ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes • Hacker News Board

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#31

Post by taspeotis » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:41 AM UTC

loeg wrote: post #12

> First, Qualcomm’s System on a Chip (Soc) designs have improved so dramatically in the past four years that their performance rivals that of mainstream Intel Core chipsets for PCs. Hah! > And even better, Microsoft has developed an emulation technology that allows Win32 applications to launch and run unmodified on ARM-based PCs. And to do so with what I am assured is excellent performance. I don't believe it.

> I don't believe it.

My understanding is Microsoft actually has some pretty cool and fast tech for this already: the Xbox 360 emulation on Xbox One.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#32

Post by TheSpiceIsLife » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:43 AM UTC

dragonbonheur wrote: post #27

skrebbel wrote: post #19

Download my great free Windows program now! Please choose: EXE installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM MSI installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM Portable Zip 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM (Download my great free macOS program now! Click here ) This is already a usability problem, and adding 2 more target chipsets makes it worse. Given both bandwidth and smart programmers, c…

It's not really different from choosing among 32 bit or 64 bit programs, or even, for Linux software choosing the package that's best for your distribution. It's not really a pain point. People can read. People who use Windows and Linux know how computers work. People are smart. People should not be babysat by their operating systems. It's gonna be OK. Don't worry.

Well, one guy I work with, I've had to install DraftSight for him on three computers now.

In my head I think "Google download draftsight, click click, how hard is that?", then I remember some of the guys I work with csn hardly read but at least this guy can draw rectangles in DraftSight.

I put Linux on my SOs laptop, she llove it, but I still have to remind her to install updates occasionally.

The right balance for notifications, nagware, user interaction, download and installing things, is hard.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#33

Post by dragonbonheur » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:45 AM UTC

An interesting development, but it is a shame that this will require a new chip from Qualcomm, while there have been full desktop Linux distributions for several ARM chips and boards for quite a while now. Microsoft's software is really full of bloat.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#34

Post by cm2187 » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:46 AM UTC

I tried a surface pro as a replacement for an ipad, but I found it to be extremely frustrating. Beyond the bugs and blue screens, I found the battery life to be way shorter, and the surface to take a long time to wake up, not an instantaneous experience like an ipad, where you can forget it in a bag for 10h and use it straight away. More like a laptop.

Would an ARM based windows device achieve an ipad style battery life and instantaneous experience? Or is it more linked to the architecture of the system?

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#35

Post by ZenoArrow » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:46 AM UTC

Eridrus wrote: post #26

Even assuming they can hit performance targets with this, which sounds hard but not impossible, what's the major use case? Continuum? Windows laptops with better battery life? Most win32 software is going to suck on a touch screen, so I'm not really seeing this help them in mobile.

>"Windows laptops with better battery life?"

Not going to happen. There's a performance hit that almost certainly comes along with emulation. Battery life is likely to get worse with x86 Windows emulation on ARM.

Also, by the time Intel stopped pushing x86 in mobile devices they were producing chips that were competitive with ARM chips when it came to power draw.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#36

Post by Osiris » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:49 AM UTC

skrebbel wrote: post #19

Download my great free Windows program now! Please choose: EXE installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM MSI installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM Portable Zip 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM (Download my great free macOS program now! Click here ) This is already a usability problem, and adding 2 more target chipsets makes it worse. Given both bandwidth and smart programmers, c…

Wasn't one of the points of the .NET Framework to make architecture independent apps? The CLR is compiled to the native instruction set, but apps are only compiled to IL and thus are dynamically recompiled to the native instruction set.

So, ideally, you'd just have one download.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#37

Post by colemickens » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:53 AM UTC

skrebbel wrote: post #19

Download my great free Windows program now! Please choose: EXE installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM MSI installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM Portable Zip 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM (Download my great free macOS program now! Click here ) This is already a usability problem, and adding 2 more target chipsets makes it worse. Given both bandwidth and smart programmers, c…

1. I don't think it's going to explode the compatibility matrix... it seems to run unmodified x86 executables on ARM.

They demo Photoshop running on a Qualcomm processor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_GlGglbu1U&feature=youtu.be

2. Existing "desktop app" authors can opt to package their app in a way that will make it possible to distribute through the Windows Store.

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/uwp/porting/desktop...

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#38

Post by skrebbel » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:57 AM UTC

Mao_Zedang wrote: post #25

skrebbel wrote: post #19

Download my great free Windows program now! Please choose: EXE installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM MSI installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM Portable Zip 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM (Download my great free macOS program now! Click here ) This is already a usability problem, and adding 2 more target chipsets makes it worse. Given both bandwidth and smart programmers, c…

https://www.microsoft.com/en-au/store/apps/windows "it still can't be used to download and install boring oldschool desktop applications" it can. https://msdn.microsoft.com/windows/uwp/porting/desktop-to-uw...

Are you sure? Afaik you can convert most apps to UWP apps but they don't have the same rights and capabilities as the oldschool desktop apps. I don't exactly know what the limits are but I doubt stuff like Wireshark or f.lux could run as an UWP app.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#39

Post by skrebbel » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 5:58 AM UTC

colemickens wrote: post #37

skrebbel wrote: post #19

Download my great free Windows program now! Please choose: EXE installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM MSI installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM Portable Zip 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM (Download my great free macOS program now! Click here ) This is already a usability problem, and adding 2 more target chipsets makes it worse. Given both bandwidth and smart programmers, c…

1. I don't think it's going to explode the compatibility matrix... it seems to run unmodified x86 executables on ARM. They demo Photoshop running on a Qualcomm processor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_GlGglbu1U&feature=youtu.be 2. Existing "desktop app" authors can opt to package their app in a way that will make it possible to distribute through the Windows Store. https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/uwp/por…

You can also run 32-bit apps on a 64-bit OS (also because of an emulation layer), but still people offer 64-bit downloads of programs. Why? Speed and memory. With ARM it'll be similar.

Re: ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

#40

Post by pcr0 » Thu, Dec 08, 2016, 6:00 AM UTC

dragonbonheur wrote: post #27

skrebbel wrote: post #19

Download my great free Windows program now! Please choose: EXE installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM MSI installer 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM Portable Zip 32-bit x86 64-bit x64 32-bit ARM 64-bit ARM (Download my great free macOS program now! Click here ) This is already a usability problem, and adding 2 more target chipsets makes it worse. Given both bandwidth and smart programmers, c…

It's not really different from choosing among 32 bit or 64 bit programs, or even, for Linux software choosing the package that's best for your distribution. It's not really a pain point. People can read. People who use Windows and Linux know how computers work. People are smart. People should not be babysat by their operating systems. It's gonna be OK. Don't worry.

There was literally a post about this on HN yesterday [0]. I'll accept that people using Linux are better at computers. But Windows is too broad in terms of user skill.

[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13111768