Today Microsoft unveiled a new lineup of PCs centered around AI, complete with advanced AI-driven features like Recall, a tool that keeps track of everything you’ve ever done on your screen so you can easily revisit it later.
Microsoft was especially eager to show how its new ARM-based PCs could outperform Apple’s M3 MacBook Airs, both in sheer performance as well as battery life. The Mac vs. PC fires were very much being stoked in this presentation.
Microsoft’s ‘Apple silicon’ moment?
Microsoft’s new AI-focused PCs carry the branding ‘Copilot Plus PCs.’ Copilot being the company’s AI assistant. A new Copilot Plus Surface Laptop and Copilot Plus Surface Pro were revealed, while other key manufacturers pledged to offer their own Copilot Plus models soon.
A key feature at the center of these Copilot Plus PCs is the neural processing unit (NPU). This makes AI-heavy tasks like the new Recall feature possible. Recall will keep track of everything that happens on your screen at all times and make it searchable. Even something like a live Zoom call will have its contents automatically transcribed and stored for your future reference. Microsoft sought to allay privacy concerns by sharing that this all happens locally on-device and is thus private.
Microsoft’s new Surface Laptop and Surface Pro are powered by the new Snapdragon Elite X chips from Qualcomm. As such, they require ARM-supported apps so Microsoft announced support from companies like Adobe for a fully native ARM suite of creative tools.
The new devices are said to have better battery life than Apple’s M3 MacBook Air, and faster performance too. Not to mention touch screens, of course. The Surface Pro also comes with an OLED display, positioning it to compete with Apple’s M4 iPad Pro.
9to5Mac’s Take
Microsoft had an impressive presentation today. It showed off powerful hardware and incredibly useful AI features like using super resolution to restore old photos.
Of course, these new Copilot Plus PCs still run Windows, which is a dealbreaker for many. But I’m interested to see from upcoming reviews whether all of Microsoft’s claims of beating the M3 MacBook Air hold true. And I’m even more interested to see what Apple’s AI answer is at WWDC in a few short weeks.
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