Qualcomm Has an Exclusivity Deal With Microsoft For Windows On ARM (xda-developers.com) 49
An anonymous reader quotes a report from XDA Developers: Last week, we reported that MediaTek is planning to build a chipset for Windows on ARM. As it turns out, the Windows on ARM chipset space could be even hotter than that, because there's a reason that we've only seen Qualcomm SoCs in ARM PCs so far. Qualcomm actually has an exclusivity deal with Microsoft for Windows on ARM, and speaking with people familiar with it, we've learned that the deal is set to expire soon. Other than the fact that Microsoft has publicly said that anyone who wants to can build a Windows on ARM chip, this really shouldn't come as a surprise. Qualcomm didn't just start building PC chips hoping that Microsoft would compile Windows to support it. No, these two companies worked together to make it happen. Because of that, Qualcomm gets to enjoy a bit of exclusivity.
One thing I wasn't able to learn is when the deal will expire, only that it's the thing holding back other chip vendors from competing in the space. It's possible that Samsung might want to throw its hat into the ring with its Exynos processors too, especially given its recent partnership with AMD for graphics power. This is also presumably why Apple Silicon Macs aren't officially supported for running Windows 11, so hopefully that will change as well. [...] Between MediaTek's Executive Summit and Qualcomm's Investor Day, there's been a very clear message that ARM SoC vendors absolutely believe that the 'Wintel' partnership is going to fade and that the transition to ARM isn't just happening, it's inevitable. Naturally, that means that all of these companies are going to want to be part of it when it opens up. Qualcomm has quite a head start though, given that it's been doing this for a few years and on top of that, it's going to start building its own custom silicon thanks to its Nuvia acquisition.
One thing I wasn't able to learn is when the deal will expire, only that it's the thing holding back other chip vendors from competing in the space. It's possible that Samsung might want to throw its hat into the ring with its Exynos processors too, especially given its recent partnership with AMD for graphics power. This is also presumably why Apple Silicon Macs aren't officially supported for running Windows 11, so hopefully that will change as well. [...] Between MediaTek's Executive Summit and Qualcomm's Investor Day, there's been a very clear message that ARM SoC vendors absolutely believe that the 'Wintel' partnership is going to fade and that the transition to ARM isn't just happening, it's inevitable. Naturally, that means that all of these companies are going to want to be part of it when it opens up. Qualcomm has quite a head start though, given that it's been doing this for a few years and on top of that, it's going to start building its own custom silicon thanks to its Nuvia acquisition.
Poor Intel (Score:2)
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So in any case it's been about time for the mainstream PC CPU marked to get shaken up a bit.
May Intel have seen this coming, diversifying into the GPU market? Or just coincidence? Though they were about to shut down their high end Intel Optane SSDs, I think? Maybe they won't after all while focusing more on what end users may need?
Who the fuq runs Windows on ARM anyway? (Score:2, Informative)
The only reason people use Windows is to run obsolete software (backwerds compatibility). Windows on ARM? Pbbbt. Nobody wants that.
Re: Who the fuq runs Windows on ARM anyway? (Score:2)
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Intel Optane is a great idea, unfortunately the implementation leaves a bit to be desired (there's a niche between volatile RAM and non-volatile storage, but unfortunately Optane isn't filling it properly).
It didn't had much success in the market, and Micron has divested itself from Optane production. Hopefully Intel can turn this ship around (like it didn't for Itanium).
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It's certainly an interesting idea as a go-between for slow HDDs and RAM. But with the increase in NVMe SSD adoption it becomes less useful.
Though of course to have something in between RAM and an NVMe could still be of interest. It's just that the bandwidth Optane Memory has available through 2 PCIe 3.0 lanes (?) is quite limited compared to what's possible with 4 PCIe 4.0 lanes, which can make it more efficient to just load stuff through the 4 lanes directly int
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how can a poster with such a low number manage to be so incredibly uninformed?
Intel products would NEVER be called simple or reliable, and their product fundamentally is not a "chipset". Furthermore, MS has developed their own "custom hardware" for decades, including MIPS-based computing systems over 30 years ago.
This will be, no doubt, the dumbest post in this topic.
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I see "poor Microsoft" since Qualcomm is kind of eating it right now. Google made their own chip for the Pixel 6 series - you can bet that it won't be the last one, and there really isn't a reason for them not to go the same route Apple has with upscaling and using it in Chromebooks. Android Wear is running away from the dying Snapdragon Wear. Samsung has their own Exynos line for phones and tablets, probably Chromebooks too. Apple has their own ARM line. Nvidia is trying to buy ARM, and if successful
Qualcomm has no fabs. AMD has no fabs. (Score:3)
NVIDIA has NO FABS. Who has the only American owned/operated fabs? Intel. Globalfoundries. [wikipedia.org]
Who is first in line for the next gen of ASML's EUV machines? Intel.
Who has recently partnered with IBM, who shortly there after demoed a working 2nm process (nm doesn't matter as their higher nm process is more transistor dense than TSMC's anyway)? Intel.
Who just hired 6,000 engineers and is now being run by one? Intel.
Who is partnered with Microsoft to get their latest offerings working at peak with new shit in
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That's good. Competitions! ;)
will arm on windows come with an lock boot loader? (Score:2)
will arm on windows come with an locked boot loader? that cut's Linux out?
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Probably end up much like Apple's Arm-based systems (the A chips in iPhones/iPads and M chips in iPads/Macs) where you can run Linux on the Arm cores themselves but you don't have access to all the other proprietary accelerators (GPU, image scaling, encoding, etc) unless you can reverse engineer them and develop drivers for them - though given the state of iPhone Linux that's probably not something that's really viable.
Google's already making their own chips, Microsoft has been partnering with Qualcomm for
No, it does not (Score:2)
I have (FWIW, I'm typing this on) a Snapdragon 855-based laptop, the Lenovo Yoga C630. I cannot say that installing Linux was as easy as doing so on x86; I did have to refer to the AArch64-laptops repository [github.com] for a modified version of debian-installer, and copy some firmware bits off the Windows partition.
But all in all, the install was quite easy [gwolf.org], and other than a few quirks I had to go through, I am as happy as can be. Yes, there is still some missing hardware support (i.e. for external HDMI via the USB-C
More convincing if MS hardware not Lenovo (Score:2)
Windows on RISC-V (Score:2)
I think it would be interesting if Intel and/or AMD started investing heavily in improving RISC-V and then started making chips that could compete with Apple's M-series. If they could get within 80% or so of performance, but without all the shortcuts Apple took like integrating the RAM, and could maintain comparable power consumption, that could be pretty big. In the event nVidia manages to succeed in buying ARM, it'd be a good alternative.
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It took apple 12 years, from the moment they bought PA-Semi, signaling their intent to do their own chips, to the moment the M1 came to fore.
On top of that, the ARM ISA was mature by the time apple bought PA-Semi.
Considering that the RISC-V ISA is not close to mature, and Apple, Qualcomm, Mediatek, AsRock et al are not standing still:
How long do you think it'll take from the moment you post this to the moment there are RISC-V cips competing in this space?
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It took apple 12 years, from the moment they bought PA-Semi, signaling their intent to do their own chips, to the moment the M1 came to fore.
On top of that, the ARM ISA was mature by the time apple bought PA-Semi.
Considering that the RISC-V ISA is not close to mature, and Apple, Qualcomm, Mediatek, AsRock et al are not standing still:
How long do you think it'll take from the moment you post this to the moment there are RISC-V cips competing in this space?
Yes, but I read a couple of months ago that Apple has already been investigating RISC-V, probably as a hedge against nVidia going rogue with ARM post-aquisition, and refusing to honor Apple’s perpetual ARM Architecture License, or otherwise taking ARM in some unacceptable (to Apple) direction.
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Well, start counting 12 years from this date. :-P
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Well, start counting 12 years from this date. :-P
NVidia’s evil plans, left unchecked, could well accelerate that timeline!
Cross platform for code quality ... (Score:2)
Yes, but I read a couple of months ago that Apple has already been investigating RISC-V, probably as a hedge against nVidia going rogue with ARM post-aquisition ...
Probably a hedge on software quality, keeping their code portable across multiple architectures. If they are leaving Intel behind they need some other architecture for this role. Yes it also gives them options but I don't think Nvidia is worrying them.
... and refusing to honor Apple’s perpetual ARM Architecture License, ...
Doubtful, they would try. Doubtful they could succeed. Also Apple is not just a client, it was one of the founders of ARM so who knows how deep the IP hooks go if Nvidia went down this silly route.
... or otherwise taking ARM in some unacceptable (to Apple) direction.
I don't think Apple is dependent upon ARM for future Apple Si
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If I remember correctly, the M1 and M1 Pro are still ARM compatible. ...) Apple might be forced to go on a not only diverged architecture but on a _conflicting_ one to ARM.
But if NVidia stops producing new versions of ARM architecture/instruction sets/... (ARM v7 for 32-bits, ARM v8 for 64 bits, arithmetic extensions, crypto instructions,
In this case, ARM compatibility goes out the window. If this is something Apple cares about, I have no idea. But the possibility is there.
Going to RISC-V as a "reserve" dev
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My guess is that NVidia will be going "divergent" not "conflicting" with respect to the core ARM architecture. Perhaps add CUDA cores from their GPUs to ARM to improve the performance of machine learning, image processing, etc. This wou
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Regarding a conflicting architecture, who would notice or care? The compiler will sort that out for you. Some programmers who debug at the assembly language level would need a third cheat sheet to add to the ARM32 and ARM64 cheat sheets they currently use during debugging.
My guess is that NVidia will be going "divergent" not "conflicting" with respect to the core ARM architecture. Perhaps add CUDA cores from their GPUs to ARM to improve the performance of machine learning, image processing, etc. This would leverage a lot of CUDA expertise from the x64 PC world.
Interesting.
Could Apple license a hypothetical ARM-based CUDA Subsystem as an IP Block from an nVidia-ARM, and thus achieve CUDA capability without having to deal with nVidia Graphics Drivers?
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Trying to block ARM would probably get them into trouble, anti-competitive complaints from governments. Better to keep moving ahead while others are trying to catch
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Apple has CUDA-like capabilities in their silicon. All the ALUs in the GPU, the neural engines, the image signal processors. Other than access to existing code I am not sure what CUDA itself could offer Apple. I'm thinking of CUDA more as a way for stock ARM to catch up to Apple Silicon performance wise, assuming the Nvidia sale goes through.
Trying to block ARM would probably get them into trouble, anti-competitive complaints from governments. Better to keep moving ahead while others are trying to catch up, give them a moving target. It will take them a while and Apple will build the perception of superior performance during that time. Something they never really did with PowerPC and were unable to do with Intel.
I know that Apple Silicon has the chops to do a decent job of CUDA execution; I was mostly talking code-compatibility.
I just don't trust nVidia to be a good steward of ARM. But at least Apple has the talent and proven track-record to successfully bob-and-weave if nVidia says "screw you" to ARM Architecture Licensees, like Apple.
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Yes, but I read a couple of months ago that Apple has already been investigating RISC-V, probably as a hedge against nVidia going rogue with ARM post-aquisition ...
Probably a hedge on software quality, keeping their code portable across multiple architectures. If they are leaving Intel behind they need some other architecture for this role. Yes it also gives them options but I don't think Nvidia is worrying them.
Well, considering how processor-agnostic (overall) macOS’s underpinnings are, and Apple’s proven track record of being architecture-agile themselves, I'd tend to agree with your assessment.
I am sure Apple isn't worried about the likes of nVidia. Otherwise, they would have jumped on Softbank’s offer to sell them ARM first.
... and refusing to honor Apple’s perpetual ARM Architecture License, ...
Doubtful, they would try. Doubtful they could succeed. Also Apple is not just a client, it was one of the founders of ARM so who knows how deep the IP hooks go if Nvidia went down this silly route.
I well know Apple’s deep roots in ARM, and I can only hope you are correct. . .
... or otherwise taking ARM in some unacceptable (to Apple) direction.
I don't think Apple is dependent upon ARM for future Apple Silicon designs. At worst its like Unix's AT&T BSD split, similar products, different internal implementations that most do not care about.
I am sure that, if anyone can thumb their nose at a CPU platform, at any level, it is
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Also consider that the OP's post is predicated on a religious belief on the superiority of ARM and RISC-V. Why would Intel or AMD invest in RISC-V when they have lucrative investments in another architecture that is superior?
"How long do you think it'll take from the moment you post this to the moment there are RISC-V cips competing in this space?"
RISC-V competes in the open-source, embedded space. It does not compete in the Windows application processor space, nor would Intel or AMD ever contribute to ch
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RISC-V competes in the open-source, embedded space. It does not compete in the Windows application processor space, nor would Intel or AMD ever contribute to changing that.
I disagree, I can absolutely see Intel taking a stab at it. It doesn't matter to them what architecture you buy if they're profiting from it. They took a stab at ARM back in the day (by buying it in) and in fact they had the fastest ARM implementation on the planet, although it didn't scale down like other ARMs (to ultra low power consumption levels) so they abandoned it. But nothing stops them from supporting RISC-V, either.
What would have to happen before they would be interested would be that they get th
X-86 and X-64 emulation (Score:2)
Do not forget that the technology to emilate both ISAs into ARMv9 has Qualcomm technology in it.
Will Microsoft be able to use that technology if the Underlying ARM chp chip is not Qualcomm?
Stay tuned to find out.
If only MS knew CPU architectures (Score:3)
Do not forget that the technology to emilate both ISAs into ARMv9 has Qualcomm technology in it. Will Microsoft be able to use that technology if the Underlying ARM chp chip is not Qualcomm?
If only Microsoft had some experience with x86, x84 and ARM cpu architectures; experience with the respective binary formats; experience with low level software development tools; and experience with code optimization. Then they might be able to write a tool that translates x86 or x64 into AArch64.
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Crap FUD, are you shilling for MS or for Qualcomm?
MS ought to know better than to help another company have a monopoly especially considering how MS came to being in the first place IE by selling an OS for an open hardware platform.
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Do not forget that the technology to emilate both ISAs into ARMv9 has Qualcomm technology in it.
You can get Win11 Arm from Windows Insider today and run it on AppleSilicon and it fully supports old Intel 32bit apps and newer AMD64 apps(new Intel chips use AMD’s ISA). I don’t see this changing.
The main ISA in question is 32bit ARM. I’m wondering if Windows will drop 32bit ARM completely. AppleSilicon does NOT support 32bit ARM, but Qualcomm does, so a handful of early ARM windows apps that are 32bit don’t work on AppleSilicon.
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"Stay tuned to find out."
Or don't. The product sucks and no one buys it. Should Qualcomm be able to prevent MS from fixing that, it is not worth anyone's time to "stay tuned". Not interested in finding out why a shitty product remains shitty.
MS joins the party along with Apple (Score:2)
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Bootcamp allowed people to use standard Nvidia/AMD Windows graphics drivers which gave it an edge for gaming(~25% higher frame rates). AppleSilicon’s bespoke Apple-specific GPU turns the old advantage into a HUGE roadblock.
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/. editor reposts anonymous BS (Score:2)
"This is also presumably why Apple Silicon Macs aren't officially supported for running Windows 11..."
Why is this "presumably" the reason? Why is it not because Apple doesn't support it? Apple doesn't support booting an alternative OS nor does it provide VM software itself so there is NO SUPPORTED WAY from Apple for this to work. That is THE reason, even if ARM on Apple Silicon not working would be another reason.
"...ARM SoC vendors absolutely believe that the 'Wintel' partnership is going to fade and th
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You need to pay attention. Apple have publicy stated that they are in not way trying to stop MS running Windows on M1, and that it is entirely up to MS.
They're not giving out the information needed to fully support the GPU, so that is horseshit. Apple is using the proprietary-ness of their hardware to prevent Microsoft from putting Windows on their hardware.
Get back to us with this crap when Apple publishes all the information needed to support their GPU, because then you'll be right. Until then you're off your rocker.
Remember DOS / Windows 3.1 (Score:2)
It ran only every IBM compatible PC. Now the bootloaders are locked, they cannot just release it on 1000 floppy disks. No. They also need to build their own hardware. The industry fucked itself with this.