Microsoft is preparing for the imminent rise of hardware-accelerated on-premise AI tools, and while the first steps may seem boring, they are important.
Yes, I'm going to talk about Task Manager. Wait, do not go! I know, it's not the most glamorous topic out there, but it's an important step forward. AMD has announced that it is working with Microsoft to add support for the latest version of the former. neural processing units (NPU) on Windows; Specifically, enable the Microsoft Compute Controller Model (MCDM) for AMD chips, which will allow Task Manager to monitor NPU resource usage in the same way it does for the CPU, GPU, and other components.
It's probably a relief for AMD, because its biggest rival Intel already has MCDM support for its own on-chip NPUs, even though Team Red was first to the NPU market. AMD praised Microsoft for recognizing the importance of neural processing hardware, noting that the use of AI, which can be accelerated by a local NPU, will likely increase in the coming years and praised Microsoft's efforts to “keep pace with complexity.” addition of PCs”.
What does this mean for you?
All major chipmakers, including AMD, are currently on board the AI train, and that means dedicated hardware in your device to power AI workloads. 'On-premise' AI has many advantages over the cloud-based AI tools currently available, such as ChatGPT, such as faster processing times, no need for a constant Internet connection and superior user security; So it's not hard to see why NPUs have become the new target of the gold rush.
In practice, that means we'll see more and more laptops and desktops (and phones and tablets, too!) with these dedicated AI chips as standard. Microsoft's next integration for AMD NPUs is specifically for the new Ryzen 8040 series of chips, which are laptop-only processors. While the initial functionality will be limited to monitoring the NPU within Task Manager, it paves the way for fully hardware-accelerated AI within Windows.
But even simple Task Manager integration is good and important, and if you don't use Task Manager, you should. It's an invaluable tool for keeping track of how efficiently your computer is running, allowing you to see if your system is bottlenecking a single component or consuming power when running specific programs; It is an especially useful tool for laptop users, who can use it to adjust their power settings and improve battery life.
I was pleased to see that AMD agrees with my assessment, with a spokesperson saying that tracking resource allocation is “particularly important in laptops where end users can choose to maximize battery life by controlling where certain devices are running.” workloads or adjusting global power settings. Even if your laptop doesn't have an NPU (most don't these days), Task Manager can help you get the most out of battery life.
In any case, we are probably only a year or two away from seeing all the best laptops with its own integrated NPUs, so Microsoft probably couldn't afford to delay any longer. It is not very clear since AMD Blog Post whether this is an exclusive Windows 11 update or whether it will also apply to older versions of the operating system, but I wouldn't be surprised if it were the first, as we know, microsoft In fact wants you to update!
