KB5089553

Microsoft has released cumulative update KB5089553 (build 26300.8497) for Windows 11 version 25H2, intended for Insiders on the Dev Channel. This update brings several significant improvements to accessibility, printing, and voice control, as well as a number of important fixes.

• Narrator and HID Braille displays. Braille displays now connect to Narrator instantly thanks to support for the HID standard. This is an open industry standard that allows compatible displays (e.g., Orbit Reader 20, Orbit Slate 340, Freedom Scientific Focus 40, APH Mantis Q40) to connect via USB with plug-and-play functionality without additional setup. Over Bluetooth, the display pairs in the standard way under Settings > Bluetooth & devices. HID Braille displays now work via USB already during the initial Windows setup phase (OOBE), allowing deaf-blind users to set up their PC independently from the first screen. Braille input and output settings can be changed under Settings > Accessibility > Narrator > Braille.
• Screen color tint. A new accessibility parameter that applies a color overlay to the entire display, softening its intensity to reduce eye strain and increased light sensitivity throughout the day. Under Settings > Accessibility (Win + U) in the Vision section, you can choose one of six preset colors or set your own, as well as adjust the tint intensity. Unlike Night light, which reduces blue glow to improve sleep, Screen color tint reduces the overall image intensity; they can be used simultaneously. Enabling Screen color tint disables color filters, and vice versa.
• Magnifier: touch scroll bars. Touch scroll bars in Magnifier are now disabled by default to provide a cleaner, less distracting magnified view on touch devices. Users who prefer these bars for navigation can re-enable them under Settings > Accessibility > Magnifier.
• Windows Ready Print (default printer installation management). Last month, Microsoft introduced a change where new printer installations use the IPP protocol by default to simplify setup and increase reliability (see the third-party driver deprecation schedule). This update adds a new toggle under Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Printers & scanners > Install printers by default using Windows Ready Print. When the toggle is on, Windows installs supported printers via IPP by default; when off, Windows may use other available installation methods. This feature is now called Windows Ready Print and aims to provide more uniform, reliable, and simple printing.
• Voice isolation in Voice Access. A new mode helps the feature focus on the user's voice by filtering out extraneous voices and background noise (e.g., in an office or at home with family). All processing happens locally on the device. Under Voice Access settings > Improve speech recognition, three modes are available: Voice isolation (requires a one-time voice setup – read a short paragraph aloud), Remove only background noise (e.g., keyboard typing, no setup required), and No filtering.

Known issues and fixes. The update fixes several issues from previous builds: resolved an issue where some Insiders did not see the IME candidate window when typing in Japanese or Chinese; fixed a cyclical explorer.exe crash (flashing and constant refreshing of the screen or Taskbar); addressed an issue of the Power Saver button appearing twice in Quick Settings; fixed the non-working Win + X shortcut and right-click on Start; fixed unexpected audio muting on certain devices. Also improved the reliability of Simple Service Discovery Protocol (SSDP) notifications, reducing the chance of service hangs, and increased the reliability of the dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth command.

Installation via Windows Update: go to Settings > Windows Update and click Check for updates. A computer restart is required to complete the installation.

How the new features work:

Narrator and HID Braille displays: Hardware support for the Human Interface Device protocol has been implemented, allowing Narrator to interact directly with the HID Braille class driver, bypassing third-party software layers. With a USB connection, the Plug and Play stack initiates instant device enumeration and loads the compatible usbhid.sys driver without manual setup. During OOBE, the BrailleRenderer service launches within WinPE, providing display output via serial interface from the initial setup screen. For Bluetooth connections, the standard HID over GATT profile is used, initialized through the BthLEEnum stack after pairing in Settings.

Screen color tint: The mechanism works as post-processing of the Desktop Window Manager's final framebuffer at the compositing level, applying a pixel shader based on a matrix of the chosen color and an alpha blending coefficient. The filter reduces overall brightness and colorimetric intensity by adjusting the gamma curve without altering blue light channel balance, unlike the Night light transformations that modify color temperature via LUT. Upon activation, the SetColorFilter system call is intercepted, disabling standard colorblindness filters to avoid render graph conflicts; however, parallel use with night mode is permitted due to independent rendering layers.

Magnifier: touch scroll bars: To optimize UX, the registry branch value responsible for auxiliary control element visibility within the Magnify.exe application context has been overridden. By default, the TouchScrollBarsVisible flag is set to FALSE, excluding scroll bar rendering in the magnified area overlay and minimizing content occlusion. Reactivation is performed by toggling the checkbox in the Accessibility interface, which triggers a WM_SETTINGCHANGE message broadcast to dynamically update the configuration without restarting the Magnifier process.

Windows Ready Print (default printer installation management): The print spooler service has been modified to prioritize the Internet Printing Protocol as the primary driver installation channel. The Settings toggle manipulates the RestrictDriverInstallationToIpp flag, forcing the spooler subsystem to ignore third-party vendor INF files and use the IPP Class Driver upon detecting a Mopria-compatible device. The automatic printer addition logic now queries the /ipp/print endpoint to retrieve attributes, bypassing WSD and TCP monoport monitors, thereby unifying the print stack and eliminating issues with legacy kernel-mode drivers.

Voice isolation in Voice Access: A multi-microphone beamforming module is activated, based on the AudioEndpointBuilder engine, using adaptive spectral filtering with deep learning. The DSP pipeline performs time-domain signal analysis to create a coherent mask that suppresses non-stationary noise and voices from side lobes of the beam pattern, passing only speech from the frontal sector. Neural network inference runs locally on the NPU or CPU via the Windows ML API, requiring a one-time calibration to build an acoustic fingerprint of the target speaker, unlike the noise suppression mode that removes only stationary sounds like keyboard clicks.

Known issues and fixes: Fixed a bug in TextInputHost.exe causing failure to render the IME candidate window for CJK languages due to a race condition when calling TF_GetCandidateList. Eliminated a cyclical explorer.exe crash caused by a corrupted pointer in the Shell icon pool, provoking recursive taskbar redraw resets and screen flickering. Resolved the duplicate Power Saver button issue in QuickActions by correcting the state binding in the BatterySaverAction provider. Restored the Win+X hotkey and Start context menu functionality broken by a fault in Progman. Addressed AudioDG.exe desynchronization causing unexpected muting. Improved ssdpsrv.dll stability by fixing SSDP socket timeouts to prevent service hangs. Increased Dism reliability for the /restorehealth operation by implementing retries for corrupted payload downloads.

The last 10 Windows updates: