Now that all the hype and noise from Computex 2024 is over, it’s a good time to take a more detached look at the show and review the major themes that emerged from it.
AI servers on the rise
AI servers were hot both metaphorically and literally with the huge excitement around Nvidia CEO and founder Jensen Huang’s pervasive presence at the event and the autographed big iron Blackwell boxes on display at the booths of companies such as Gigabyte, Foxconn subsidiary Ingrasys, Inventec, Quanta, SuperMicro, Wistron, and Wiwynn. Barring a sudden drop in CSP (cloud service provider) and enterprise data center demand, the AI server market is still on a tear with Nvidia the clear and undisputed leader despite attempts by AMD and Intel to crash the party with their Instinct MI-300 series GPUs and Intel Gaudi AI accelerators.
Direct liquid cooling proliferates
The intense volcanic heat of the latest AI server processor platforms is accelerating the development of new direct liquid cooling systems to prevent overheating. In his Computex 2024 keynote address, SuperMicro CEO Charles Liang predicted a dramatic rise in the adoption of these systems, estimating that 30 percent of the server racks shipped by the company next year will incorporate this technology. Other major AI server manufacturers are also developing similar liquid cooling systems as well as third parties such as Kenmec Mechanical to meet an expected explosion in demand in 2025 and beyond.
AI PC takes the stage
Competition in the nascent AI PC market ratcheted up with Intel’s announcement of Lunar Lake and AMD’s launch of the Ryzen AI 300 Series at Computex 2024 together with a slew of laptop design wins outnumbering the 22 so heavily touted by Qualcomm for its Snapdragon X Elite processors. While Qualcomm is enjoying a first-to-market advantage with its current “exclusive” status for Microsoft Copilot+ PC laptops, Intel and AMD are hot on its heels and have already surpassed the 45 TOPS performance of the Snapdragon X Elite’s Hexagon NPU with their latest platforms. Acer, Asus, Gigabyte, MSI and other leading Taiwan PC manufacturers had a host of new AI PC models on display at the event and along with AMD, Intel, and Qualcomm are hoping that the launch of these new systems will breathe life back into the moribund PC market.
The traditional PC lives
Despite the heavy marketing focus on laptop AI PCs, there were plenty of powerful desktop systems on display at the show, not to mention stunning cases of all shapes, colors, and sizes, fancy liquid cooling solutions, and a host of keyboards, mice, and other peripherals. Gaming monitors such as the Asus ROG Strix XG27UCG and MAG 271QPX E2 OLED display also captured a lot of attention. Perhaps there is still life in the traditional PC market yet, with the new systems equipped with Nvidia RTX graphics chips delivering far greater generative AI performance than their laptop counterparts.
Taiwan at the top of its game
Whether it is driving the creation of new AI server and AI PC categories or injecting new life and color into existing form factors, Computex 2024 showed that the Taiwan technology industry is at the top of its game and playing an increasingly critical role in the global marketplace. I can’t wait to see the progress it makes by next year’s Computex!
