Camera application is quite comfortable and simple to use, allowing us to quickly record video at the resolution and frames we want with the camera we connect. However, it does not allow many adjustments to the camera itself, and with 21H2 we will finally be able to change several of those settings.
To begin with, we can choose the camera we want as the default device in the event that we have several connected. At the same time, we can also adjust the brightness and contrast from the settings section, ideal to compensate if there is a very strong contrast in the room or if it looks too dark. We also have an advanced settings section where you can adjust the camera rotation, activate HDR mode in Windows, and activate the Eye Contact function.
Windows will alert us if someone is using the webcam
The webcam also receives the third big change, and that is now the operating system will notify us when there is a program or application accessing it . Currently, when an application accesses the microphone, the operating system notifies us in the taskbar with a microphone icon, but this did not happen with the camera. Now, an icon of a camera will appear, as well as the name of the application that is accessing the camera. Thanks to this, our privacy will be fully guaranteed at all times if we have a webcam with a microphone.
Other minor changes are the introduction to more users of the time bar in the lower right, in which, if we click, it will also show us recent news of the day. To test all these novelties in the stable version of Windows 10 we will have to wait at least until autumn.
