Way too many bugs, way too few official patches

May 24, 2018 12:22 GMT  ·  By

Windows 10 April 2018 Update was one highly-anticipated release that Microsoft somehow handled differently than the previous OS feature updates.

As compared to Creators Update and the Fall Creators Update, Microsoft remained tight-lipped on the name of the new Windows 10 version until the very last minute, while also not sharing launch date specifics as early as it used to.

Instead, the April 2018 Update, which was first supposed to launch as Spring Creators Update, became the first Windows 10 version believed to have been delayed after Microsoft discovered a blocking bug literally only a few days ahead of the planned release.

Despite holding it back and launching it later than originally projected, the April 2018 Update is far from being a flawless feature update, instead doing more harm than good on users’ PCs.

Available since April 30 as a manual download and May 8 as an automatic release on Windows Update for eligible devices, Windows 10 version 1803 is pretty much the buggiest product that Microsoft has released in a long time, and the number of issues that users come across seems to be increasing with every hour.

The reported problems concern not only OS performance and apps, but also the overall stability of systems, with some even bricking devices to the point where only a clean reinstall of Windows 10 restores full functionality. Microsoft itself acknowledged several bugs, including one that breaks down computers and pushes them to a blank desktop, but when it comes to fixes, the company is shockingly slow.

Since the official rollout started earlier this month, Microsoft shipped only two different cumulative updates, and some of the biggest annoyances of the new OS version are still not resolved. Furthermore, the company has also remained completely tight-lipped on several of the most widespread issues, pretty much letting users all on their own in their struggle to get smooth performance in Windows 10 April 2018 Update.

Windows 10 April 2018 Update delayed.

Until now, the experience with Windows 10 version 1803 has been mixed and it depends on how lucky you are when you perform the upgrade. While in my case I haven’t seen a single bug so far in the April 2018 Update, others are hitting them all, complaining of everything from little issues breaking down Fluent Design in the Start menu to serious problems that eventually lead to BSODs and force them to reboot computers and lose their work.

Needless to say, this slow reaction of the Windows team mixed with the continuously increasing number of bugs have made many think that Microsoft barely conducts any testing before pushing Windows 10 updates to users worldwide. This would be odd, to say the least, as this is exactly the purpose of the Windows Insider program, which helps Microsoft not only develop new features for Windows 10, but also find bugs and fix them before new updates make it to production devices.

In the case of the April 2018 Update, development started just after the release of the Fall Creators Update in the fall of 2017 and was completed only weeks before its public launch, so by the looks of things, the Windows team had enough time to hunt down all these problems and make sure users are provided with flawless experience.

And yet, this isn’t the case, and while it’s pretty hard to tell what exactly happened and who’s responsible for the disappointing performance that some users are seeing, others are wondering whether releasing two feature updates for Windows 10 every year isn’t actually too much.

Microsoft appears to always be in a rush to finalize development of new Windows 10 updates, and some features are pushed back just because the company needs more time to get everything ready. But when rapid release cycle also compromises the stability and performance of feature updates, everything gets worse.

It remains to be seen how Microsoft manages to deal with this always increasing number of bugs, but if anything, things aren’t going very well right now. The next Patch Tuesday takes place on June 12, and it better brings a huge cumulative update for April 2018 Update.