Xbox Alpha Insiders get the first Xbox One 1906 preview build today

As the Xbox team announced last week, the first Xbox One 1906 Preview build will be available to download for Xbox Alpha Insiders today. This build won’t include the new estimated install time feature that Microsoft announced last week, as Microsoft had to remove it due to a last minute bug.

Xbox Insiders – 1906 Alpha users the build today for 1906 does not have the Est download feature as we had to remove it at last minute due to issues – relnotes updated

— Brad Rossetti (@WorkWombatman) May 20, 2019

The only new feature in this first 1906 build is for the Mixer tab on the Xbox One dashboard: After installing the update, Xbox Insiders will be able to navigate this tab and start watching full-screen Mixer streams by simply pressing the A button. As of today, pressing A on any stream opens the video in the Mixer app, but enabling full screen mode requires pressing several buttons afterwards.

It’s also worth noting that this build includes a change that could be annoying for some Insiders. Indeed, you should be aware that Xbox One consoles will now crash when apps or games are taking too long to start. The Xbox team explained that this will allow consoles to send crash data back to Microsoft, so the company can “better understand the increase in activation timeouts we’ve seen in recent releases.”

You can learn more about this specific experience below:

Starting with todays build of 1906, we’ve introduced a deliberate console crash when a game fails to launch due to an activation timeout (0x8027025A). We realize this isn’t the best experience, but this will help us better understand the increase in activation timeouts we’ve seen in recent releases. Here’s what you can expect if you hit an activation timeout while launching a game after taking this update:

• Your console will freeze on a “Something went wrong” error screen
• The console’s power button will begin flashing so that we can gather data and drive for a fix, please leave the console alone if you notice the behavior described above. Once the console is finished collecting information (approximately 2 minutes), it will shut down on its own. At this point, please turn your console back on, allowing the console to automatically upload the dump information that was collected in the background. After your console has rebooted, please file a bug using the “Report a problem” tool and indicate in the subject line that you hit the activation timeout console crash. Thanks for helping us track down and squash difficult bugs like this one prior to GA!

This first Xbox One 1906 preview build will be available for Alpha Insiders starting at 2:00PM PST today. “This first update is meant to lay the groundwork for what’s to come in 1906,” the Xbox team explained in the release notes, and we should learn more about other new features in the coming weeks.