Microsoft Pushes Agentic Windows With Nvidia-Powered Surface Laptop Ultra

At the Windows and Surface event, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said, 'I think today is the day we'll start talking and thinking about the frontier ecosystem taking maybe slightly different contours.' The Verge reported that after trying to sell businesses on a new Copilot last month, Nadella took a similar approach for agents and hybrid intelligence, including security, identity, and management aspects, making it seem as if he was pitching businesses again rather than AI developers, creatives, and regular Windows users.

Windows chief Pavan Davuluri then appeared onstage to explain why agents and hybrid intelligence are important for Windows users. Demos included GitHub Copilot coding locally without expensive cloud tokens; a long list of models that can now run locally; agents such as OpenClaw, Hermes, and Perplexity; and deeper Copilot integration in Windows. The Verge's reporter was not fully convinced by the demos, wanting to see practical benefits local AI models could deliver for regular Windows users rather than AI builders and developers. Those builders and developers are the people who could turn the agentic OS vision into reality, and many use MacBook Pro instead of Windows, The Verge reported.

Microsoft's answer to tempt them is the Surface Laptop Ultra, described as the home for its agentic OS push. Nvidia's RTX Spark chips power the device, and there is enough raw GPU power to run AI models exceeding 120 billion parameters locally. 'We built it for developers and creators that push the limit of performance and want portability with exceptional craft,' Davuluri said. The Surface Laptop Ultra is the flagship RTX Spark device, with similar laptops from Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, and MSI. The Surface Laptop Ultra starts at $2,599, and some RTX Spark PCs can run as high as $6,999. The Verge reported that buyers would need to really need 128GB of unified memory to spend that kind of money, though many AI builders might find it worthwhile if they can save thousands in token costs.

For other Windows users, Microsoft showed little. A new Windows Search interface looks like it could be one of the best additions to Windows 11 in years, The Verge reported. Microsoft has redesigned search to be more modern and much faster, with results surfaced in-line and search usable more like a launcher. The Verge's reporter said they had disabled Bing results in Windows Search but found the new UI promising.

Microsoft is still in the early stages of the future it is betting on for Windows. Copilot Plus PCs arrived two years ago with a focus on NPU chips expected to revolutionize how consumers use everyday AI on laptops. That has not happened yet, with only a handful of photo, video, and productivity tools using the NPU. Microsoft's Recall feature was supposed to star in the NPU show, but privacy concerns and a delayed launch made it irrelevant instead, according to The Verge. Nvidia's presence and GPU dominance may make RTX Spark a bigger success story than Copilot Plus PCs, but these machines target a niche audience for now. If Microsoft and its partners want to move beyond selling them as MacBook Pro competitors, The Verge reported, they will eventually need to bring the same capabilities to less expensive, less powerful devices and demonstrate practical reasons for regular Windows users to care. The difference is that RTX Spark PCs are aimed at people with a more immediate reason to care about local AI: developers and creators who need to run large models and can potentially save on token costs.