The Windows PC is about to get GOOD, and you can thank Windows on Arm for that

[Windows Central]

Windows on Arm is good now, and it's going to have an effect on the entire Windows ecosystem. Microsoft is going to unveil AI features that are exclusive to Windows on Arm.

The Windows PC is about to get GOOD, and you can thank Windows on Arm for that : Read more

 

[taynjack]

If all of this comes true, this will be the first major Microsoft innovation since the Surface Studio. (Chatgpt was mostly Openai's doing. Microsoft was just the platform it dropped on.) It's been deafeningly quiet for big windows innovations for a long while; almost a decade. Since then it's been nothing but hype for half baked then left to wither, and announced but never released. Windows mixed reality seems like the last Microsoft product that was mostly baked and where the OEM's were all in. Even that in Microsoft culture withered on the vine. I'm still cautious on this one. I guess I've been burned too many times.

 

[taynjack]

Curious to see if Lenovo uses this processor in their ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid?

 

[Kaymd]

Isn't this upcoming windows AI software capability only artificially limited to the ARM portable devices? What of mainly desktop users with far more powerful CPUs/GPUs and theoretically no power limit? These devices are more than capable of running the AI explorer. So why limit the functionality to the mobile devices?

 

[John McIlhinney]

Isn't this upcoming windows AI software capability only artificially limited to the ARM portable devices? What of mainly desktop users with far more powerful CPUs/GPUs and theoretically no power limit? These devices are more than capable of running the AI explorer. So why limit the functionality to the mobile devices?

I believe that the AI features use the NPU specifically and the NPUs in current Intel and AMD CPUs are not up to the task. From what I've read, they need to get about 4-5 times more powerful, which they will be in the next generations.

 

[End User]

"The Windows PC is about to get GOOD"

The Windows laptop space is about to see a major improvement at the low to mid-range. This has nothing to do with the classic Windows desktop PC at the moment.

 

[Kaymd]

I believe that the AI features use the NPU specifically and the NPUs in current Intel and AMD CPUs are not up to the task. From what I've read, they need to get about 4-5 times more powerful, which they will be in the next generations.

Yes that's understood, but what of high end desktops with 'unlimited' power? Desktop class RTX GPUs are far more capable than any laptop NPU.

 

[Kaymd]

"The Windows PC is about to get GOOD"

The Windows laptop space is about to see a major improvement at the low to mid-range. This has nothing to do with the classic Windows desktop PC at the moment.

My thoughts exactly. I'm predominantly a desktop user, with desktop grade CPU/GPU/RAM at the high end. I'm wondering why this Windows AI explorer isn't starting life on far more capable machines.

 

[John McIlhinney]

Yes that's understood, but what of high end desktops with 'unlimited' power? Desktop class RTX GPUs are far more capable than any laptop NPU.

A discrete GPU is not an NPU. As I said, the AI functionality is targeted at the NPU specifically. I'm sure that it could be implemented to make use of a discrete GPU but that would be extra work. There is no artificial limitation because it's not the case that the capability is there but not being used. That capability hasn't even been implemented. I would imagine that future generations of desktop processors will include an NPU too and then it will work with the current implementation. That's my understanding anyway.