The AI PC competition is about to heat up.ASUS is set to unveil a series of laptops running AMD’s Ryzen AI 300 chipsets, according to a social media post from the company. These powerful new APUs could be major rivals for Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite and Snapdragon X Plus chips, which are running the current line-up of Copilot+ PCs. ASUS launched a Copilot+ PC, the ASUS Vivobook S15, in May, but it looks like it is not the only AI PC in ASUS’s 2024 line-up. An upcoming July 17 event is expected to showcase several new laptops running ASUS’s own AI platform using AMD chips. Here’s a look at what we could see at the event, what we know about it so far, and how AMD’s Ryzen AI 300 chips could compete with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon offerings. ASUS July 17 event to feature Ryzen AI 300 laptops(Image credit: Laptop Mag)On Tuesday, ASUS posted on its official Weibo account announcing a “Next Gen AI PC” event slated for July 17 at 20:00/8:00 pm (Weibo is a Chinese social media site similar to X). Get our in-depth reviews, helpful tips, great deals, and the biggest news stories delivered to your inbox.At the time of publication, ASUS has not shared the announcement on its US social media accounts or press outlets. Laptop Mag has contacted ASUS for more information about this event and we’ll update this story as soon as we hear back. The event follows a June 3 announcement unveiling ASUS’s upcoming AI PC line-up for Computex 2024. Over the past few weeks, the AI PC world has been focused on the recent launch of the first Copilot+ PCs. However, it looks like ASUS is preparing to shake things up with its own AI tools and several new laptops running AMD’s Ryzen AI 300 chipsets. ASUS published a press release Wednesday detailing its plans for enterprise and consumer AI apps and services, which could be a build-up to a hardware-focused event later this month. This event could be a big one, too. It could include new Zenbook and Vivobook models with processors that may rival Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite. Can AMD’s Ryzen AI 300 APUs compete with Snapdragon X Elite?(Image credit: Laptop Mag)Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite/Plus chipsets kicked off the AI PC race but may not dominate the market for long. Other AI-powered chipsets are in development or gearing up for launch at Intel and AMD, Qualcomm’s biggest rivals. AMD’s Ryzen AI 300 chips are expected to power this next wave of ASUS’s AI laptops, so we could soon get a look at how these chipsets compare to Qualcomm’s in actual benchmarks. Early benchmarks hint that the Ryzen AI 300 chips could offer graphics performance similar to some low-end discrete GPUs, which is impressive for integrated graphics. If AMD’s AI chips can deliver strong graphics performance, it could give them a significant edge over Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chips, which have struggled thus far with gaming. If AMD’s AI chips can deliver strong graphics performance, it could give them a significant edge over Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chips, which have struggled thus far with gaming. This is partly because Qualcomm chips use Arm architecture, which most games are not designed to run natively on. So, the Ryzen AI 300 chipsets could offer an alternative to Qualcomm’s chips for gamers looking to switch to an AI PC. The Ryzen AI 300-series chips also support up to 50 TOPS (trillion operations per second), outpacing the current variants of the Snapdragon X Elite, which max out at 45 TOPS. That means the Ryzen AI 300 chips offer stronger performance for AI applications than the Snapdragon X Elite. We will have to wait until we can run Laptop Mag’s thorough lab tests to determine whether AMD’s AI chips deliver in real-world use. However, these early specs and benchmarks indicate that the Ryzen AI 300-series chips could pose serious competition for Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chipsets. What’s next?The July 17 ASUS event has not yet been announced on ASUS’s US press site or social media accounts, but we have contacted ASUS and will share updates with any further information they provide. Until then, we’re looking closely for additional news and rumors surrounding ASUS’s next wave of new releases and AMD’s Ryzen AI 300-series chips. AI PCs are the next wave of innovation in the laptop space, so it’s exciting to see some new laptops on the horizon to contend with the current line-up of Copilot+ PCs. Laptop Mag will cover the latest news on ASUS’s upcoming laptops and share our full reviews soon, so stay tuned for more expert insights, deals, and details. More from Laptop Mag
