Microsoft, It’s Time to Set Copilot+ PC Free (Premium)

Copilot+ PCs differentiate themselves from other PCs in just one way: They have a more stringent set of hardware requirements than other Windows 11 PCs that includes, most notably, a sufficiently powerful NPU (neural processing unit) that enables unique on-device AI capabilities.

And that's a problem. For multiple reasons.

Most obviously, Copilot+ PC bifurcates the market into haves and have-nots. It does so outside of the normal SKU, or product edition, system in which consumers typically have access to Home and Pro versions of Windows, the latter with additional capabilities. But you can buy Copilot+ PCs running Windows 11 Home or Pro, further confusing matters for customers.

It's also problematic because the on-device AI capabilities that Copilot+ PC provides are mostly lackluster. This was especially true at launch one year ago, but it's also true today, despite a few cool features like Click to Do. But this is a needlessly granular set of functionality that's nice to have but not crucial. It's further unclear whether Click to Do would work without an NPU. Is this requirement artificial?

The biggest and most obvious problem, however, is that the Copilot+ PC specification ignores the powerful GPUs and APUs that many already have in gaming PCs, workstations, and other PCs. Dedicated GPUs from Nvidia and other companies offer dramatically better performance than even the fastest NPU--often 10 times more TOPs, or more--and yet having one doesn't give you any Copilot+ PC features.

The customers who spent lots of money on dedicated GPUs, whether they're gamers, scientists, developers, or whatever else, are Microsoft's best (Windows) customers. The on-device AI capabilities provided only to Copilot+ PC buyers today could easily be handled by these PCs. And, most likely, by many modern Windows PCs of whatever type. But Microsoft is artificially limiting those features. For reasons.

This creates a chicken and egg problem that guarantees that the PC industry cannot and will not move forward quickly enough to embrace the AI wave adequately to help any interested parties, which includes PC makers, silicon vendors, developers, and customers. And that makes one wonder why Microsoft even went with with this strategy in the first place.

As we've discussed, all PC buyers will eventually end up with Copilot+ PC functionality. That can happen in the short term by buying a Copilot+ PC, of course. But it will happen in the long term because every PC, eventually, will be a Copilot+ PC. Just as the TPM (Trusted Platform Module) went from specification to optional to mandatory, so too will powerful NPUs. In time, all PCs will come with a powerful NPU integrated into their processor packages.

But the PC market is an ecosystem. It includes developers who create, maintain, and update apps and services. It includes PC marker partners that create devices to sell to customers. And it includes those customers, who must evaluate the available...