Windows 11 may let users reserve unified memory for GPUs and AI
© NVIDIA
Windows 11 is getting a new control that could let users decide how much unified memory is reserved for graphics and AI workloads. The feature is called IntelligentCarveout internally and is currently hidden in an experimental Windows 11 build.
Windows Latest first found references to the feature in internal NVIDIA documentation. Windows watcher phantomofearth then confirmed the same functionality inside Windows 11 build 29648.1000, released on August 17.
Windows can reserve memory for graphics and AI
The unfinished Windows interface refers to memory reserved for accelerators and a separate setting for graphics and AI acceleration. The idea is to take part of a system’s unified memory pool and reserve it for GPU and AI workloads. That reserved portion would no longer be available to regular Windows applications.
© NVIDIARTX Spark
This is not yet an available Windows 11 feature. Build 29648 belongs to Microsoft’s Experimental Future Platforms channel, which the company uses to test platform changes long before they reach retail versions of Windows. Microsoft also warns that features tested there can change or disappear completely. The unified memory setting itself remains hidden and cannot currently be enabled through the normal Windows Settings interface.
NVIDIA RTX Spark is a likely target
NVIDIA RTX Spark appears to be one of the likely targets. RTX Spark processors combine Arm CPU cores and Blackwell graphics with up to 128GB of unified memory. Microsoft already confirmed in May that it had modified Windows to increase the amount of system memory accessible by the RTX Spark GPU, allowing larger AI models and graphics workloads to use more of the shared memory pool.
Unified memory optimizations
To realize the potential of up to 128GB of unified memory on RTX Spark, we have focused on improving how Windows supports unified memory systems, starting with a new higher, smarter limit on total system memory accessible by the GPU. This updated limit increases the memory available to the GPU on high-memory systems, unlocking the ability to load larger local AI models or render more complex projects.
— Microsoft
AMD already offers a similar feature through its graphics drivers. Variable Graphics Memory in AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition lets Ryzen AI Max users adjust how much system memory is allocated to the integrated GPU. A Ryzen AI Max+ 395 system with 128GB can reserve up to 96GB for graphics, with the allocation reducing the memory available to the CPU.
Microsoft’s implementation could bring comparable memory controls directly into Windows and provide a common mechanism for upcoming unified-memory platforms from NVIDIA and potentially other vendors.
Sources: Windows Latest