What is Windows 11 'AI Explorer'? Everything you need to know about Microsoft's upcoming defining AI PC feature
www.windowscentral.com
Windows 11 will be supercharged with AI designed to enhance productivity and search across the OS.
  • SuperSpruce@lemmy.zip
    681·
    6 months ago

    Windows 11 is really shooting itself in the foot. Not just the privacy implications of this, but also the CPU and memory usage will surge once again. Why is this important?

    I went to an electronics store recently to see the state of brand new laptop performance in 2024. Here’s what I found:

    • Laptops with 16GB RAM, an SSD, and a good CPU (3K/13K single/multi thread on Passmark) will run Windows 11 smoothly. File manager, task manager takes about a second to open, while the start menu takes around 400ms. It feels like a truck with 350hp.

    • Laptops with 8GB RAM, an SSD, and a mediocre CPU (2.5K/9K Passmark) will noticably struggle with Windows 11. The file manager takes 3 seconds to open and the start menu takes 1 second, with stutters and hiccups using it. It’ll be usable, but quite slow. It feels like a truck with 100hp.

    • Laptops with 4GB RAM, eMMC, and a bad CPU (1.5K/4K Passmark) will be brought to its knees by Windows 11. Task manager takes 27 seconds to open! A web browser takes even longer, and loading my light game somehow took 7 seconds (this game loaded in under a second on the better computers) to open. The CPU, RAM, and storage were pinned to 100% most of the time. Completely unacceptable performance, it’s like a truck with 10hp.

    • And a laptop with the above but with a CPU with a Passmark score of 1K/2.5K was so bad that it couldn’t open literally anything in Windows 11. It’s literally a brick. I cannot believe the store (a giant multinational company) is selling this laptop. It’s like a truck with 5hp that cannot go up a moderate hill.

    But now, the store also sold ChromeOS laptops. As much as I hate how locked down ChromeOS was, I was delighted by the performance of it. The worst laptop specs I mentioned (4GB RAM, 64GB eMMC, CPU with 1K/2.5K Passmark score) ran actually quite reasonably on ChromeOS. It opens Chrome in about 3 seconds, and my game in 1 second, with some stutters but no freezes. It struggled with YouTube, but this is due to YouTube’s own bloat, which is like a 1000lb trailer to a bike with 5hp.

    In conclusion, Windows is losing due to its incredible bloat. It’ll make every computer–including my friend’s 7900X, 4070, 1TB SSD, 64GB RAM, water-cooled beast–sweat, and will make low-end computers unusable. The super locked down ChromeOS is literally more desirable to me on laptops under $400. Yet Microsoft is still deciding to add even more bloat! No wonder why Linux market share is skyrocketing, because Windows can barely run on their computers!

    I know you can disable this, but most non-techy people won’t even know this exists and won’t do anything to disable it, because they just want to browse the web and read emails. But the added bloat by this “feature” will cause them to notice their computers are even slower, and switch away from Windows when they realize they need a $800 Windows laptop to have a smooth OS experience, when they can buy a $250 Chromebook or $1000 Mac with a smooth OS experience.

    TL;DR: Microsoft is shooting itself in the foot by adding more bloat to an obese OS, and Windows’s bloat is its biggest liability.

    • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
      9·
      6 months ago

      I disagree with Windows shooting itself in the foot

      People will just buy better computers and throw out the ones that “don’t work”

    • freebee@sh.itjust.works
      8·
      6 months ago

      I know you can disable this, but most non-techy people won’t even know this exists and won’t do anything to disable it,

      Even if you can, the ones that do that get annoyed once again, as it will likely in windows tradition be randomly reset after an update: “oops, we reframed this feature you previously consciously turned off and thought we’ld give it a spin for you”

    • headset@lemmy.world
      41·
      6 months ago

      “AI Explorer will utilize next-gen neural processing unit (NPU) hardware to process these machine learning and generative AI experiences locally on the device with low latency.”

      “The feature is also said to be exclusive to devices powered by Qualcomm’s upcoming Snapdragon X series chips,”

      Tl;dr: you should read the article first

      • You999@sh.itjust.works
        4·
        6 months ago

        If you actually read Qualcomm’s white paper for their NPU you’d know OPs concerns about windows resource bloat is still a reasonable concern to have at least on the memory side of things.

        The memory on their SoC is shared between the CPU, GPU, and critically the NPU. This is so they can save on memory bandwidth since they won’t have to copy the same data potentially three times over. However this also means by adding more AI bloat into windows will also clog up precise memory that could be used elsewhere.

        That SoC, the snapdragon elite x supports eight channels of LPDDR5x which means the lowest amount of memory we could see is 16Gb assuming all eight channels used with 2Gb memory packages (which is the smallest size JEDEC allows LPDDR5x).

        Is that really going to be enough for everything? In my opinion no because the the GPU will take a chunk, windows will take a chunk, the NPU will take a chunk, and the storage will try to take a chunk for caching if there’s anything left.

        TL;DR: You should read the white papers instead of the marketing fluff articles.

      • SuperSpruce@lemmy.zip
        11·
        6 months ago

        The article said "The feature is also said to be exclusive to devices powered by Qualcomm’s upcoming Snapdragon X series chips, at least at first.

        And even if it requires a PC with at least 16GB RAM, then those computers will feel slower than they should be.

  • freebee@sh.itjust.works
    50·
    6 months ago

    I’m told that much of this experience is rendered on-device and does not reach out to the cloud to process information.

    Yeah, right.

    • jkrtn@lemmy.ml
      23·
      6 months ago

      If they’re already saying “much” to hedge that, I give until the end of the year before it is literally all of the information going to their servers.

      • exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de
        8·
        6 months ago

        they’ll probably do a lot of computation ally expensive preprocessing / analysis of your behavior on-device to save costs. They’ll only send home the relevant results of the analysis. So it’s “only very little of the data” - like the important part :-)

  • fluckx@lemmy.world
    50·
    7 months ago

    They really want me to shift my gaming PC to Linux. Gaming is the only reason it’s still in windows 10.

    But now? Ads? Full time spying? And they choose to do all this at a time when proton is making gaming on Linux easier than ever?

    Okay then. Heck. I’ll gladly help my friends install Linux in their main device.

    Hey government. This includes all your devices too. I’m sure you’ll be able to turn it off, and by some bug oversight it just hides everything but not actually turn it off.

    Do something about it. Stop blindly trusting bigcorp to do the right thing. They’ve proven time and time again they WILL NOT.

    • Zoboomafoo@slrpnk.net
      141·
      7 months ago

      Hey government. This includes all your devices too. I’m sure you’ll be able to turn it off, and by some bug oversight it just hides everything but not actually turn it off.

      My work computer upgraded to 11 last week and I’m sure I’m giving away people’s personal info via the OS

      • Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz
        7·
        6 months ago

        My work is also rolling out the Win11 updates, and I am wondering if they knew about this. There are many things that require secret/TS clearance via temp badge and pass on certain project as well as low level sensitive documents.

        If Win11 is recording all of this, they have committed about 100,000 felonies by illegally recording these documents from not just us but all the government contractors.

      • fluckx@lemmy.world
        6·
        7 months ago

        I can’t make my mind up over a distro tbh.

        I’ve used Ubuntu for a long time, but I absolutely hate snap packages.

        Doubting between endeavoros, garuda and popos. Imnsure they’re all viable, though my main experience has been with apt and Debian based distros

            • akakunai@lemmy.ca
              6·
              6 months ago

              It’s Debian instead of normal mint.

              …but seriously, it uses Debian as a base for its upstream packages instead of Ubuntu. They’re very similar and you won’t notice a difference.

              I’ll disagree and suggest to go with the latest release of the normal (Ubuntu-based) Mint instead. I prefer Debian over Ubuntu, but there’s realistically little difference. And if you’re just getting into the Linux world, you’ll want to be using what’s used by most people in case you run into problems and want to follow written instructions or ask for support.

              • CancerMancer@sh.itjust.works
                2·
                6 months ago

                I agree, I don’t suggest newbies run less popular distros. Overcoming the learning curve is easier when you have lots of documentation and support.

        • thanksforallthefish@literature.cafe
          4·
          6 months ago

          Mint & popOS are both Debian tree distros and Ubuntu derivatives without the snap cruft.

          They work fine for gaming in my experience as any linux native game is always tested against ubuntu and I’ve had no issues with Steam/proton for windows games.

          No EAC anti cheat compatability for Linux of any flavour of course.

          • olutukko@lemmy.world
            2·
            6 months ago

            I mean kinda, but there are still some software and version differences that can make some stuff behave differently. my brother has been tinkering with chromebook with touch screen. and he hasn’t found a distro yet where everything works. in some distros sound doesn’t work, in some touchscreen doesn’t work, in some keyboard doesn’t work etc.

            so while the experience is mostly same there are still some differences, they do show up easier with odd hardware though

          • VindictiveJudge@lemmy.worldEnglish
            0·
            6 months ago

            I’ve been considering putting Mint on my system, then adding the new version of Unity that Canonical doesn’t contribute to. Last time I used Linux was when Ubuntu finally had Unity working well and I really miss the HUD thing. Tapping alt to search the menus for the tool I wanted in Gimp was very nice.

        • lightnegative@lemmy.world
          1·
          6 months ago

          I’m currently using Endeavouros (btw) but Fedora is a solid distro as well.

          Used it for years until just recently when I got a new laptop and decided to give managed Arch a go

          • fluckx@lemmy.world
            1·
            6 months ago

            I’m used to gnome, and I currently tried out garuda. It’s a tad weird as there’s no app bar anywhere with “running apps”. If I execute it again it just starts a new one. Which is strange behaviour.

            It works quite well for what it should do, but I’m feeling a bit lost in it. It also feels if I’d want to do something else ( like coding ) that it wouldn’t be very intuitive.

            The nobara gnome screenshot looks similar ( no app drawer ). Are you running it in gnome or kde/official?

            • olutukko@lemmy.world
              1·
              6 months ago

              you can change that from gnome tweaks I believe. and I have gnome underneath but I use i3. i used to have just fedora with just the i3 using fedora installer but it got a bug of some kind that I just didn’t get the propiertary nvidia drivers to work no matter what I did

          • fluckx@lemmy.world
            2·
            6 months ago

            It isn’t. But they are pushing it more aggressively. The latest release will tell you it can’t even open .deb files anymore. The Ubuntu store will load indefinitely and not be able to install it. ( read it in a blog post ). And it’s opening deb files in archive manager by default rather than the software centre.

            Even if it is just a bug. It is one they are refusing to fix ( and one that I can’t imagine being difficult to solve ).

            It still works over CLI for now, which is how I usually install deb’s. But if I have to go online to download all kinds of debs it feels like I’m back in the 90s windows downloading a bunch of exe’s I no have to manage myself.

            It’s more of a statement against Ubuntu and how canonical is handling the snap packages. Maybe it won’t be so easy to disable it in the future. Or maybe apt will barely be able to install anything anymore if you disable snap since that seems to be all they went you to run.

            In any case. I don’t really like the direction they’re headed, and I’d rather not have to distro hop in two years because canonical decide to make snap mandatory.

            Snap has not worked out well for me in the past :(.

          • jkrtn@lemmy.ml
            1·
            6 months ago

            We’re in a thread about Windows malfeasance and that’s what the Windows users say about their ad-ridden trash heap of an OS. Why would we tolerate the same behavior just because it is on top of a Linux kernel?

  • kubica@kbin.social
    19·
    7 months ago

    I’m told that much of this experience is rendered on-device and does not reach out to the cloud to process information.

    So far. Gotta boil the frog slowly.

    • biggerbogboy@sh.itjust.works
      52·
      6 months ago

      Actually real, I’m genuinely planning to flash steamOS os my school laptop, sincr I have no need for adobe apps, I usually use web based stuff and the apps I do want are just games id likely be able to run through proton.

      • scoobford@lemmy.zip
        11·
        6 months ago

        I don’t know what you do or do not know about Linux, but I’d highly recommend using a desktop Linux distribution instead, like Fedora, OpenSUSE, Debian, or Arch. Something with quick releases so you get new performance improvements and bugfixes quickly.

        SteamOS in particular is really cool on a handheld, but would be kind of irritating to use on a regular laptop. It’s also immutable, which protects you from fucking up too bad, but also makes certain types to configuration way harder.

        I love Arch, but don’t install it unless you want to learn how it works. Archinstall is quick and easy if you aren’t scared of the terminal, but it doesn’t hold your hand at all and you will break something if you don’t read the news or fuck about without knowing what you’re doing.

        • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
          2·
          6 months ago

          I got rid of my Surface, bought a FrameWork, and installed PopOS on it. Can’t say I’m any kind of a PC guru, certainly not a Linux expert, but it works awesome. I have zero complaints or regrets.

          And I’m learneding.

        • biggerbogboy@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          6 months ago

          I’ve been using Linux since 4 years ago, I’ve distro hopped between Ubuntu, OpenSuse, Fedora and others, I’m currently on Fedora and its working well. I’m not too sure how to manually integrate windows apps into the mix, but it sounds it would take time I don’t really have.

          ive known of the pitfalls of SteamOS, i fully agree with you on that and i was considering using it as a 2nd or 3rd option. someone actually mentioned me to use Bazzite, basically fedora based steamOS with either KDE or GNOME, and Android apps through Waydroid.

          trying to get windows apps working for me at least was quite difficult last year, ill try it out this time and see if its easier, but if its not i may just switch to bazzite or other steamOS like distros.

        • biggerbogboy@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          6 months ago

          Thanks man, I was actually trying tomake a similar implementation on another machine to test out, since I use fedora, but I never knew I could get it out of the box. I’ll try this out on one of my mains since I distro hop occasionally on there to test stuff.

  • GrymEdm@lemmy.world
    8·
    7 months ago

    I try to swear only when I mean it, and fuck off Microsoft. I’d rather take the few seconds or even couple minutes it takes to type out the beginning of an e-mail or set up a new app than have something recording my every move.

    The development will be something like: in 2025 it will be offline, optional, and meant to optimize efficiency. In 2026 it will be online, mandatory for updates, and also used to optimize advertising. Finally in 2027 it will be fully integrated and aimed at sales of extensive data to companies who desire to know what habits users exhibit and so on. I have no faith whatsoever that my interests will outweigh the potential profits of knowing what every PC user is doing all the time.

    • lemmylommy@lemmy.world
      5·
      7 months ago

      In 2025 „much“ of it is „rendered on device“. Meaning that a part of it is not. It also leaves open what is uploaded to Microsoft.

    • HackerJoe@sh.itjust.works
      32·
      7 months ago

      Yes. That’s why I use Win7 for legacy stuff and Linux for everything else. On Win7 it was still easy to deactivate (disable a few Tasks and a few checkboxes). Since the updates stopped that PC is super stable too.

      no need to lecture me about muh sEcuRitY uPdAtEs. I know. As if any Microsoft Software was ever secure.

      • lud@lemm.eeEnglish
        04·
        6 months ago

        Microsoft software software isn’t really insecure.

  • Teon@kbin.social
    6·
    7 months ago

    Products you pay for should not have the ability to exploit you.
    If micro$oft wants to provide free computer software to all it’s exploited users, that’s a different conversation.
    Until then you have better options available.