Microsoft will reveal what's next for Windows and Surface next month, Nvidia RTX Spark included

[Skye Jacobs]

Forward-looking: Microsoft will use an event in San Francisco next month to lay out its next moves in Windows and Surface, with local AI computing expected to take center stage. The October 7 presentation marks Microsoft's first major Windows-focused event in more than two years – its last one came in May 2024, when the company unveiled Copilot+ PCs and laid out a strategy built around AI-ready hardware.

The event is expected to cover Windows, Surface, Nvidia RTX Spark, and the broader PC market. It kicks off at 10am Pacific time, 1pm Eastern.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Pavan Davuluri, the executive leading Windows and Surface, are set to attend. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is also scheduled to appear, underscoring the chipmaker's role in Microsoft's plans for AI-capable PCs.

– Microsoft Surface (@surface) September 15, 2026

The event could bring more details on the Surface Laptop Ultra, a system Microsoft introduced earlier this year. The laptop runs on Nvidia's RTX Spark platform and is built with up to 128GB of unified memory and up to one petaflop of AI compute performance.

Microsoft still lists the Surface Laptop Ultra as a pre-release product. Pricing and a release date remain unannounced, and final availability hinges on regulatory approval – details the company is expected to address at the October event.

The laptop is part of a broader push to move more AI work onto the PC itself, giving users and developers more room to run AI workloads locally rather than relying entirely on the cloud. Microsoft has yet to say which applications or workloads it plans to highlight.

Nvidia's involvement adds weight to the event. Microsoft has already been building its next PC strategy around AI hardware, but it's taken more than one path to get there. In May 2024, the company introduced Arm-based Copilot+ PCs and deepened its work with Qualcomm; this time, the spotlight turns to a Surface system built around Nvidia technology.

That could make the Surface Laptop Ultra a different kind of Windows machine from the Copilot+ PCs Microsoft introduced in 2024. Its stated memory capacity and AI performance point to a machine aimed at users who need more local compute power for demanding AI tasks.

Microsoft hasn't said whether the event will include other new Surface hardware or Windows features. Still, the company has framed the gathering as a look at how local AI will shape the next chapter of the PC.

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Microsoft will reveal what's next for Windows and Surface next month, Nvidia RTX Spark included

 

[GeoffreyA]

Microsoft needs to up their game; Apple leaves them in the dust.

 

[yRaz]

I'm actually excited for Windows to make ARM a think with these copilot PCs because it might make people stop and think. "If the same hardware in my PC is in my phone then why can't my phone run like a PC?"

I shouldn't need android to let me use DEX and I still can only install things through them because if I use third party app stores or "side load" something then either all my Google srvices go haywire or the app just doesn't work.

I can plug my phone into a dock and use it like a PC aside from all the things that make having a PC great like, idk, installing whatever the **** you want on the device because it's MINE.

 

[Squid Surprise]

I'm actually excited for Windows to make ARM a think with these copilot PCs because it might make people stop and think. "If the same hardware in my PC is in my phone then why can't my phone run like a PC?"

I shouldn't need android to let me use DEX and I still can only install things through them because if I use third party app stores or "side load" something then either all my Google srvices go haywire or the app just doesn't work.

I can plug my phone into a dock and use it like a PC aside from all the things that make having a PC great like, idk, installing whatever the **** you want on the device because it's MINE.

I REALLY hope that’s the future of computing… we’re already at the stage where a tablet can do ALMOST everything a PC can… only a matter of time before that hits the phone size…

 

[Kashim]

Microsoft needs to up their game; Apple leaves them in the dust.

Right, right. That's why Apple has less than 10% market share compared to Microsoft. Your comment reminds me of Intel's ex-CEO claiming AMD was in the "rearview mirror" when in fact AMD was ahead of them by multiple generations.

 

[yRaz]

I REALLY hope that’s the future of computing… we’re already at the stage where a tablet can do ALMOST everything a PC can… only a matter of time before that hits the phone size…

I have a galaxy tab S10 Ultra and you have no idea how much it makes me rage that I can't install my own distro to install steam and run things like Skyrim or fallout or really anything on it. It's got the hardware chops to game, I'm just locked down by Samsungs bootloader.

I'm not joking what I say I bought a tablet to read comic books on. I have plenty of other things I use them for, but when I got into tablets it was just to read comics.

I have so many good things to say about Samsung products but the way they lock everything down leaves the biggest "but" at the end of anything good I want to say about them. Apple doesn't get a pass on this, either.

I look at this stuff "you have great hardware for what I want to do but you won't let me do what I want on your hardware so it's almost useless"

They year of the tablet being a laptop replacement is as big of a joke as the year of the Linux desktop

 

[GeoffreyA]

Right, right. That's why Apple has less than 10% market share compared to Microsoft. Your comment reminds me of Intel's ex-CEO claiming AMD was in the "rearview mirror" when in fact AMD was ahead of them by multiple generations.

Take a look at what Microsoft has done to Windows since 8, defacing the excellence of NT and 7. To add icing to the cake, they have created and abandoned framework after framework, leaving no definitive answer for making applications on the platform. Today, they say WinUI, but many are rightfully sceptical.

Apple, in contrast, have been on a steady course since Mac OS X. The OS gets better, and the UI frameworks are the same ones inherited from NeXTSTEP in the '90s. Cocoa, Swift, and Objective-C are their definitive answers. Microsoft had that in Win32, C/C++, and Petzold, and still do, but threw it under the carpet, chasing the managed mirage in the C# desert.

Microsoft is always innovative and usually comes up with the concepts; but they jump the gun, or don't get the implementation right. Apple weighs and considers with a conservative grasp, and strike when the moment is right.

 

[NumberNine]

Another inference laptop...
Somehow simultaneously both insufficient and excessive.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Take a look at what Microsoft has done to Windows since 8, defacing the excellence of NT and 7. To add icing to the cake, they have created and abandoned framework after framework, leaving no definitive answer for making applications on the platform. Today, they say WinUI, but many are rightfully sceptical.

Apple, in contrast, have been on a steady course since Mac OS X. The OS gets better, and the UI frameworks are the same ones inherited from NeXTSTEP in the '90s. Cocoa, Swift, and Objective-C are their definitive answers. Microsoft had that in Win32, C/C++, and Petzold, and still do, but threw it under the carpet, chasing the managed mirage in the C# desert.

Microsoft is always innovative and usually comes up with the concepts; but they jump the gun, or don't get the implementation right. Apple weighs and considers with a conservative grasp, and strike when the moment is right.

Now if Apple could just support Vulkan or make a Metal>DXVK translation layer.....