Microsoft has big plans for May 2024. The company is hosting a special Surface event and its flagship developer conference, Build 2024. Besides announcing new Surface devices, Microsoft is expected to talk a lot about AI and AI-powered features for Windows 11. The so-called “AI File Explorer” is One of those features, and details about it are slowly leaking out.
It looks like the upgraded File Explorer in Windows 11 could be exclusive to ARM-powered AI PCs. Albacore shared their findings on XReveals that AI Explorer allegedly has the following system requirements:
- ARM64 processor
- A minimum of 16GB of RAM
- A minimum of 225GB of space
- Qualcomm Snapdragon Elite neural processing unit (NPU, hardware ID QCOM0D0A)
This revelation is consistent with the previous story about raising the base RAM requirement for “AI computers” to a minimum of 16GB.
It’s interesting to see Qualcomm’s NPU and ARM64 processors listed as requirements, given that the latest Intel and AMD chips also have built-in neural processing units. This may indicate that not all “AI computers” will be equal, and the feature set available will depend on your hardware. Making “AI Explorer” an ARM-exclusive feature could also be Microsoft’s strategy to make ARM-powered Windows PCs more appealing to the masses.
While official details on the “AI File Explorer” are almost non-existent, rumors say it will offer some interesting capabilities, such as the ability to interact with it using natural language and make requests like “find me this thing about dinosaurs” or similar. .
If you’re not planning to buy a new PC with an ARM chip in it (like Lenovo’s), you’re still on your way to getting some nice features in Windows 11 24H2. Check out our article covering five cool things coming to Microsoft’s operating system soon. The best part is that there are more to come.