The End of x86?
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The End of x86?
1–10 of 119 posts
Re: The End of x86?
#2I think the largest hurdle for ARM to get over is the preponderance of Windows installations with kernels only complied for x86. Linux and OS X (Mach) already run on ARM, and I think that possibly the NT kernel runs on ARM (Windows phone 7 is ARM, right?) I have trouble seeing Microsoft port over Windows proper to ARM until there's a really strong market for it. That being said, perhaps low power consumption ARM devices will provide that market. Perhaps this is another reason that Apple has their own ARM chip - to be at the forefront of the ARM revolution, displacing MSFT?
Re: The End of x86?
#3Is ARM's power advantage really that significant for devices larger than the smart phone / tablet form factor? If an Atom-based CPU consumes ~2-3 extra watts but offers marginally better performance and (more importantly) compatibility with an enormous base of existing applications, that doesn't seem like a very compelling argument for switching.
Re: The End of x86?
#4I think the largest hurdle for ARM to get over is the preponderance of Windows installations with kernels only complied for x86. Linux and OS X (Mach) already run on ARM, and I think that possibly the NT kernel runs on ARM (Windows phone 7 is ARM, right?) I have trouble seeing Microsoft port over Windows proper to ARM until there's a really strong market for it. That being said, perhaps low power consumption ARM devi…
NT doesn't currently run on ARM (WP7 is still based on CE), though it was originally designed to be CPU independent. Probably the biggest obstacle for MSFT porting Windows to ARM is not the expense of the port itself, but reluctance to put out a version of Windows that's binary incompatible with all the Windows software out there.
Incidentally (and speaking of breaking compatibility), MSFT is working on a brand new kernel and operating environment (Midori) which does have ARM as a target. But this is an incubation project with no guaranteed release, though it's a very serious effort.
Re: The End of x86?
#5I think the largest hurdle for ARM to get over is the preponderance of Windows installations with kernels only complied for x86. Linux and OS X (Mach) already run on ARM, and I think that possibly the NT kernel runs on ARM (Windows phone 7 is ARM, right?) I have trouble seeing Microsoft port over Windows proper to ARM until there's a really strong market for it. That being said, perhaps low power consumption ARM devi…
I don't think Windows Phone is based on NT.
Apple and Android have shown that you can build a mainstream platform ecosystem from nothing in 2-3 years, so who needs Windows compatibility?
Re: The End of x86?
#6I think the largest hurdle for ARM to get over is the preponderance of Windows installations with kernels only complied for x86. Linux and OS X (Mach) already run on ARM, and I think that possibly the NT kernel runs on ARM (Windows phone 7 is ARM, right?) I have trouble seeing Microsoft port over Windows proper to ARM until there's a really strong market for it. That being said, perhaps low power consumption ARM devi…
NT doesn't currently run on ARM (WP7 is still based on CE), though it was originally designed to be CPU independent. Probably the biggest obstacle for MSFT porting Windows to ARM is not the expense of the port itself, but reluctance to put out a version of Windows that's binary incompatible with all the Windows software out there. Incidentally (and speaking of breaking compatibility), MSFT is working on a brand new k…
Windows NT originally was CPU independent, but only for Little Endian architectures.
Re: The End of x86?
#7Is ARM's power advantage really that significant for devices larger than the smart phone / tablet form factor? If an Atom-based CPU consumes ~2-3 extra watts but offers marginally better performance and (more importantly) compatibility with an enormous base of existing applications, that doesn't seem like a very compelling argument for switching.
Think of a data center situation though where you can get a ~50% power requirement difference for marginal performance decreases. The cost savings would be huge even if you require more servers to make up for the performance difference.
For most home users I think you're right for now but for businesses it could be huge.
Re: The End of x86?
#8Is ARM's power advantage really that significant for devices larger than the smart phone / tablet form factor? If an Atom-based CPU consumes ~2-3 extra watts but offers marginally better performance and (more importantly) compatibility with an enormous base of existing applications, that doesn't seem like a very compelling argument for switching.
Except that the Atoms at same (and even a bit higher) clock don't even offer marginally better performance.
And another thing that I came to think of that weighs heavily in ARM's favor is the multitude of composite, multifunctional chips, SoCs etc. currently available in the ARM flavor. Is there ANYTHING like this for Atom, or any x86 at all?
Re: The End of x86?
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
NT doesn't currently run on ARM (WP7 is still based on CE), though it was originally designed to be CPU independent. Probably the biggest obstacle for MSFT porting Windows to ARM is not the expense of the port itself, but reluctance to put out a version of Windows that's binary incompatible with all the Windows software out there. Incidentally (and speaking of breaking compatibility), MSFT is working on a brand new k…
Windows NT originally was CPU independent, but only for Little Endian architectures.
There is nothing in Windows which requires fixed endianness. While all known versions of the OS have been shipped on little-endian machines (except XBox 360, albeit running highly modified version of NT Kernel), there is very little dependency on the endianness for all modules except format parsers and network API. Changing that is a relatively simple undertaking, much simpler than building a new version of kernel, for XBox, for example
Re: The End of x86?
#10Is ARM's power advantage really that significant for devices larger than the smart phone / tablet form factor? If an Atom-based CPU consumes ~2-3 extra watts but offers marginally better performance and (more importantly) compatibility with an enormous base of existing applications, that doesn't seem like a very compelling argument for switching.
Is ARM's power advantage really that significant for devices larger than the smart phone / tablet form factor?
I'll bet $5 that the MacBook Air in the future (18-24 months) will switch to ARM once the >2GHz ARM processors start shipping en masse.
The Asus Eee PCs running Android with Snapdragon processors already embed the Cortex-A9 MPCores.