Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Computing
  3. News

Supply channels hint that ARM-based Windows 10 machines are due in 2017

By

microsoft building tab support into windows 10 upgrade popup
Image used with permission by copyright holder
One of the more exciting — and potentially underrated — announcements out of Microsoft’s 2016 WinHEC conference was upcoming Windows 10 support for ARM processors. While the original Windows-on-ARM experiment, otherwise known as Windows RT, was Microsoft’s first Surface iteration, Microsoft’s future efforts will be more aggressive and likely successful.

Apparently, Microsoft’s OEM partners believe that the company will be more successful this time around and also less exclusive. According to industry supply channels, a number of companies are planning to create ARM-based notebooks and tablets running Windows 10, Digitimes reports.

Recommended Videos

The reports don’t have any meat to them and so they deserve a strong rumor caveat, but they make sense. Microsoft seriously gimped Windows 10 running on ARM with the first Surfaces, limiting them to running only Windows 8 apps — equivalent to today’s Universal Windows Platform, or Windows 10, apps — and a special version of the company’s Office suite. Going forward, Windows 10 on ARM will support the entire library of millions of standard Win32 desktop apps via an optimized emulation engine.

Related

That means that while ARM-based Surface devices were limited to a relatively small selection of Windows 8 apps and Office, future ARM-based devices will run any of the more feature-rich Windows desktop apps that so many individuals and organizations rely upon. And, they will run them on machines that enjoy the power management benefits of ARM processors.

So far, it’s looking like Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 835 is the first candidate to receive Windows 10 in 2017, likely starting with the Redstone 3 release expected in late 2017. Microsoft did show off this version of Windows 10 running on a Snapdragon 820 and performance seemed good for both Windows 10 and a couple of Win32 applications.

Windows 10 Running on a Qualcomm Snapdragon Processor

It’s likely that Windows 10 support for ARM processors will represent one of the bigger stories in computing in 2017 and could represent the basis for the much-anticipated Surface Phone initiative. In the meantime, Windows fans should be excited to know that there are already rumors of serious OEM support for ARM-based Windows 10 devices.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Mark Coppock
Mark Coppock
Computing Writer
Mark has been a geek since MS-DOS gave way to Windows and the PalmPilot was a thing. He’s translated his love for…
The upcoming Windows ARM laptops may have surprisingly powerful GPUs
A laptop and a camera on a table with a Qualcomm logo on the screen.

The next generation of ARM-based laptops and tablets with the new Snapdragon X Elite system-on-a-chip (SoC) won't be coming for a few more months, but new benchmarks already show its potential power in an important way. The results are surprising, and they show that Qualcomm's new ARM chip has as powerful a GPU as Intel's latest Core Ultra CPUs.

All of these new tests, which were initially spotted by WccfTech, were performed by Turkish YouTuber Erdi Özüağ in some pretty specific scenarios. Özüağ was able to push beyond the benchmark suites we've seen thus far and run the Proycon benchmark, as well as 3DMark and tests in Visual Studio Code and 7-Zip. He used a device with Qualcomm's reference design, as well as a laptop with an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H CPU. The device with the Qualcomm chip was running at 28 watts of power.

Read more
The Surface Pro 10 sounds amazing, and it may be coming soon
The back of the Surface Pro 9, with the kickstand pulled out.

Microsoft could be getting ready to reveal the Surface Pro 10 and Surface Laptop 6 sooner than expected. Reporting from Windows Central's Zac Bowden indicates the devices might be announced on March 21, and could feature both Intel Core Ultra and Snapdragon X Elite chips under the hood, along with some design tweaks.

These new Surface devices are expected to go all-in on AI features in Windows 11. More important is that we could see the next Surface Laptop in a new ARM-based variant in addition to one with a traditional Intel Core Ultra CPU. This change in chips should not only bring more choice like the Surface Pro 9 did, but also performance gains that can help the devices rival what Apple has accomplished with the iPad Pro, as well as the new MacBook Pro with the M3 chip.

Read more
A huge barrier just fell for Windows on Arm
The back of the Surface Pro 9, with the kickstand pulled out.

Windows on Arm hasn't caught on yet, despite years of effort from Microsoft. One of the biggest issues facing Arm-based processors on Windows has been app support, but one major holdout just opened up support for these CPUs.

Google Chrome has been at the center of the conversation around app support for Windows on Arm, but it appears Google is prepping a native Arm version. The build went live late Thursday night in the Nightly channel for Google Chrome, which is a developer channel that showcases cutting-edge features (and plenty of bugs) for those who want to be on the bleeding edge of what Google Chrome has to offer.

Read more