Microsoft debuts Surface RTX Spark Dev Box to run large AI models without cloud costs

Microsoft on Monday unveiled the Surface RTX Spark Dev Box , a compact desktop computer designed to let software developers run large AI models on their desks instead of paying for cloud computing — a move that directly challenges the per-token pricing model that has defined the AI industry's economics since ChatGPT launched three and a half years ago. The device, announced at Microsoft Build 2026 , packs Nvidia’s new Blackwell-architecture RTX Spark processor and 128 gigabytes of unified memory