Earlier today, we reported about the first official mention of "Windows 11 24H2" and also speculated on how this could affect the supposed launch of the next Windows version, also called Windows "12" casually.
In case you haven"t been keeping up with Windows 12 leaks and rumors, the next-gen OS launch is purportedly scheduled to happen sometime in 2024 if previous reports are to be believed, and according to a new report, such rumors were indeed correct. Taiwan"s Commercial Times (CTEE) reports that Microsoft will be releasing Windows (12) in June of 2024 alongside a wide variety and range of AI-based PCs. This sounds very close to Computex 2024.
Although there are no direct quotes provided, the publication attributes this to recent statements made by Quanta Chairman Lin Baili and Acer Chairman and CEO Chen Junsheng at the recent Taiwan Medical Technology Exhibition.
While you are probably familiar with Acer as it is a fairly popular PC manufacturer in the US, UK, Canada, and most parts of the world, Quanta Computer is mainly based in Taiwan and also makes PCs, like notebooks, among other electronics hardware.
It also makes sense that this report comes from a place like Taiwan as this region in South-East Asia is brimming with such activities that include manufacturing and assembly of computer parts and PC hardware.
Aside from Quanta and Acer, earlier this year, a senior Intel executive said that a "Windows refresh" was expected in 2024, though it did not explicitly state if that meant Windows 12 or a feature update to Windows 11.
The mention of AI-based PCs alongside Windows 12 makes a lot of sense too as Microsoft has doubled down on AI features like Copilot recently. Although not stated in the report, it is likely that systems with dedicated AI-accelerating hardware could be recommended by the tech giant and also by its hardware partners like AMD, Intel, and Nvidia.
If you recall, Microsoft was at AMD"s CES 2023 event earlier this year endorsing and discussing the advantages of such hardware. Hence, such a recommendation does not seem too far-fetched. It is unlikely though that such hardware will become a minimum system requirement for next-gen Windows as the vast majority of PCs today lack both AMD"s Ryzen AI technology and Intel"s NPU (neural processing unit) / VPU (vision processing unit).
Source: CTEE