Most modern SSDs come with some form of hardware encryption. On these drives with hardware encryption, it’s usually permanently turned on - all data written to the NAND is typically stored in encrypted form. This stems from the fact that all writes to NAND had to be scrambled to begin with (writing long repeated strings of data to NAND can cause problems for data retention). The earliest implementations weren’t sophisticated enough to be considered real encryption, but these days it’s not uncommon to see hardware AES-128/256 support. The bad news has been that relying on OS driven filesystem encryption always meant the use of software encryption on top of your drive’s native encryption. This was particularly a problem on SandForce based drives, where full disk...

Futuremark Announces 3DMark for Windows 8

Windows 8 will bring with it a variety of changes—all of our Windows 8 coverage to date will give you the quick overview, but features such as the new...

2 by Jarred Walton on 11/14/2011

Windows 8 Task Manager Features Improved UI for Multiple CPUs

Microsoft's Ryan Haveson takes to the Building Windows 8 blog today to give us one of our first looks at a Windows 8 feature not included in the Developer...

36 by Andrew Cunningham on 10/27/2011

Windows 8 To Use Less Memory Than Windows 7

One of Microsoft's stated goals for Windows 8 is for it to run on any system capable of running Windows 7, which at a minimum will require the its...

71 by Andrew Cunningham on 10/7/2011

Microsoft Details SkyDrive Integration for Third-Party Developers

Microsoft's Mike Torres digs into some code today on the Building Windows 8 blog, showing third-party developers how to integrate SkyDrive functionality into their programs using the Windows Live...

4 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/28/2011

Windows 8 Syncs Settings Between Systems Using Windows Live ID

Today on the Building Windows 8 blog, Katie Frigon explains how user settings, Metro apps purchased through the Windows app store, and other data can be synced across Windows...

4 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/26/2011

Microsoft Details Revamped Windows 8 Boot and Diagnostic Menus

In the latest Building Windows 8 blog post, Microsoft's Billie Sue Chafins details some of the improvements and changes made to Windows' boot and diagnostic screens to make them...

8 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/21/2011

Windows 8 Malware Protection Detailed

Every new version of Windows has done something to help alleviate the platform's chronic malware problem, and Windows 8 will be no different: Microsoft's Jason Garms takes to the...

13 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/15/2011

Metro Internet Explorer 10 to be Plug-in Free

When using the browser's Metro interface, Internet Explorer 10 will be completely plug-in free, says Microsoft's Dean Hachamovitch on the Building Windows 8 blog. The new browser will depend...

15 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/15/2011

A look at Windows 8 Tablets running on TI, Qualcomm, Nvidia, AMD and Intel silicon

This afternoon (and yesterday) we had a chance to meet with a number of SoC vendors who have partnered with Microsoft for Windows 8. Each of them has their...

94 by Brian Klug on 9/14/2011

BUILD: Details On Direct3D 11.1

We're currently sitting in a Microsoft session on DirectX in Metro, where Microsoft is discussing the improvements they've made to DirectX for use with Metro. Every individual DirectX graphics...

18 by Ryan Smith on 9/14/2011

New Server Manager Shown Off for Windows Server 8

Ryan and I are on the floor at Microsoft BUILD for day two, where Windows Server 8 is the subject. There's still more for the keynote, but Microsoft briefly...

5 by Brian Klug on 9/14/2011

Xbox Live Coming to Windows 8

Microsoft’s Major Nelson confirmed yesterday that Xbox Live will officially come to PCs with Windows 8. “Bringing Xbox LIVE to Windows 8 is part of our vision to bring you...

14 by Craig Getting on 9/14/2011

Windows 8 Developer Preview Available for Everyone at 8 PM PST

At BUILD today Microsoft just announced that the same version of Windows 8 Developer Preview we've been using on Samsung tablets for the past day will be available at...

9 by Brian Klug on 9/13/2011

Microsoft BUILD: Windows 8, A Pre-Beta Preview

We’re here in Anaheim, California at Microsoft’s BUILD conference. As has become tradition Microsoft has been holding major developer conferences for their new OSes roughly a year ahead of...

236 by Brian Klug & Ryan Smith on 9/13/2011

Windows 8 Features Vastly Improved Boot Times

Windows 8 news continues to trickle from the Building Windows 8 blog at a steady clip: today, Gabe Aul detailed changes to the Windows 8 boot process that promise...

52 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/9/2011

Microsoft Integrating Hyper-V Into Windows 8 Client

Microsoft is beefing up virtualization support in Windows 8 with Hyper-V, writes Microsoft's Mathew John on the Building Windows 8 blog. Hyper-V was previously available in Windows Server 2008...

9 by Andrew Cunningham on 9/7/2011

Microsoft Explains Relationship Between Windows 8 User Interfaces

Today's Building Windows 8 blog post, written by Steven Sinofsky, isn't really about a new Windows 8 feature or tweak, but rather about how the new-style Metro tablet UI...

21 by Andrew Cunningham on 8/31/2011

Windows 8 Improves Native Support for ISO, VHD Files

Today's Building Windows 8 blog post is from Rajeev Nagar, and describes how Windows 8 can natively mount and work with files stored in ISO and VHD files. For those...

16 by Andrew Cunningham on 8/30/2011

Windows Explorer Gets Ribbon Interface in Windows 8

The Windows 8 details continue: Today on the Building Windows 8 blog, Alex Simons takes us through some changes to the Windows Explorer, chief among them the fact that...

45 by Andrew Cunningham on 8/29/2011

Windows 8 Aims to Improve File Copy Operations

The trickle of Windows 8 news continues ahead of next month's BUILD conference: today on the Building Windows 8 Blog, Microsoft's Alex Simons detailed several improvements to the way...

37 by Andrew Cunningham on 8/24/2011

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