The AI desktop PC is not coming anytime soon, AMD says

A hot potato: Generative AI and other “trained” machine learning algorithms are apparently the future of everything. Every single technology corporation has adopted the new AI mantra, and chipmakers are scrambling to embed some sort of AI acceleration logic into their products. Except for AMD, which is taking a more opportunistic approach to the latest tech trend.

AI-based computer chips aren’t a thing just yet, and they will not invade the market for quite some time. Justin Galton, worldwide Business Development director at AMD, said that the company isn’t seeing a widespread need for AI-dedicated x86 chips except for “the top of the stack.”

The Santa Clara company was first to arrive on the AI market with the Ryzen 7040, a chip featuring a dedicated AI acceleration logic block. Intel is betting everything on an AI-powered future with the Meteor Lake architecture and the upcoming Core Ultra “SoC” processors, but AMD isn’t planning to release new AI chips for the time being.

Galton doesn’t think that small to medium businesses “will be bullish on AI,” and Microsoft is mostly focused on forcing Windows 10 users to switch to Windows 11. The newly introduced Copilot features of Windows 11 can use AMD’s own “AI engine,” but the hardware logic will be available only in Ryzen 7040 CPUs for now.

The AMD representative stated that many buyers are still investing their money on affordable computers based on Ryzen 5000 and Ryzen 6000 CPUs, therefore the company has decided to extend technical and marketing support for those two processor families into early 2024. AMD is of course working on future CPU technology that will exploit the power of ML algorithms, but those products are scheduled to debut in 2024.

Many customers have now adopted a five-year refresh cycle, Galton said, so companies and consumers will likely start to think about getting a new “desktop AI PC” in the upcoming years. More “exciting” computer models and technologies are coming, AMD assured, but AI won’t be helping sell much PC gear anytime soon.

According to Galton, AMD now controls between 15 and 20% of the overall commercial PC market. AI or not, the company wants to break the 20% barrier by the end of 2024.