Amidst the controversy aroundWindows 11’s new (mostly-unwanted) Copilot+ features, a developer on Twitter has taken the discussion a step further by revealing that one of the flagship new features, Recall, doesn’t require the presence of a powerful NPU after all. This makes sense, though, considering Recall’s main functions seem to be automated screen captures and the ability to search through those screen caps' text — two things that modern hardware has been capable of for a while, now.
Making great progress enabling Recall on current Arm64 hardware, no fancy X Elite in sight! ✨Should theoretically work on Intel/AMD too, OEMs only received Arm64 specific ML model bundles so there’s not much I can do yet.Here’s a small demo video showing off screenray 🪄 pic.twitter.com/w57fF1LxiNMay 23, 2024
The big question is, will these workloads run as fast without an NPU? According to @thebookisclosed, the slow performance seen in the video above can be partially attributed to the screen recording taking place, so it should be faster without it.
In any case, we’re sure that the feature can properly leverage a powerful NPU. However, considering the existing presence of AI cores in the majority of modern consumer GPUs from AMD and Nvidiaandthat this can clearly be run without them, one wonders whyMicrosoftis restricting these features so heavily. At leastAutomatic Super Resolution’s restrictions make some degree of sense, but even then earlier versions of AMD FSR and Intel XeSS don’t use AI upscaling hardware either, so itshouldbe an optional requirement.
We suppose there would be less to market withWindows 11and the “AI PC” and its “technical advancements” if the software didn’t have artificial limitations built into it. This wouldn’t be the first time — for example, theWindows 11implementation of Auto HDR was first tested in Windows 10 preview builds before being removed from the older OS, likely for the same reasons. I’m still mad about that one.
In any case, it was impressive work from @thebookisclosed to pull this off, so we have to tip the hat. While this testing was done with “current-gen Arm64 hardware”, they claim that it should also work on x86-64 CPUs from Intel and AMD, which would certainly make sense considering how truly unimpressive most of these “AI PC” features actually are.
And of course, none of that is even broaching themany ethicalandenvironmental concernsthat come with such excessive saturation of AI technology, especially generative AI.
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Christopher Harper has been a successful freelance tech writer specializing in PC hardware and gaming since 2015, and ghostwrote for various B2B clients in High School before that. Outside of work, Christopher is best known to friends and rivals as an active competitive player in various eSports (particularly fighting games and arena shooters) and a purveyor of music ranging from Jimi Hendrix to Killer Mike to the Sonic Adventure 2 soundtrack.
