Microsoft event debuts new AI-friendly hardware and Windows changes
Get ready for more AI in your Windows and more AI on the desktop.
Microsoft held its first live event in two years, unveiling new AI-friendly hardware and Windows enhancements during the proceedings. The centerpiece of the event was the Surface Laptop Ultra, which is Microsoft's first product to utilize the new Nvidia RTX Spark SoC. Priced starting at $2,599, the device offers various SoC and memory configurations, including either a 5120-core or 6144-core Blackwell GPU, paired with up to 128GB of LPDDR5x unified memory. Scheduled for a launch on October 16, pre-orders are now available.
Despite its focus on developers, the Surface Laptop Ultra's graphical capabilities were emphasized during the presentation, showcasing its potential for handling modern gaming tasks and AI development. By leveraging unified memory allocation instead of traditional VRAM limits, the laptop can allocate resources effectively to support both gaming and AI workloads.
To demonstrate this, the game Gears of War: E-Day was highlighted running smoothly on the system, indicating that even AAA titles can be accommodated without relying on a conventional gaming GPU.
Written by urgent.news from Ars Technica's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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