How Microsoft Made 2024 the Year of Windows on Arm (theverge.com) 58
"I still can't quite believe that I'm using an Arm-powered Windows laptop every day," writes a senior editor at the Verge:
After more than a decade of trying to make Windows on Arm a reality, Microsoft and Qualcomm finally nailed it this year with Copilot Plus PCs. These new laptops have excellent battery life and great performance — and the app compatibility issues that have plagued Windows on Arm are mostly a thing of the past (as long as you're not a gamer). Microsoft wanted 2024 to be "the year of the AI PC," but I think it was very much the year of Windows on Arm...
The key to Windows on Arm's revival this year was Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite processors, which were announced in April. They've provided the type of performance and power efficiency only previously available with Apple's MacBooks and challenged Intel and AMD to do better in the x86 space. After much debate over Microsoft's MacBook Air-beating benchmarks, the reviews rolled in and showed that Windows on Arm was indeed capable of matching and beating Apple's MacBook Air. Qualcomm even hired the "I'm a Mac" guy to promote Windows on Arm PCs, showing how confident it was in challenging Apple's laptop dominance.
Microsoft and Qualcomm also worked closely with developers to make key apps compatible, and it's now very rare to run into an app compatibility issue that can't be solved by a native Arm64 version or Microsoft's improved emulator. Even Google, which previously shunned Windows Phone, has created Arm64 versions of Chrome and Google Drive to support Microsoft's efforts. With developers continually providing native versions of their apps, it makes it a lot easier to switch to a Windows on Arm laptop. The only big exception is gaming, where x86 still reigns supreme for compatibility and performance...
It's hard not to see 2025 as the year that Windows on Arm continues to eat into the laptop space. A Dell leak revealed Qualcomm is preparing new chips for 2025, and the chip maker has also been rolling out cheaper Arm-based chips to bring laptop prices down.
The article acknowledges that both AMD and Intel "have the key advantage of game compatibility that Windows on Arm is definitely not ready for..." But "Given the Windows on Arm gaming situation, a new generation of Nvidia's GPUs could help generate fresh excitement around x86 laptops throughout 2025." And "Nvidia might also be planning to help the Windows on Arm effort. The chip maker has long been rumored to be planning to launch Arm PC chips as soon as 2025... Whatever happens to laptops in 2025, you can guarantee that there's going to be fierce competition between Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm."
But the author still complains about the dedicated Copilot key on his new WIndows-on-Arm laptop. "While the Copilot experience on Windows has gone through several confusing revisions, it's still a key I accidentally press and then get frustrated when a Copilot window appears."
The key to Windows on Arm's revival this year was Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite processors, which were announced in April. They've provided the type of performance and power efficiency only previously available with Apple's MacBooks and challenged Intel and AMD to do better in the x86 space. After much debate over Microsoft's MacBook Air-beating benchmarks, the reviews rolled in and showed that Windows on Arm was indeed capable of matching and beating Apple's MacBook Air. Qualcomm even hired the "I'm a Mac" guy to promote Windows on Arm PCs, showing how confident it was in challenging Apple's laptop dominance.
Microsoft and Qualcomm also worked closely with developers to make key apps compatible, and it's now very rare to run into an app compatibility issue that can't be solved by a native Arm64 version or Microsoft's improved emulator. Even Google, which previously shunned Windows Phone, has created Arm64 versions of Chrome and Google Drive to support Microsoft's efforts. With developers continually providing native versions of their apps, it makes it a lot easier to switch to a Windows on Arm laptop. The only big exception is gaming, where x86 still reigns supreme for compatibility and performance...
It's hard not to see 2025 as the year that Windows on Arm continues to eat into the laptop space. A Dell leak revealed Qualcomm is preparing new chips for 2025, and the chip maker has also been rolling out cheaper Arm-based chips to bring laptop prices down.
The article acknowledges that both AMD and Intel "have the key advantage of game compatibility that Windows on Arm is definitely not ready for..." But "Given the Windows on Arm gaming situation, a new generation of Nvidia's GPUs could help generate fresh excitement around x86 laptops throughout 2025." And "Nvidia might also be planning to help the Windows on Arm effort. The chip maker has long been rumored to be planning to launch Arm PC chips as soon as 2025... Whatever happens to laptops in 2025, you can guarantee that there's going to be fierce competition between Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm."
But the author still complains about the dedicated Copilot key on his new WIndows-on-Arm laptop. "While the Copilot experience on Windows has gone through several confusing revisions, it's still a key I accidentally press and then get frustrated when a Copilot window appears."
Seriously now, after 5+ years ... (Score:3, Informative)
... that is in the current push for ARM Windows (yes, they've been at it since before the first M1 Macs) we managed to get a (beta!) Google Drive client!
Both the Netflix app and Netflix in a browser crash the whole OS! https://www.reddit.com/r/Surfa... [reddit.com]
Despite insane marketing push, despite hiding that these devices are "special" and calling them like "Surface Pro" and the OS Windows 11 (for sure deliberately trying to trick people in just buying them by mistake) the market share of the new Snapdragon devices is 0.8% https://www.techradar.com/pro/... [techradar.com] . I'm telling you, we sold THOUSANDS of these (across all manufacturers)!
Re: (Score:3)
From your own link, first comment:
" Ignore dr100, check his post history he shits on every thread dealing with ARM, don't feed the troll.
This is more a Microsoft Surface issue than a Snapdragon issue, for instance it doesn't happen on my Snapdragon Elite Lenovo Slim 7x.
Netflix issues are not exclusive to Surface either, as from this thread it affecting AMD based laptops:
https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/G... [lenovo.com] "
In any case, it was really the lack of competitive ARM laptop oriented CPUs that was the issue. I guess
Re: (Score:3)
That doesn't refer to the post, but to one of the comments that's so downvoted you probably didn't even see it, anyway irrelevant to the post itself. It's a minor fanboy kerffufle.
Let me guess, you've found ANY Netflix crash before 2024 anywhere on the Internet and that's
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Regardless of Netflix's DRM problems, reviewers are saying these are good machines. Performance is there, compatibility is there for the most part, and some of the hardware is really nice. It benefits from things like Qualcomm's camera processing tech that makes the webcam phone quality, something rare on laptops.
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"Compatibility is there *for the most part*", "some of the hardware is really nice".
These aren't exactly phrases that inspire confidence. And compared to, say, Apple Silicon, it doesn't feel me with any great desire to run out and buy these machines. Maybe if you can install Linux on them...
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That was the situation with Apple Silicon too. Compatibility is still improving, gaming is not great etc.
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There is no comparison with what Apple did. Windows ARM is just a blip, both in terms of new sales and of course install base. Apple came in 2020 with the M1s for the portables and that was it (technically the transition was complete when they killed the Intel Mac Pro "Cheese Grater" in 2023 but these were very niche products). Ever since early 2020s when you see "MacOS supported" it means Mx Macs (at least), or both Mx and Intel. When you see "Windows" it means x86 Windows, unless there's a special line sa
Netflix isn't a good example right now. (Score:2)
Not just an ARM issue. Netflix just rewrote the app in Electron and updated the backend code of their website. I've had no end of problems with it and the web redesign they did a few weeks ago. The app/browser crashes every second video (starts playing the video corrupted and if you seek anywhere it crashes and takes down any app that is doing 3D video acceleration with it). Additionally when it does work I now often get out of sync video and audio requiring me to skip back and forth. Add to that the deep h
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If 2024 was the year of Windows on ARM, then 2000 was the year of Linux on the desktop!!!
Who cares? (Score:1, Informative)
Nobody is doing anything serious on Windows any longer, as a server or dev platform it's dead. Its main purpose is as a mobile XBox so if games can't run (as well/at all?) then this is just a bunch of faff. Joe and Jane have iPads and that's more than enough for the non-serious, home-use, gig economy market.
Re:Who cares? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody is doing anything serious on Windows any longer
Bro is pretending the entire corporate world doesn't exist and isn't contributing heavily to the global GDP. Take your pills and go back to bed.
Re: (Score:2)
They aren't there yet and Microsoft office on the OS as opposed to in a browser still dominates. Give it some time though, and Microsoft may shoot their foot all the way off. They certainly haven't stopped firing at it.
Re: you'd be surprised (Score:2)
None of us have useful figures on how many people are talking about this, but anecdotally I used to see everyone who said it on popular Faceboot discussions shouted out of the room immediately, now that doesn't happen much and there are hordes of users saying they have switched or plan to switch.
Maybe Fb is only for old people or whatever but this is clearly a change. And we all know we have Valve to thank on one hand, and Microsoft on the other.
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The corporate world is moving towards web hosted apps used through a browser for 90% of workstations.
It is not. Virtually none of the actual products that do serious work are web hosted apps. Just because SAP and Outlook 365 has a web interface doesn't mean actual productivity work isn't done on locally run apps instead. Those "few specialised jobs" you're talking about is virtually all jobs outside of being a receptionist - and they weren't the contributors to GDP in the first place.
Even with Microsoft moving it's entire productivity suite online everyone still uses actual apps because (and you can quote
By your logic, everyone would live in RVs (Score:2)
Nobody is doing anything serious on Windows any longer, as a server or dev platform it's dead. Its main purpose is as a mobile XBox so if games can't run (as well/at all?) then this is just a bunch of faff. Joe and Jane have iPads and that's more than enough for the non-serious, home-use, gig economy market.
You clearly haven't tried using an iPad. There's a lot that's just painful on them, for example typing...and multitasking is horrible. An iPad is like an RV. It kinda has most of what you want if you're welling to make serious compromises. Yeah...you "could" live in an RV and some do, but most don't. Everyone I know who has money eventually buys a laptop or Chromebook after trying to go iPad only for awhile.
Also, you don't like Windows...kewl...it's a marketplace economy and the majority of people
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In a weird sense, the development story on Windows has never been better and the move to ARM help push some people in that direction.
Docker is finicky enough without emulation issues. And with things like a Terminal app that is quite usable, WSL and the like, things are less (less, not zero) painful on Windows. Of course, this doesn't convince any hard core fans nor score any points with the Slashdot crowd. So, yea, call me out as a Windows fanboy (it is my daily driver OS)
I just wish Microsoft would make W
Not. (Score:5, Interesting)
Windows is a joke, Windows on ARM even more so.
It's not that MS is incompetent - although one could easily draw that conclusion - it's that they make (way) more money producing junk. That's why Windows on ARM won't be a thing until the market squeezes them so hard that M$ will be forced to play ball.
lmao (Score:2, Insightful)
No, MSFT is incompetent. The gap between the greybeards there who stick around out of boredom and the current crop of engineers is, for the most part, the grand canyon. Of course there are some younger ones who are good but not many. Kindof like the freshman dorm at a Big 10 college, there's a few people who should have gone to Harvard and the rest who won't even bother to do the reading for their philosophy class. Like, it legitimately makes me angry that there are so many stupid people working in software
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I disagree. MS is incompetent regarding engineering and technology. They always have been, but the requirements got higher and higher, while MS just kept its old ways of half-assing everything. These days, Windows is just a bad joke and the same goes for Office.
So, short-term, yes, they are making more money. But the whole house of cards could come crashing down at any moment and windows might become completely unusable without much warning and no way to fix things.
Battery life (Score:2)
Imo the battery life gain by windows on arm has been a minor achievement because laptops can be powered by usb c and usb c battery phone banks.
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Imo the battery life gain by windows on arm has been a minor achievement because laptops can be powered by usb c and usb c battery phone banks.
I don't see how USB-C-- plus related standards like USB-PD (that are probably in play for a laptop and that I would reasonably assume are part of this assertion, or possibly just USB BC for a phone, or at least older ones) are really relevant to this claim. It just tells you what chargers and cables your device can use. It doesn't mean it's efficient.
If you haven't been following, the latest USB-PD standards allow 240W (48V*5A) of charging, and ones allowing close to 100W have been around for some time now
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I think what the GP meant is that battery life isn't that much worth the hype it's getting as long as you can easily charge your laptop from a (any half-decent) USB-C powerbank. If you had for example an older Dell with a 19.5V barrel connector (and not even a simple 2-pin one, but 2 pins + data pin, DRM for the chargers!) you had to carry the huge power brick with you AND have some 110V-240V A/C power source. You couldn't use a Macbook charger, or whatever USB-C PD charger you can get from the corner store
Helps the Mac world (Score:3)
I run Windows in a VM on an M-series Mac and MS making it more compatible with apps or more native apps is a win. I could care less about CoPilot; I just need to be able to test stuff under Windows before shipping it and it's a pain to transfer it to another machine to do that.
A push to ARM could help the Mac world as well if it makes it easier to port programs to ARM based Macs; which might encourage developers to port their programs. Benchmarks are just geek measurabation, most real world users only want a machine that is fast enough for their needs, and don't care if machine X is 1% or 10% faster or slower on Geekbench.
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I could care less about CoPilot;
I personally couldn't are less about it, but sure if you want to be one of those AI crazed people then you do you. I'll think for myself.
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I could care less about CoPilot;
I personally couldn't are less about it, but sure if you want to be one of those AI crazed people then you do you. I'll think for myself.
Yea, I reach a threshold of not caring where there is a diminishing margin of caring less so I just stop giving a fuck about something and not trying to get the extra 10% or so of not carrying to get to the couldn't care less level of caring.
Nice hardware (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
If you're asking about these Copilot Plus thingies, then no, not really yet. The firmware of these seems to have Windows-specific features. If some project like Asahi Linux emerges to support them, then the next year the Copilot Plus might become (mostly) Linux-supported.
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Nope, and probably due to complete lack of interest, not that there's anything wrong with the platform. What's more it doesn't run Android in almost any way, not only bare metal (which let's say it's understandable as you'd need Linux drivers for the hardware). None of the emulators/various types of virtualisation would work, including the official Android Studio device emulator (that runs otherwise mostly on any OTHER "desktop OS" platform, and funny enough these Snapdragon ARM CPUs are by far the closest
Re: (Score:2)
I'm sure Google has no interest in copilot but does it really make sense to produce one set of Snapdragons for Android and another for Windows? It's 2025 (almost) and we're still producing OS-specific hardware, why?
What Qualcomm could be doing with OEMs ( HP, Lenovo etc) is to define a common subset of hardware for Windows, Chrome OS, Android and (gasp) bare metal Linux.
(Okay, I'm a consumer and not a middle manager, so I don't understand product segregation as a business strategy!)
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We kind of lost this segregation between the OS and the actual device ever since we accepted the most popular computers (the smartphones) to come with their own, manufacturer, sometimes carrier, specific OS without any real choice to use something else. Now anything except X86 PCs are basically more like cars or TVs than computers.
As far as how it serves Qualcomm to have different SKUs I don't think it's much of an issue. These are really powerful chips, designed originally for servers (they had some big li
Happy owner (Score:2)
Not a Windows user, but... (Score:2)
Windows on arm is not to blame (Score:2)
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Not that you wrote something wrong, but half a percent is ten times the number you provided.
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My previous joke "I tell you we'll sell THOUSANDS of these" is only half joke, as in the order of magnitude is just about right. These were hyped beyond belief on YouTube and most top-tech sites but in reality approximately nobody has one.
Delusional (Score:2)
Not switching to “winoa” anytime soon (Score:2)
The other Windows box is a laptop/notebook computer. Dell XPS. The lack of battery life when unplugged really annoys me. So Arm is attractive for that. But then I do some
ARM (Score:1)
Flamebait story (Score:2)
Don't they know slashdot is the land of the Linux desktop? Claiming it's the "Year of Windows on ARM" is pretty much the same as insult around here. Can a story be modded "Flamebait"???
Made the PC laptop market worse... (Score:2)
I get Microsoft wanting keep and Intel and AMD on their toes. Yes, compatibility is fine if you are strictly in Office or a browser. You get some NPU silicon and a key you really want to remap. There is value in making sure your OS isn't completely dependent on one ISA to really work.
What got ignored was Lunar Lake, which has a serious improvement on battery life, (I expect something similar from AMD) none of the compatibility issues and better integrated graphics, which as somebody who does audio, software
HiDPI screens (Score:2)
Strangely, Windows on ARM means HiDPI screens. Several manufacturers (hi Dell) basically do not make laptops with screens which are 3k or up. However, Copilot Plus PCs seem to be commonly available with half-decent resolutions.
I have no idea why those are linked, but the change is certainly welcome.
They did? (Score:2)
Somehow nobody really noticed. So just hyperbole, as usual.
Anyways, they are a decade or two late compared to the alternatives. As is usual for them. And, obviously, they do it worse.
Congrats (Score:2)
Congrats Microsoft! In the race of 3 major operating systems porting to ARM, you finished at a solid 3rd place.