Question Windows on ARM: any chance for the desktop?

[thedighubs]

Good day dear friends,

For more than ten years, Microsoft has been struggling with Windows notebooks with ARM processors. But that's history I guess.

Now, there are attractive devices with the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processor. Well afaik the new Windows-on-ARM notebooks are primarily aimed at potential MacBook buyers. They are intended to entice the latter to Windows or at least prevent frustrated Windows users from switching to macOS.

If we come to the tech factors: The new Windows-on-ARM notebooks run much longer on battery power than x86 laptops with AMD chips.

Would you mind taking such a new CPU?
What is your opinion here?

Look forward to hearing from you

 

[adroc_thurston]

The new Windows-on-ARM notebooks run much longer on battery power than x86 laptops with AMD chips.

they kinda don't and LNL exists anyway.

 

[thedighubs]

good day dear adroc_thurston

thank you for the reply. Food for thougths

 

[mikeymikec]

Now, there are attractive devices with the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processor. Well afaik the new Windows-on-ARM notebooks are primarily aimed at potential MacBook buyers. They are intended to entice the latter to Windows or at least prevent frustrated Windows users from switching to macOS.

If we come to the tech factors: The new Windows-on-ARM notebooks run much longer on battery power than x86 laptops with AMD chips.

Are a significant percentage of Windows users frustrated about battery life? Of that percentage, how many care about x86 app performance (which ARM sucks at, AFAIK, most likely the reason why Apple clean-broke from x86)?

IMO one needs to ask why Windows users use Windows. AFAIK the answers are:

1 - familiarity
2 - compatibility / lock-in with old apps / hardware

I don't think there are going to be any more "killer apps" that are going to sell a new processor architecture, and I think that's what Windows on ARM needs... or Microsoft imitates Apple again and kills Windows on x86 for uh reasons, but IMO Microsoft would be betting the farm on this strategy as well as throwing OEMs under the bus, and I think they've been spending trust with their users ever since releasing Windows 8 rather than building trust.

I think Microsoft has been banking on "AI" to perform a soft maybe-migration to ARM ("soft" being users want AI so they choose Windows on ARM hardware, so OEMs follow where the money's going), which is the reason why for example Recall exists (kinda). IMO it's only a matter of time before mainstream "AI" runs its course as a fad and becomes a niche subscription service.

It would make sense for Microsoft to maintain a viable Windows on ARM service in a potentially volatile time in the hardware market, if Microsoft can be bothered to do any meaningful QA on Windows.

 

[Doug S]

What problem does Windows on ARM solve? It isn't better at running native Windows apps, at best it does that equally well with x86. It is clearly worse at running x86 Windows apps, and there aren't any ARM only Windows apps so its disadvantage isn't mirrored by the competition.

There's nothing inherent in the ARM ISA that makes it more power efficient than x86. The x86 duopoly has just never cared (and probably never will care) about efficiency as much as Apple does - and as noted LNL does a pretty decent job of matching Qualcomm ARM laptops efficiency wise.

I'd argue Windows on ARM has always been a solution looking for a problem. For Microsoft the problem is "some of our userbase is gazing longingly at the fanless Macbook Air" but the current crop of ARM Windows laptops doesn't even fully solve that problem - they all have a fan. For Qualcomm the problem is "the smartphone market is saturated so we need new markets to expand into". Unfortunately for Qualcomm, their ARM designs possess no inherent competitive advantage over Intel & AMD, and one huge competitive disadvantage when it comes to running x86 Windows binaries. They can't compete on price because stealing Celeron market share would hurt their margins, so they have to attack the premium segment.

When the floodgates are opened to other ARM competitors they won't all have Qualcomm sized margins to protect (Mediatek) meaning competition from below, and you never know what ARM competitors might out-premium Qualcomm - perhaps Nvidia with their GPU and AI advantage, or possibly even Apple if Microsoft decides the best way to keep Windows users from defecting to macOS to get a Macbook Air is to fund a Windows GPU driver and fully support installing native Windows on Macbook Air and other AS Macs. Qualcomm won't make Windows on ARM a success, but maybe some combination of the above does to enough of an extent for Microsoft to decide to keep it around.

 

[Thibsie]

x86 binaries are a problem.
Arm drivers are probably way more of a problem.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I think WinARM will carve a sizeable niche for itself in the market, not the least because Microsoft wants to ensure its success. Will it displace x86 someday? Maybe. Maybe not. I do not dislike cool running powerful devices. I have seen first hand what the M1 SoC can do in Microsoft Excel (it's blazing fast). So if suddenly Microsoft and the OEMs get this bright idea of pitching better TCO to corporates due to much lesser power consumption of ARM devices in typical office environments, that could spell serious trouble for x86.

I had a deadline to meet and my task was to provide some important data for a survey. There were 800,000 rows of data to process. Excel took 25 minutes on a Core i5-12500 and then Excel froze because probably Windows so I had to spend another 10 or maybe 15 minutes doing the same thing in LibreCalc. I could hear the fans roaring in the quietness of the night. At that moment, I sure wished I had my M1 laptop with me in the office. Would have saved a good deal of time for me.

 

[Doug S]

Arm drivers are probably way more of a problem.

Drivers for what?

What does the average PC user need drivers for that aren't included by the OEM in the preinstalled Windows load? Drivers for everything on the motherboard, and the dGPU (if any) will be included in the OEM load. I've mentioned before the stats (outdated, it would be even higher now) that over 90% of PCs are NEVER opened. The mainstream PC consumer isn't adding mystery PCIe cards that need drivers, or even upgrading RAM.

For them "expansion" begins and ends at USB, and even that is being supplanted more and more by stuff the PC talks to via wifi or bluetooth. Most of that stuff will be keyboards/mice (covered by generic USB HID drivers or the BT equivalent) or USB storage (covered by generic USB storage drivers) A printer is the only thing I can think of that might need a driver that may not be available for ARM, though the days of the "winprinter" are fortunately in the past (I think?) with most supporting wifi and IPP.

Now sure from the perspective of people here, many of whom who are tinkerers who build their systems from part and are constantly swapping stuff around, it is easy to imagine getting caught short if you buy the latest Nvidia GPU and find its ARM driver sucks or worse isn't available yet, or you're doing something less than mainstream like attaching monitors using USB-C or TB and find the drivers your OEM included have broken/no support for that. Those ARM PCs aren't for you, and may never be.

 

[Doug S]

I think WinARM will carve a sizeable niche for itself in the market, not the least because Microsoft wants to ensure its success.

Why do you think Microsoft really cares about the success of ARM Windows? It is a hassle for them to support other ISAs, and when they have in the past they've abandoned them all (including ARM the first time around in the Windows 8 days)

I think the only reason they decided to renew support for ARM is because Qualcomm came to them with a bag of cash that would defray all their development/support costs so it was a no lose proposition. They'll ride the train as long they can, but if they decide its market share is too small to be worth it it will suffer the same fate as the ports to i860, MIPS, PPC, Alpha, Itanium, and ARM before it.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Why do you think Microsoft really cares about the success of ARM Windows? It is a hassle for them to support other ISAs, and when they have in the past they've abandoned them all (including ARM the first time around in the Windows 8 days)

You don't use Win11 probably so you don't know how it is becoming more and more like MacOS (annoying). It's like Microsoft hired a bunch of ex-Apple software engineers and UI designers and told them, make Windows great again! Except it's just bewildering existing users with disruptive changes they didn't ask for.

Windows 11 - The Bits That Look Like A Mac

Windows 11 has borrowed a few interface ideas from macOS. See how the new operating system looks here.

www.forbes.com

That article is old. Win11 is more intrusive and problematic than ever. Microsoft is hell bent on trying to make its Surface line succeed and the only thing they can think of is to copy Apple but in the worst way possible.

 

[adroc_thurston]

You don't use Win11 probably so you don't know how it is becoming more and more like MacOS (annoying).

No it's like a badly edited badly themed Plasma 5 setup.

 

[poke01]

You don't use Win11 probably so you don't know how it is becoming more and more like MacOS (annoying). It's like Microsoft hired a bunch of ex-Apple software engineers and UI designers and told them, make Windows great again! Except it's just bewildering existing users with disruptive changes they didn't ask for.

Windows 11 - The Bits That Look Like A Mac

Windows 11 has borrowed a few interface ideas from macOS. See how the new operating system looks here.

www.forbes.com

That article is old. Win11 is more intrusive and problematic than ever. Microsoft is hell bent on trying to make its Surface line succeed and the only thing they can think of is to copy Apple but in the worst way possible.

wow that article is outdated but WIndows 11 is nothing like macOS. Although, now macOS does have better widgets than windows 11 as you now place them on your desktop.

 

[Thibsie]

wow that article is outdated but WIndows 11 is nothing like macOS. Although, now macOS does have better widgets than windows 11 as you now place them on your desktop.

But macOS "control panel" is utter crap IMO.