Friday, December 16, 2022

The Current State of Windows on ARM-Architecture (& Its Promising Future)

The industry is moving toward efficient ARM processors, in an effort to catch up to Apple.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psbucvxF-UU&t=468s

This video is talking about a future processor.  I saw another video claiming that Microsoft's current ARM-based devices fall way short of what Apple's M-series chips can do.

Although the video claims that there is no problem running X86 programs on ARM processors using emulation (https://youtu.be/psbucvxF-UU?t=195), reportedly many videogames have difficulty or don't work at all under emulation.  However, if we are moving toward two competing hardware architectures, I hope that many software makers will compile their software to work on both platforms.  For video games, it can be more complicated because the GPU hardware can be different.

I don't think that Intel will stand still as their processors get out-competed.  All they would need to do is come up with more powerful processors to recapture the market.  They also are planning to come out with 3-nanometer chips in a couple of years.

However, ARM's main strength is power efficiency, so it will remain popular on portable devices.

According to one video, the industry is moving away from PCs as we know them today, and toward System on a Chip devices like what Apple has done.  Although these tend to be more efficient, you can't change the hardware configuration, like the memory size, after you buy them.