When Microsoft introduced the Copilot+ app for Windows 11, it created a lot of anticipation and a lot of buzz with Memories, also known as “Recall” by its name in English. This feature quickly became one of the great standards of next-generation AI (artificial intelligence), but it also became one of the most controversial.

Memories is able to remember and remember everything we do with our PC. This is an AI-powered feature that relies on the NPU (Neural Processing Unit) and works in the background analyze, record and store what we do with our team. It also consumes other resources like RAM and storage.

With all the information it records, it creates a database that can later be used to query and offer us useful information and help. For example, imagine you are working on a document and accidentally close it without saving. You’ll think you’ve lost hours of work, but with memories You will be able to restore the content without any problems.

This feature also allows us to do many other things such as search photos and files by date, place or people, remember the content and date of meetings and other important events, track our activity using our browser and applications and many other things based on the specific timeline that Memories creates to work efficiently.

Memories and privacy in Windows 11, a chronicle of the announced controversy

During the presentation, Microsoft emphasized that Memories will be a secure and private feature, as it will only work locally and all information will be encrypted on the computer’s storage drive. However, this didn’t convince anyone and ended up being a big controversy as many users saw Memories as a feature designed to spy on them who was able to see everything they were doing with their PC.

It didn’t help that Microsoft emphasized that the content used by memories was always associated with a unique profile, and that will not be shared with anyone nor would they be used to train AI or create targeted advertising. The controversy and rejection generated by Memories was so great that the company had no choice but to delay its launch and “reflect”.

The Redmond giant has said that it will give Memories a twist and that it will arrive on the Insider channel in a few weeks. That was in June, but it’s the end of August and the company hasn’t released anything yetin fact, he didn’t even provide information on the status of the feature, leaving its future in a state of complete uncertainty.

What is going on with “Recall”, will it end up being cancelled?

What happened was that Microsoft did not expect this reaction from the general public, he realized at the wrong time that the Memories are a much more serious subject than he had imagined and now he is aware that he needs to polish them as much as possible and make changes to help convince the user means three basic things:

• That it’s really safe. Encryption helps, but BitLocker isn’t reliable, so Microsoft needs to move on.
• This poses no danger to protect privacy and that it will not be used to spy on user activity.
• That the information really stays on the computerand which will not be used in any way for advertising purposes.

Microsoft will be working on Memories to meet these three points, and that must be one of the reasons why its launch is being delayed. On the other hand, it should also be taken into account that this feature requires a specific configuration at the hardware level to work and that it has requirements that few teams meet today.

I think it also affected the pace of Microsoft’s work with Memories, and that’s what the company ended up prioritizing take this topic in stride and wait a bit for AI computing market share to improve. In short, since you have no choice but to wait, you can use that waiting to make the best of things.

What will I need to use Memories and when will they arrive?

As I said earlier, Memories is an AI-powered feature that runs locally, so it has some serious requirements. To use it, we need a PC with An NPU that has a minimum performance of 40 TOPsand we must also have 16 GB of RAM and SSD storage with a capacity of at least 256 GB.

The memories will use the NPU to speed up AI-related tasks, consume RAM for background work, and By default, 25 GB of storage will be reserved to create your databases. With this amount of storage, we can have up to three months of saved activity with our gear, according to Microsoft, although this can vary depending on what we do and how we use it.

Few current devices meet these requirements, and turning Memories into something capable of convincing users in terms of security and privacy will not be easy, so I think This feature will take a long time to appear.at least more than originally thought. I know it won’t arrive with the Windows 11 24H2 update, so we’ll at least have to wait for its official implementation until Microsoft’s next annual update, which It will take more than a year.

As part of the Insider channel, it should probably launch much sooner in a few months. In this channel, it will be subjected to various tests and receive feedback from users. Microsoft will use this feedback to identify potential issues and bugs, but the company should also conduct intensive security testing.

If all goes well, after a reasonable testing period within the Insider channel, memories can be considered to enter the final phase of the start. This would be the last necessary step for it to be included in the annual update of Windows 11 and eventually reach users at a general level.