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A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

blogs.windows.com

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Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#371

Post by q-big »

macspoofing wrote: post #140
qalmakka wrote: post #70

I hope that the possibility of an industry-wide switch to ARM doesn't take away the flexibility we now have with the PC. Standardized parts and a well defined firmware interface (and thus "standard" bootloaders instead of a multitude like on ARM) is what makes the PC truly special. Moving to a world where you can't install Linux or where every single machine has incompatible firmware would be disastrous, IMHO. Curren…

>I hope that the possibility of an industry-wide switch to ARM doesn't take away the flexibility we now have with the PC That's a 100% inevitability. Every new CPU architecture incorporates an entire set of new restrictions under the guise of security and privacy.

> That's a 100% inevitability. Every new CPU architecture incorporates an entire set of new restrictions under the guise of security and privacy.

Under the guise of security: for sure. But where are the restrictions under the guise of privacy? In my observation, the trend rather moves away from privacy.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#372

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #353
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux desktops used to run with 4MiB of RAM on a 33MHz processor. You don't need the ultimate best to have a usable computer.

OK, sure, "we got to the moon with 4Mhz" but try watching youtube, editng photos and google docs with that configuration. What you probably mean by usable computer is either an embedded system or some ssh server but what most people actually do with computers is access the web and the modern web is so bloated that without fast hardware and proper software it becomes a pain to do anything remotely productive or fun. T…

You can run X11 with a non-compositing window manager on very low performance hardware.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#373

Post by temac »

tambourine_man wrote: post #312
sonotmyname wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Seems Apple have time this perfectly for their transition Important to note that this doesn't really apply to Apple Silicon. Rosetta II isn't X86 emulation, it's a translation layer - big technical difference.

I get the technical difference but not the legal one. Why would one be OK but not the other?

Especially since that kind of legal aspect highly depend on how much companies are willing to fight, and the state of mind of the judges. And in a not so distant past, Intel warned MS and PC vendors doing some ARM stuff that it might be willing to fight. As for the state of mind of the judges, it is difficult to predict...

But it can be different. Depends on the magic formulas you use for your claims, and whether you are actually permitted to patent software in the first place (with or without other magic formulas usually stating that said software is executed by some hardware).

And in places where it is not supposed to be possible to patent software, patent offices are usually nevertheless accepting them, because it gives them money so why not? :P

TLDR it is a mess. Depends on an insane nmuber of contextual factors, and as unpredictable as the outcome of Oracle vs. Google before the verdict. Or maybe even more unpredictable.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#375

Post by dehrmann »

TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #158
whatever1 wrote: post #132

Now we need an ARM processor that can compete with M1. Seems that Apple caught everyone with the pants down in the PC industry. Microsoft SQ2 processor that ships in their $1400 Surface Pro X is almost 50% slower than M1.

It would be hard to argue that the PC world won't at least make some attempt at shifting to ARM. Apple has demonstrated far too large of a performance and power efficiency savings to not try. Of course, even if that becomes successful, x86 will be available for decades. Right now, ARM Macs are going to just be lost for any kind of gaming (except Catalyst versions of mobile games). This is probably ridiculous, but my…

> Apple has demonstrated far too large of a performance and power efficiency savings to not try

I wonder how much of an improvement you could get by having TSMC make a high-end 5nm x86 SoC.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#376

Post by momokoko »

bluedays wrote: post #211
Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I hope that the possibility of an industry-wide switch to ARM doesn't take away the flexibility we now have with the PC I think that ship has long sailed as we failed to treat smartphones as handheld computers and subject the smartphone/OS manufacturers to the same scrutiny as computer/OS manufacturers. This is a missed opportunity especially to those countries where smartphones are the first computer to majority of…

I see this sorta argument frequently but there was a time when only IBM was capable of making PCs. It seems whoever is first to market ends up not having an open platform, which later is superseded by a more open platform.* See the variety of open operating systems for devices. Ie sailfish, postmarketOS, librephone, etc.

The DMCA did not exist then. Nor did strong encryption and code signing.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#377

Post by icedchai »

nvrspyx wrote: post #232
bluedays wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see this sorta argument frequently but there was a time when only IBM was capable of making PCs. It seems whoever is first to market ends up not having an open platform, which later is superseded by a more open platform.* See the variety of open operating systems for devices. Ie sailfish, postmarketOS, librephone, etc.

> there was a time when only IBM was capable of making PCs They may have been the only one's that could use the term "Personal Computer" for a short time, but they were not the only ones making PCs. You had Commodore, Amiga, HP, Wang, Apple, etc. Even still, IBM's PCs were not locked down and were, for the most part, based on an open architecture allowing you to freely upgrade parts. Later down the line (specifically…

In the 80's, "PC" meant IBM or compatible. Nobody ever called their Apple, Amiga, Commodore 64, etc. a "PC."

There were even some products, like the "Apple II PC Transporter" that made your Apple II compatible with a PC. That meant an IBM PC.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#378

Post by viraptor »

bearjaws wrote: post #207
lars-b2018 wrote: post #41

I think the bigger story here is that computing based on ARM64 has been, and continues to, surround the traditional x86-64 territory. ARM dominates phones, and is popping up in server environments as well, where it is cheaper to run for many workloads than X86-64. We have migrated to ARM based Gravitron processors to deliver our services at my company, and we have been able to reduce our AWS EC2 costs by 40% or so, w…

ARM instances are usually 10% cheaper than their equivalent instance. How exactly did you achieve such a dramatic reduction in cost? The graviton instances aren't faster than the Intel/AMD options, so you need at least the same number of instances unless something else changed.

https://www.honeycomb.io/blog/observations-on-arm64-awss-ama...

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#379

Post by jeffbee »

snvzz wrote: post #361
oblio wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Micro ops?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcode

That's two completely different things. Every x86 instruction is decomposed into one or several micro-ops that are executed. Hardly any x86 instructions are microcoded, which means that the decoder has to start streaming micro-ops from the microcode ROM.

Re: A preview of x64 emulation on Windows for ARM

#380

Post by higerordermap »

qalmakka wrote: post #70

I hope that the possibility of an industry-wide switch to ARM doesn't take away the flexibility we now have with the PC. Standardized parts and a well defined firmware interface (and thus "standard" bootloaders instead of a multitude like on ARM) is what makes the PC truly special. Moving to a world where you can't install Linux or where every single machine has incompatible firmware would be disastrous, IMHO. Curren…

Same here. The people saying hobbyists can still buy open hardware are missing the point - that most become hobbyists precisely because they can tinker with the commodity hardware.
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