Windows Updates Break Administrator Account, FLAC Audio, and Windows Sandbox
The new year has barely begun, but more Windows 10 bugs have popped up. This time Microsoft has disabled built-in administrator accounts, caused problems with FLAC audio, and broken the new Sandbox feature along with Windows Defender Application Guard.
No Administrator For You
Most people haven’t enabled the built-in Administrator account at all, and it is disabled by default in Windows 10. So, as MSPoweruser notes, this only affects you if you’ve gone out of your way to enable that account.
Anyone who’s chosen to enable it probably expects it will still be there after upgrading. But, as explained on the Microsoft Taiwan blog, when you upgrade from the April 2018 Update to the October 2018 Update, the built-in Administrator account will be silently disabled if you have both the built-in administrator account activated and another administrator account present.
If you delete your local administrator account, you wouldn’t be able to gain administrator permissions on your PC. Microsoft says it plans a patch for sometime in January.
Where’s My FLACing Metadata?
According to MSPoweruser, FLAC support was already partially broken in the April 2018 Update. But only rating music and editing metadata was broken. You could still listen to your music.
Updating to the October 2018 puts a stop to even that. After taking the update, metadata for FLAC files will be truncated, or cut off. When you try to listen to a FLAC file in Groove Music or Windows Media Player, the first minute or so of the track will be skipped.
The good news is that this seems fixed in an Insider Build. The bad news is the fix hasn’t been brought to the October Update, and this isn’t listed as a known issue. So it’s hard to say when this will be fixed.
Sandbox and Application Guard Breakage
We really like the new Sandbox feature in the latest insider build. And Application Guard is a useful security feature if you want a locked down browser, too.