Windows 11 Field Guide Update: Initial Progress on 23H2 Content

I’ve made some good progress on updating the Windows 11 Field Guide for version 23H2, mostly in the foundational beginning chapters. And while these updates are appearing on the web version of the book here on Thurrott.com roughly as they happen, I think I’ve figured out when I’ll be posting the first 23H2 update for the ebook version. Well, maybe not “when,” exactly, but what content needs to be completed before that can happen.

You may have noticed the chapter updates I’ve made over the past week or so. If not, you can find them on our Windows 11 Field Guide landing page.

So far, I’ve posted 9 completely updated chapters—What’s New and Familiar in Windows 11 Version 23H2, What’s Missing in Windows 11 Version 23H2, Windows 11 Version 23H2 Hardware Requirements and Recommendations, Upgrade from Windows 10 to Windows 11 Version 23H2, Upgrade to Windows 11 Version 23H2 on Unsupported Hardware, Create Windows 11 Version 23H2 Installation Media, Step-by-Step: Windows Setup First-Boot Experience, Step-By-Step: Windows Setup Out-of-Box Experience (OOBE), and Overcome Windows Setup Annoyances—representing the first three sections of the book: Get to Know Windows 11, Upgrade to Windows 11, and Install Windows 11, respectively.

There is more going on here than may be immediately obvious.

First and most importantly, to you, these are all new chapters on the site. This means that I didn’t just update the existing chapter articles, I replaced them. If you scroll down to the bottom of the Table of contents on the book landing page, you’ll find a new section called Archive – 22H2 that links to the original chapter articles.

Creating new chapter articles is no less tedious than editing the existing ones (and trust me, this is tedious). But I’m rethinking a lot of things here, and this seemed like the best approach. I’ve replaced “Windows 11” with “Windows 11 version 23H2” in titles where it makes sense to do so in so it’s clear what’s new.

I’ve reordered some things. For example, the Upgrade to Windows 11 section now comes before the Install Windows 11 section.

There is a lot of new content. Some of the more notable additions so far include:

• Almost every single screenshot—105 of them, so far—is brand new to this edition, and I’m switching to 16:10 shots where possible. (Some Setup shots taken in VMs can’t be scaled this way.)
• The What’s New and Familiar in Windows 11 Version 23H2 chapter now highlights new features that are unique to 23H2.
• There’s a new and simpler method for upgrading on unsupported hardware in that chapter.
• I added the super-clean Windows 11 install method I first wrote about in Roll Your Own Windows Time Machine (Premium) to the Overcome Windows Setup Annoyances chapter.
• This won’t appear on the site, but the ebook version has links to the most pertinent content in each of its chapters. For example:

I also verify everything in the book as I go. Each step in the OOBE, each workaround, whatever, has been tested multiple times in both virtual machines (VMs) and on physical PCs. I have reset my test PCs here in Mexico over a dozen times already. And I’ve recreated the 23H2 installation media at least six times so far.

This also won’t impact the web version of the book as all the callouts are identical there, but I’m doing a consistency pass on the callouts (Tip, Warning, etc.) in the book as I go to make sure they’re used the same way everywhere.

You get the idea, I assume, but the book will be better for all this work. It can get a bit tedious, but I’m making good progress. And as noted, I think I know now what will be completed before I will post the first 23H2 ebook update. I will keep updating existing chapters, most often in the order in which they appear. But I want to add two new chapters that cover Copilot and Windows Backup before publishing the ebook update. That’s not too horrible.

Beyond that, there will be new content throughout the book, of course, covering such things as passkeys, Dev Home, bloatware removal, the Windows Insider Program, Microsoft Edge for Business, the new Teams – Free app, Notepad, Paint, and more: I’ve been thinking about doing a chapter on properly configuring your Microsoft account, for example. There’s a lot going on here.

Finally, please check out the new chapter articles and provide feedback if possible: This is a great time to impact the book before these updates go out to the world.

Thanks!