Microsoft a few months ago announced the Copilot+ artificial intelligence for Windows 11. For this to work, a processor with NPU cores of power equal to or greater than 40 TOPS is MANDATORY required. Although, as Intel has recently revealed, in reality it is only a mechanism of planned obsolescencesince any graphics card could execute Copilot+ tasks.
The Copilot+ function, at the moment, is only exclusive for the Snapdragon X Plus and Elite processors. In the coming weeks, Intel and AMD are expected to launch laptop processors that also support this Microsoft technology.
All chips must have neural processing units (NPUs) capable of performing more than 40 trillion operations per second (TOPS). If the system does not have a CPU that contains NPUs or they have a power lower than that specified by Microsoft, they will not be able to use this new tool.
Forced to buy a new computer without being necessary
For those who do not know, the term planned obsolescence refers to the fact that products have a certain life span. Manufacturers can make a poorer quality product, hoping that it breaks after a certain period of use, forcing you to buy a new one.
Within computing and technology, it is not so necessary to make a poorer quality product. For example, in computing it serves to modify the software or requirements after an update. This happened with Windows 11, which includes TPM 2.0, making it impossible for you to install this operating system without this element.
Now, they have invented a new, totally fictitious measure to force us to update our computer. The inclusion of the AI Copilot+ in Windows 11 it seeks to force the user to update the computer. As we have mentioned, it can only be used in systems whose CPU has the NPU and with power equal to or greater than 40 TOPS.
The thing is that, as Intel explains on its website and in one of its Lunar Lake presentation slides, NPUs are unnecessary.
Intelduring the presentation of the Moon Lake, indicated that the NPUs of its processors could offer a power of between 40 TOPS and 48 TOPS. But, on one of the slides, he indicates that his chips can offer a power of up to 120 TOPShow is this possible?
All Intel processors (except “F” and “KF”) have integrated graphics. The company indicates that Lunar Lake chips have a iGPU which has a computing power of 60 TOPS. Specifically, Intel on its website specifies the following:
In addition to the higher-performance NPU, Lunar Lake will also be equipped with more than 60 GPU TOPS, offering more than 100 platform TOPS
Any computer has a graphics card, this will be of greater or lesser power depending on its design. Therefore, the vast majority of computers on the market could enjoy Copilot+ in Windows 11 without the need for an NPU.
Microsoft has developed this set of AI tools, functions and features to work with new kernels that make most systems obsolete. They could have developed this set of AI-based solutions that will work under the GPU, not needing new hardware.
The GPU is a perfect component for AI, since they are developed to work in parallel, something necessary for this technology. One just has to look at how NVIDIA is selling its GPUs like hotcakes for AI.
It is clear that it is a Microsoft strategy with the main chip manufacturers to generate planned obsolescence. Also, are the features of Copilot+ really interesting and necessary?
