It was 9:30 AM in the morning and Sunita was looking at another mundane start to her weekday. A long and tiresome commute to work, followed by weekly review meetings and a bunch of deadlines to meet, was all she had on her plate. Suddenly, her Gmail reminds her of a presentation on a project that was assigned to her last weekend – something which she had forgotten to jot down while planning for the weekend party.
Sunita had just 30 minutes to do something, and although she had the pointers and research ready, it would take at least 3 hours to get a presentable slideshow in front of the senior management. Sunita’s attention then fell upon the small Microsoft CoPilot icon, the widely celebrated free AI tool in Windows laptops that she had never paid attention to. Out of desperation, she decided to give it a try, especially after all the praises she’s heard online.
She clicked it, fed her top points to discuss and asked the chatbot to create a nicely detailed presentation outline with 14 slides. 2 minutes later, she was fine-tuning her AI-prepped presentation deck along with the bonus points the chatbot suggested. Sunita delivered a good presentation. The bosses liked it, she got praises, and all went well.. Sunita quietly pinned a shortcut to the CoPilot app on her desktop.
All hail AI.
AI is more than just a buzzword in laptops
It is highly possible for most of you to be in Sunita’s situation, given the hectic work life modern corporate has to endure. In such situations, AI is more than just a buzzword imprinted on your laptop. It’s one of the most powerful tools that most of you haven’t paid attention to. Think of it as a personal assistant that can help with your workflow in more ways than one can imagine.
Generative AI chatbots and applications have come a long way in a little over three years since ChatGPT arrived on the scene. These AI tools have become more than just fun and interactive chatbots – they can properly help you with your workflow. In fact, AI tools can improve your efficiency as a human worker at the desk, contrary to the popular belief that they can replace you.
Let’s look at another example from my workflow. As a journalist working on advanced technology-based feature stories and listicles, an AI tool on my laptop helps greatly in speeding up the mundane tasks. Although we take care of our written content, journalists struggle with appropriate representational photos to further the core message of the story. In such cases, an onboard AI assistant comes to the rescue, helping create appropriate AI-generated images that match the mood of the story and enhance the overall presentation. For example, the cover image you see here has been generated by my laptop’s AI assistant. Stock photo libraries don’t offer such images for use.
Onboard AI tools can also summarise emails, long documents and web pages. They can also generate outlines for presentations (as demonstrated earlier), and even automate data analysis into charts and tables.
AI also makes your laptop smarter
Beyond helping you with your tasks, AI on your humble laptop takes care of certain other aspects that eventually boost your productivity.
Spicing up performance and efficiency
Modern ARM laptops, like the Apple MacBook Air or a Dell XPS 13, feature processors with dedicated AI accelerators like Neural Processing Units (NPUs) alongside CPUs and GPUs. In layman’s English, it simply translates to clever management of the computing power within your device and enabling smarter functions. NPUs can process AI chatbot conversations, image recognition, faster biometric verification and other real-time data analysis to make the most out of your PC’s processor and other resources.
NPUs can even take care of battery stamina! Did you consider how your new MacBook’s battery life outlasts the older one, despite seeing no upgrade to the battery cell capacity?
Robust security
Unlike the older days when your laptop’s data privacy and security depended solely on the antivirus software, modern AI laptops eradicate vulnerabilities smartly. Through features like advanced facial recognition and voice authentication, AI ensures that no other threat factor can access your device and its data. As far as online threat is concerned, AI solutions are capable of real-time threat detection and behavioral analytics to identify and neutralise potential threats even before you know it! The more powerful processor you have, the better on-device processing happens, thus minimising reliance on external servers.
Smarter collaboration
Collaboration is probably the most underrated application of AI in modern-day laptops! Modern machines help to make collaboration easier in the age of virtual meetings. Laptops like the MacBooks, Dell XPS and HP business machines utilise features like automatic background noise cancelling during video meets, clever blurring/ visual masking of backgrounds, real-time accurate translations and accurate transcriptions to ensure an easier virtual life. Your video conferences on modern laptops are much better and easier to comprehend than the machines of the past.
Accessibility
AI integration boosts accessibility with features like voice commands, screen readers, and real-time translation for over 40 languages, facilitating communication across linguistic barriers.
Smart maintenance
As more of our work ecosystem goes digital, the IT departments at corporate houses need more help in solving lower-level complaints. That’s where AI comes to the rescue. AI-enabled diagnostics systems can predict hardware issues and resolve them proactively, minimising downtime and ensuring consistent performance. This also helps with efficient resource allocation and battery management.
Hence, next time when you wonder whether AI has any chance in making your laptop usage experience any better, think again.
