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Shifting Apps To ARM Chips Could Save Laptop Batteries
An anonymous reader writes "When is an Intel PC not an Intel PC? When it moves applications such as Internet browsing and email on to an ARM processor because it can get longer battery life. And according to a story at EE Times, this hybrid Intel-ARM processor approach is being taken by PC makers as prominent as Dell. The problem for Intel: Why would you switch out of 'all-day' mode and use the Intel processor? The problem for ARM: lacking support from Microsoft for Windows; the applications it runs for the PC have to do so under Linux."
Not a problem for everyone. I've already got an ARM-based Linux running on a NSLU32 NAS head - 32Mb RAM, 32 Mb flash. If I could get a lightweight laptop with a modern ARM chip, I would be over the moon.
"It doesn't cost enough, and it makes too much sense."
And this is how Linux will win. Not with a bang but a whimper. Embedded appliances, dedicated purpose applications, and multi-platform compatibility.
Firefox, Thunderbird, and (hopefully) soon KDE.
MS users who don't know any better, will win this for us.
Geeks like us have already dominated the server-side of the Linux equation, now fools will win the desktop for us.
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
Reminds me of the days when Acorn Computers were around with their RISCPC - A machine that was ARM powered, but you could also attach an x86 processor.
This is so 1990's!
Frankly I would love an ARM based notebook except for just a few issues.
1. Flash. Like it or not Flash is everywhere and I have not seen a Linux ARM version.
2. Java. I need it and JavaFX could be a nice alternative to Silverlight/Moonlight.
I see Flash as the big issue for most people. I would love to see ARM back on the "desktop" even if it is on the laptop. A ARM with a good GPU really would be a nice netbook system.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Funny...I read the story and was going to ask on this thread, "Where could I get an ARM-based laptop to run Linux on?" All day on a battery would be fantastic.
Constitutionally Correct
I'm wondering if, the the overall scheme of things, the price we pay for the x86-ness of Intel and AMD's CPUs is that high. All their CPUs are basically RISC things, with a very optimized x86 compatibility layer running on top. Is that layer that expensive performance-wise ?
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
The display uses far more power than the CPU, so the benefit of adding a second low-power CPU will only be realized with a different display technology that has much lower power consumption for a static image.
When traveling, most of the time, I really do want a long battery life and don't need much compute power. But when I arrive at my destination, give a presentation, and demo some software, then I want compute power.
So, as far as I'm concerned, having a high power and a low power CPU sharing the same keyboard, screen, drive, and power supply is actually very much what I want. I hope it becomes standard.
Don't ARMs also run BSD ? It would seem that Apple might have a solution for their laptops, if they decided to go that way.
Out of curiousity, not hostility, can I ask why?
I work as a systems architect/administrator (whatever you want to call it) for UNIX/Linux-based large datacenters, but also use Linux personally and for non-technical tasks (e.g. Word, Excel, and assorted other files), without any difficulty. And I've been using Linux for almost 10 years now - back when things were difficult for users that weren't highly technical.
The only things I ever find myself using Windows for is to run Visio (if someone could recommend a F/OSS replacement for it, it would be greatly appreciated, but I have yet to find one as full-featured - or even close) or to play games (which I do rarely, I prefer other forms of entertainment). And Flash rarely works to my satisfaction, but I don't really consider that a great loss either.
I just don't understand it when people say that they can't switch over to Linux. Or at least dual-boot. Not to insult your intelligence, but most modern distributions are simple to install and productively work in. Maybe it's my background, maybe it's your choice of distributions, but I fail to see what the fuss is about. Especially when there are distributions (Ubuntu, for example) that are specifically geared towards non-technical users. While I personally find Ubuntu to be over-simplified and (as of my last use, about 3 years ago) not secure enough, I don't see why it wouldn't be easy to use as well as a vast improvement over Windows.
PC moderators can suck my White pierced, tattooed dick. If you think pride == hate, s/dick/Aryan meat mallet/g.
"Have you used Windows Mobile? That's something I reserve for inflicting on only my worst enemies and only as a last resort. It's the Jack Bauer option of OSs."
That is an insult to Jack Bauer. He is competent and works 24 hours a day.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
"Have you used Windows Mobile? That's something I reserve for inflicting on only my worst enemies and only as a last resort. It's the Jack Bauer option of OSs."
That is an insult to Jack Bauer. He is competent and works 24 hours a day.
But only one day a year.
WINE is just Win32 for POSIXy platforms. It's not able to rewrite x86 binary for ARM.
Indeed, *wine* doesn't do it itself. But nothing prevents you from running a separate layer to do the translation.
QEMU has a Linux-on-Linux mode, where it doesn't emulate a full blown virtual PC, it only runs the application targeting a foreign architectures inside the emulator and passes along the calls to the actual native OS and libraries.
Darwine has been doing exactly this to run x86 Win32 application on PPC Mac OS X using a combination of Wine and QEMU. It should be possible to build a similar stack to run x86 Win32 application on ARM Linux.
But don't expect much performance from it on an ARM netbook. It will probably OK to run a couple of simple tools. It won't probably work with games or other more resource intensive application.
But gamers aren't the machine's main audience anyway, the ARM netbooks are targetted at people who just want Web, Email & Chat, with the longest possible battery life.
Although, you probably could get better Win32 performance (at the cost of battery life) with dual-chip machine (like DELL Lattitude ON) or using accelerator boards if the ARM netbooks has some standard connector (like Xpress card).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
What's the current state of OLED?
OLED display have been spotted in the wild (sony, available since 2007). They are ultra thin, size 11".
But they still cost an arm and a leg. And OLED currently still has a shorter life time.
But as production ramps up, price will probably fall down. After a couple of year, OLED will probably cheap enough for netbooks.
Electronic paper?
Still suffers from really slow refresh rate. Good for e-book. Bad for anything which needs higher refresh rate.
The good thing, with eink is that, when not refreshing, it costs exactly 0 W. (Under sunlight. Otherwise, you still have to light it up somehow).
Maybe that display from the XO?
The first gen XO uses a normal LCD screen, but with a LED backlight that doesn't use coloured filters, but prism that split the light to generate the colours.
Thus having a better efficiency. Also works in B&W under sun light.
Currently, XO-type display are the best compromise in quality and price.
OLEDs are going to be the next-big-thing once 11" displays stop costing prices in the thousand dollar range.
Beside, given the power consumption of ATOM's chipset, a whole Intel-based solution still has a much more higher power drain than an ARM based one (which has everything into a single SoC - and can even embed RAM in the same CPU package).
So even if ATOM vs. ARM differences aren't big, Intel netbook vs. ARM netbook still makes a difference.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Yeah, but he spends the rest of the year describing everything he did on that one day to ad-nauseam, and he always makes it sound like he saved the world.
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