Really hope they sort out Linux support on these. Seems like it would make a great travel laptop
Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
71–80 of 223 posts
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does anyone buy these?
For people complaining about battery control and android emulation on linux, ChromeOS is a boon. You effectively get an actual Linux distro + most of android, with a side of Chrome. It's way closer to "a real computer" than an iPad for instance, and only loses to the Surface Pro/Z13 line in term of versatility IMHO. It really wasn't bad, my only deal breakers were keyboard remapping being non existent and the bluetoo…
I got a ChromeOS device a few years ago and it was great. I think they get an underserved bad reputation from being the locked-down devices you're forced to use in schools, but a personal ChromeOS device is a capable computer that can run any Android app or desktop Linux app.
Though having said that, in the past year I've replaced ChromeOS with desktop Linux (postmarketOS) and I love it even more now. 4GB of RAM was a bit slim for running everything in micro-VMs for "security," which is what ChromeOS does. I've had no trouble with battery life or Android emulation (Waydroid) since switching.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#73If Snapdragon (or ARM players in general) wanted to challenge x86 and Apple dominance, do they need to compete in the exact same arena? Could they carve out a niche (example: ultra-efficient always-on machines) and then expand?
Are you aware of countless SoCs meant for use in smartphones and below? This is them expanding.
Exactly! That makes this move all the more interesting. The smartphone SoC market is saturated, and margins are shrinking. Laptops/PCs give Qualcomm a chance to leverage its IP in a higher-ASP segment. Expanding is logical, but the competitive bar is way higher.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#74If Snapdragon (or ARM players in general) wanted to challenge x86 and Apple dominance, do they need to compete in the exact same arena? Could they carve out a niche (example: ultra-efficient always-on machines) and then expand?
Are you aware of countless SoCs meant for use in smartphones and below? This is them expanding.
Also a bunch of Chromebooks with MediaTek chips.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#75why is it so hard for these companies to do any kind of descent marketing? more importantly, when do we get descent macbook air competitors?
> when do we get descent macbook air competitors When laptop OEMs stop catering to the lowest common denominator corporate IT purchasers (departments which don't care about screen quality, speaker quality, or much of anything else outside of does the spec sheet on paper match our requirements and is it cheap).
> departments which don't care about screen quality, speaker quality, or much of anything else outside of does the spec sheet on paper match our requirements and is it cheap)
Translation: departments which don't care about worker's wellbeing.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have I had any app compatibility issues? To quote Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 3, Line 87: "No." The Prism binary emulation for x86 apps that don't have an ARM equivalent has been stellar with near-native performance (better than Rosetta in macOS). And I've tried some really obscure stuff!
For me it is too slow to run Age of Empires 2: DE multiplayer. More than ten year old Laptops with Intel chips are faster there.
I suspect that's due to the GPU and not due to Prism, because they basically just took a mobile GPU and stuffed it into a laptop chip. Generally performance seems to be on par with whatever a typical flagship Android devices can do.
Desktop games that have mobile ports generally seem to run well, emulation is pretty solid too (e.g. Dolphin). Warcraft III runs OK-ish.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#77If Snapdragon (or ARM players in general) wanted to challenge x86 and Apple dominance, do they need to compete in the exact same arena? Could they carve out a niche (example: ultra-efficient always-on machines) and then expand?
Apple chips are ARM chips.
“ARM chip” is a pretty broad umbrella. Apple’s M-series is based on the ARM ISA, the microarchitecture is Apple’s own design, and the SoCs are built with very different cache hierarchies, memory bandwidth, and custom accelerators. I was simply using Apple as an example of another big player.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#78Linux support is still basically non-existent for the first gen, and they made all this deal about supporting Linux and the open source community. This is to say, don't trust them
Not surprising considering I haven't seen a programming manual or actual datasheet for these things in the first place. Usually helps if you tell the community how to interact with your hardware ..
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
How's the compatibility? Are there any apps that don't work that are critical?
Most apps for dev work actually work; - RStudio - VS Code - WSL2 - Fusion 360 - Docker Only major exception is: - Android Studio's Emulator (although, the IDE does work)
Yeah, I too was surprised to find the dev experience very good: all JetBrains IDEs work well, Visual Studio appears to work fine, and most language toolchains seem well supported.
Re: Snapdragon X2 Elite ARM Laptop CPU
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
The truth is much more subtle than "nonexistent" IMO [1]. Clearly it's a priority because the support for ChromeOS/android support is a big headline this year. [1] https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/ubuntu-24-10-concept-snapdrag... Also worth noting that not all the bits needing support are inside of the Snapdragon, so specific vendor support from Dell, Lenovo etc is required.
My (admittedly cynical) interpretation is that they are dropping support for desktop Linux completely and shipping Android drivers instead.
I thought “Android drivers” were Linux drivers?