Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

ARM-Based Windows 10 Portable PCs? Hell Yes

thurrott.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 121 posts

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

#71

Post by millstone »

ac29 wrote: post #65
nikanj wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

macOS can support all three of the platforms above with a single fat binary.

You are mostly right, I had forgotten about fat binaries. However, 10.6+ only supports x86{-32,-64}, and and 10.8+ only supports x86-64 [0]. Having Windows 10 (?) support 4 architectures is a feature, in my opinion. But, I'd still agree fat/universal binaries would be a usability enhancement. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_binary

Aside from universal binaries, Apple's approach to 64 bit also provided a better user experience. Microsoft required you to choose either a 32 bit or 64 bit version of Windows, with the 64 bit version breaking driver compatibility. Apple enabled 64 bit apps to run atop a 32 bit kernel, enabling driver compatibility, at a slight perf cost.

Probably these new ARM machines won't support legacy hardware, though that may not be relevant nowadays.

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

#72

Post by millstone »

eikenberry wrote: post #70
kalleboo wrote: post #48

People have been speculating for the past year if Apple could switch their Macs to ARM, and keep compatibility with a emulation layer like they did during the PowerPC->Intel transition. I guess Microsoft beat them to the point... Will be interesting to see how well it performs in real life.

I think Linux beat them both to the point... many years ago.

No way. Linux has never had any sort of cross-architecture binary compatibility story. Certainly nothing that worked as well as Apple's Mixed Mode Manager or Rosetta.

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

#73

Post by jazoom »

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…

Looks like trying to pick the installer for Linux except there are also different distributions.

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

#74

Post by Jedd »

millstone wrote: post #72
eikenberry wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Linux beat them both to the point... many years ago.

No way. Linux has never had any sort of cross-architecture binary compatibility story. Certainly nothing that worked as well as Apple's Mixed Mode Manager or Rosetta.

> Linux has never had any sort of cross-architecture binary compatibility story.

You mean like qemu?

> Certainly nothing that worked as well as Apple's Mixed Mode Manager or Rosetta.

I think the parent was alluding to the fact that with GNU/Linux and/or free software in general there isn't the same kinds of requirement to get binary lumps of code running on alien architecture.

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

#75

Post by millstone »

Jedd wrote: post #74
millstone wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No way. Linux has never had any sort of cross-architecture binary compatibility story. Certainly nothing that worked as well as Apple's Mixed Mode Manager or Rosetta.

> Linux has never had any sort of cross-architecture binary compatibility story. You mean like qemu? > Certainly nothing that worked as well as Apple's Mixed Mode Manager or Rosetta. I think the parent was alluding to the fact that with GNU/Linux and/or free software in general there isn't the same kinds of requirement to get binary lumps of code running on alien architecture.

> You mean like qemu?

No.

> there isn't the same kinds of requirement to get binary lumps of code running on alien architecture.

Are you implying that this has something to do with the software being free?

In 2006, I used Time Machine to back up my G5, and then restore it onto my new Intel Core Duo (both iMacs!). The migrated apps just worked, regardless of whether they were free software or binary blobs.

This has nothing to do with software freedom. It's about having a good user experience: when your users migrate from an old machine to a new one, it just works, period.

Linux doesn't have this requirement because it prioritizes developers over end users. I'm not bashing Linux here, I use it often and appreciate it for what it is. But an honest assessment tells us it has never come close to Apple-level smoothness in architectural transitions.

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

#76

Post by setq »

Call me cynical but this feels like another platform to be abandoned when no one buys them as per the old Windows ARM tablets. Those who bought them abandoned quickly.

There will probably be a crazy restriction like App Store only.

Oh and the whole MSI 32/64/ARM pile of crap as well.

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

#77

Post by cm2187 »

setq wrote: post #76

Call me cynical but this feels like another platform to be abandoned when no one buys them as per the old Windows ARM tablets. Those who bought them abandoned quickly. There will probably be a crazy restriction like App Store only. Oh and the whole MSI 32/64/ARM pile of crap as well.

Well, that would be repeating the Surface RT failure. I can only assume they are not going to make the same mistake twice, so I doubt it will be locked down like Windows RT was.

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

#78

Post by adrianN »

m_mueller wrote: post #59
liamzebedee wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds intriguing, could you offer up a more detailed insight or a link? :-)

Basically, you get a corporate drama, a human drama and a tech drama all wrapped up in one series of presentations: Jobs' return (as a consultant) 1997, promoting technologies from NeXT. Watch basically everyone asleep at the wheel except Jobs, the man with a plan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QrX047-v-s WWDC Q&A - 'the art of saying no' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iACK-LNnzM Jobs' hostile takeover in July b…

I find it interesting to hear how important developers were in the 1997 video. I feel like the first Intel Macs were indeed machines build for developers. But since, like, Snow Leopard, the developer experience has either stagnated or regressed. The command line tools are ancient, managing packages has been left for Homebrew and the like, etc. Macs more and more become pure Facebook consumption machines.

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

#79

Post by m_mueller »

adrianN wrote: post #78
m_mueller wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically, you get a corporate drama, a human drama and a tech drama all wrapped up in one series of presentations: Jobs' return (as a consultant) 1997, promoting technologies from NeXT. Watch basically everyone asleep at the wheel except Jobs, the man with a plan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QrX047-v-s WWDC Q&A - 'the art of saying no' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iACK-LNnzM Jobs' hostile takeover in July b…

I find it interesting to hear how important developers were in the 1997 video. I feel like the first Intel Macs were indeed machines build for developers. But since, like, Snow Leopard, the developer experience has either stagnated or regressed. The command line tools are ancient, managing packages has been left for Homebrew and the like, etc. Macs more and more become pure Facebook consumption machines.

Basically they had to attack the problem from the chicken side. Nowadays there are so many eggs (users) that the chickens (devs) come free. At some point not catering to them will likely backfire however.

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

#80

Post by untoreh »

millstone wrote: post #75
Jedd wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Linux has never had any sort of cross-architecture binary compatibility story. You mean like qemu? > Certainly nothing that worked as well as Apple's Mixed Mode Manager or Rosetta. I think the parent was alluding to the fact that with GNU/Linux and/or free software in general there isn't the same kinds of requirement to get binary lumps of code running on alien architecture.

> You mean like qemu? No. > there isn't the same kinds of requirement to get binary lumps of code running on alien architecture. Are you implying that this has something to do with the software being free? In 2006, I used Time Machine to back up my G5, and then restore it onto my new Intel Core Duo (both iMacs!). The migrated apps just worked, regardless of whether they were free software or binary blobs. This has no…

Maybe he just meant that there have been arm based linux distros for quite sometime while windowsRT got canned
Post reply on HN