Let’s go through some of the new features and enhancements included in this release of .NET Framework and then head towards the direct download links to 4.6.1 offline installers.

Features

Windows Presentation Foundation improvements

The WPF has improved with enhancements in spell check, support for per user custom dictionaries and improved touch performance as it becomes more and more integrated into Windows 10. You can read more about WPF improvements on the WPF team blog.

Features Windows Presentation Foundation improvements Cryptography security updates Better SQL connectivity More fixes and improvements Download Links

Cryptography security updates

Enhanced support for Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) X509 certificates. ECDSA certificates are smaller than the traditional RSA keys resulting in better performance.

Better SQL connectivity

There has been some improvement to how SQL connectivity works. Support for AlwaysOn and AlwaysEncrypted functionality for SQL connectivity has been added. You can read more about this from MSDN library here and here.

More fixes and improvements

Other fixes and improvements include the following:

Profiling improvements related to IcorProfilerInfo interface and introduction of Ngen PDBs System.Transactions APIs now support distributed transactions with a non-MSDTC coordinator Many other performance, stability, and reliability related fixes in RyuJIT, GC, WPF and WCF.

Meanwhile, Microsoft recommends that its users install .NET Framework using the web installer, it can be installed using the full standalone installer. Both installers are free and work fine. I’m giving the download links of both the installers. Download .NET Framework 4.6.1 full offline installer This package is compatible with Windows Vista SP2, Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows 10, Windows Server 2008 SP2 Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1, Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 R2. There are separate installers for Windows RT. You can also go through the .NET Framework 4.6.1 readme file for more details about the issues still present in this release.

If you are using Windows 10 with fast updates enabled, then there is no need to install this update as most probably, this update has already been installed in your system automatically by Windows Update.