Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Will Bring 64-Bit App Support To ARM-Based PCs In May (engadget.com)
Microsoft's general manager for Windows, Erin Chappie, told Engadget today that an SDK for ARM64 apps will be announced at the upcoming Build developer's conference in May. From the report: With the new SDK, developers would be able to natively recompile their apps to run in 64-bit on ARM-based PCs like the ASUS NovaGo. This opens up app support for the platform, which previously only supported 32-bit apps. The potentially greater app compatibility is welcome, since this was one of the biggest drawbacks of Windows on Snapdragon devices. But whether you'll get the higher performance that you'd typically expect out of 64-bit apps will depend on the Snapdragon 835 CPU that powers the current generation of the PCs in question. Connected PCs ship with Windows 10 S, but Microsoft has been offering free upgrades to Windows 10 Pro through 2019, making the OS more familiar and versatile. The ARM 64 SDK will be available for both Store apps and desktop versions (.exes). Ultimately, it'll be up to developers to decide whether they want to go to the trouble of recompiling their apps for Windows on Snapdragon, but Microsoft at least appears to be making strides in creating as open and useful a platform as possible.
To be fair, Steam also takes 30%, so it makes little difference for game developers. Sure, you can distribute through other digital game stores, but the ones that don't also take 30% aren't nearly as popular as Steam. If you're Notch, and invented a new game genre with no competitors, and are riding the wave of a new way to experience games (Let's Plays narrated by Youtube personalities) then you can sell the game exclusively through your own website, with a processor that takes only 3%, and still become a billionaire. But pretty much noone else has pulled that off.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Hopefully -- the alternative is more locked-down ARM hardware being rammed down the public's raw gullet. Secure boot should be optional, locking it down to Windows shouldn't be mandatory.
Between this, and Macs moving away from Intel CPUs (and reportedly to ARM as well), Intel is in deep trouble, their low-power CPUs in particular. Pretty much anything open-source will be recompiled for Windows on ARM, legacy proprietary apps will be about the only thing propping up x86, and emulation will serve for anything not performance-critical. The latest ARM chips are on a smaller node than the latest Intel chips, and have been for a while, so Intel no longer has a process advantage compared to the ARM manufacturers. I wonder if anyone will start producing larger ARM chips that have the power of the larger Intel chips.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
These "64 bit apps" are not the same 64 bit apps that CIOs are asking MSFT about. The 64 bit apps that everyone cares about are the AMD64 ones. The fact that you can recompile to ARM64 is nice I guess but it's basically as useful as WinCE was back in the day. You don't get the broad ecosystem of custom made business process automation software that makes Windows legendary.
Unless you're trying to port an existing MFC application, such as FamiTracker.
the first computer based on it is an HP selling for a grand. It's got a 19 hour battery life, but there are droid tablets in the $500 range that push 16 hours. You'd have to really want battery life to pay that kind of premium.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/