Microsoft is integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into its laptops. On Monday, the US tech group announced a new computer category called Copilot Plus PC, in which AI plays a crucial role. These are Windows laptops with built-in AI hardware and support for AI features across the operating system.
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Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called Copilot Plus PCs “the fastest, most AI-enabled PCs ever built.” All of Microsoft’s major laptop partners, such as Dell, Lenovo, Samsung, HP, Acer and Asus, will launch their own Copilot Plus PCs, Nadella announced Monday at the launch event at the company’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington . At the event, Microsoft then presented two of its own devices with integrated AI as part of the Surface series: the new Surface Pro and the Surface Laptop. Both devices are equipped with Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus and Snapdragon X Elite chips. These are equipped with a Qualcomm Hexagon Neural Processing Unit (NPU) that can carry out 45 trillion computing operations per second. The powerful neural processors make the integrated AI functions possible.
One of the most important new features is according to the tech portal The Verge the so-called “recall” function, which uses AI to create a searchable “photographic memory” of everything users have done and seen on their PC. The data remains on the PC and is not used to train Microsoft’s AI models, writes the tech blog Engadget. More than 40 AI models will run on the laptops as part of Windows 11 to support the new functions. Microsoft’s built-in AI assistant, Copilot, will also support OpenAI’s GPT-4o model, which was recently unveiled.
Beginning of a new era
Microsoft is touting the Copilot Plus devices as the start of a new era of Windows laptops. The new AI functions are designed to work with any processor hardware, writes The Verge and judges: “They are two big bets on unproven hardware and software, but they have the potential to be transformative if they work.”
The new laptops will be “58 percent faster” than a MacBook Air with an M3 processor, said Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft’s Windows manager, at the launch. It remained unclear whether this applies to all Copilot Plus PC laptops or only to the models that are being converted to Qualcomm processors. For its part, Apple has already launched more powerful M3 chips in its laptops and an M4 chip that was recently introduced in the new iPad Pro.
According to Microsoft, Copilot Plus PCs must meet certain technical requirements in order to deliver the promised performance. You must have at least a 256GB SSD, an integrated neural processor and 16GB of memory. The Arm-based models with Qualcomm chips should have a battery life that allows up to 15 hours of active Internet use. The first Copilot Plus PCs with Qualcomm processors are expected to come onto the market on June 18th. Models with Intel and AMD processors will be released at a later date.
(akn)