Lenovo is announcing a second ARM-powered Windows 10 laptop this week, and this time it’s a Yoga. The Lenovo Yoga C630 WOS (Windows on Snapdragon) is, as you might have guessed, powered by Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 850 processor. It’s the first Windows laptop we’ve seen with the Snapdragon 850, and its a chip that Qualcomm specifically designed for always-connected Windows 10 PCs. This new processor ushers in the latest generation of ARM-powered Windows 10 laptops.
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Lenovo is promising 30 percent better performance over its previous Miix 630 Windows on ARM device, and a surprising claim of 25 hours of battery life to match. While the battery life sounds impressive, it’s the performance that will matter in a device like this and we’ll need to test this latest range of ARM-powered laptops to see if app compatibility and performance has improved. As this is powered by the Snapdragon 850, there’s also built-in LTE support for mobile connectivity on the go.
In theory, these ARM-based laptops are really nice. In practice, though, they simply haven’t yet delivered. Maybe Snapdragon 850 devices will finally be it?
Of what EXACTLY is the point of Windows on ARM? Because with Linux you have source so pretty much any software for it is trivially ported, with OSX its targeting a niche market where users pay top dollar so software devs have a financial incentive to follow whatever CPU arch Cupertino is pushing this week, with Windows….Step 2 ? Step 3 profit?
I can tell ya the local Walmart took a bath on the last WOA offerings as they found out the hard way what I could have already told them which is consumers don’t know CPUs, they only know “Windows runs Windows stuff” and when these ARM units don’t “run windows stuff”, specifially the programs they are used to running on X86 Windows? Consumers WILL bring these back en masse saying “this is broken” and demanding their money back.
Ironically its the exact same situation vendors found themselves in when Netbooks first came out as consumers thought “baby laptops run same stuff as big laptops” IE Windows programs when those units actually shipped with Linux? They saw 400% higher returns than the later Windows units as consumers couldn’t run their stuff and brought them back. Now its MSFT trapped by X86 as Google can port Android to anything and as long as GAPPS works the consumers are happy but if all their windows stuff won’t run on these “new windows” units? They ain’t gonna blame MSFT, they are gonna blame the vendor for selling them “something broken” and send ’em back.
I agree that this isn’t something that should be sold to general consumers without a big warning sticker “will not run 64bit Windows Software”
For schools and business (where the IT-Department influences the buying process) this seems like a pretty good development though. It can run basically all software at acceptable speeds in silent, thin, light, portable machines without worrying about battery running out today or tomorrow.
Of course we all know that Microsoft isn’t going to put that sticker on the box, that these devices will end up being sold to customers that will not be happy with them and that business and schools will simply think “so for 50 dollars more and a daily charge I can get a machine that runs all software at higher speeds….better deal”
Not being able to run 64-bit Windows software is not, repeat not, “basically all” software and particularly not when dealing with enterprise crap.
Oh that’s so true. There’s a universe of software out there. Especially in the enterprise arena.
There really isn’t much software for Windows that is 64bit only, especially when you consider the hardware that these machines are running on (4 or 8 GB maximum, focused on portability not max-performance). Of course there is a lot of software that is 64 bit, but there will be a 32 bit version of it as well and that will run on this CPU. You will really have to reach to find a piece of software that people would normally run on these machines that they cannot run on ARM.
Ya know I have to LMAO at getting constantly modded down for pointing out what should be common knowledge on a site called “OSNews” that consumers do not know what a CPU arch is, they just know “Windows runs Windows stuff” but hey flag waving fanboys gotta wave their little flags, be they ARM flags or Winflags.
Doesn’t change the fact that you sir are 100% correct, which is why my local Walmart, Walgreens, and Big Lots ALL ended up taking baths on the last time MSFT went WOA because Shock! Gasp! Consumers see a device with a big Windows sticker and see screenshots of Windows and think that its gonna run Windows stuff and get seriously irked and take it back when it doesn’t.
Look its real simple…YOU know what the difference between ARM and X86 is, I know what the difference is, as do the readers of this site but riddle me this…how many actual big box consumers know WTF a CPU arch is or that there are differences? It would be different if they were releasing a version of Windows that did NOT carry the Windows sticker, did not look like a bog standard Windows 10 desktop, but if they did that it would have to stand on its own merits/lack thereof and not ride on the Windows name which is why I consider WOA more than a bit of a scam, because I can tell ya the last WOA units didn’t have ANY big warnings that “Windows Stuff” wouldn’t work and it was sold to consumers who didn’t know better…any bets on how likely that the same will happen with this round?
You’re probably getting downvoted because you miss how this time Win for ARM does run legacy x86 apps, via emulation – when people will try to run them on Win10 ARM, they’ll work seamlessly. That is likely “common knowledge” for most here, just not you…
Riiight, so its gonna run drivers for winprinters? Those cheap point and click cameras, the other bazillion devices that are Windows only?
Yeah and pull this leg it plays jingle bells, Linux devs have been trying to get that shite to run for damn near forever, I SERIOUSLY doubt MSFT is magically gonna make everything that runs on Windows run on ARM, especially all that funky @ss badly coded crap that damn near every consumer has!
Look even Wine can’t run a lot of that crap with any stability, and that is running on X86, what makes anybody think that because MSFT has the source to the OS that is somehow gonna magically fix all software calling the undocumented crap, badly kludged together messes, and the horrible X86 drivers that most folks depend on when it can be a fricking nightmare to get a lot of that crap to run on Win 10 period?
I have to say I find that pretty damned hilarious, most sites about OSes know what a royal clusterfsk MSFT has been for several years now, hell they can’t even put out a rolling release without breaking major sh*t all over the place, but they can magically make all windows stuff run on ARM? Yeah and my mama was queen of England ROFL.
The comparison to Wine is nonsensical. Microsoft isn’t re-implementing Windows on a foreign OS. The emulator is just emulating x86 instructions within the application binary, and any calls to Windows itself (Which, for a lot of programs, is a huge chunk of what the program does) will run natively, bugs and all.
This is essentially what they’ve done since for 20+ years – thunking calls from one supported architecture to another. Win16 programs ran in a virtual machine, but calls to the OS were thunked to the 32-bit counterparts. WoW64 does the same thing, minus the virtual machine – 32-bit apps makes calls, which are thunked ot 64-bit versions. They did this on WinNT for Alpha. This is trivial for Microsoft. They have tons of experience.
What Drumhellar says… (you’ve probably been on /. too much lately, there such posts are met with rejoice…)
But they do run windows stuff. WOA emulates x86 so you can run most common software. It’s slower but the perceived performance of desktop software isn’t that much different.
You’re not the first to point that out; I wonder when will it finally get through to bassbeast that Win10 ARM can run legacy x86 apps…
But why would I bother at that price.
Sorry, I care little for size weight or battery capacity on a laptop (and a nice heavy extended battery with a buldge is fine by me).
So what does this offer me that cheaper laptops do not?
PAIN, that is all.
Yes, this isn’t a cheap laptop. I guess the broader question is whether any one or more of the things you cite (size, weight, battery life) is worth enough for someone else that the pain is also worth it.
Personally those things matter to me (although not exclusively), so I’m interested to see whether there’s life in the hardware platform. One thing I don’t want, and which I suspect may worry others, is to buy in to a platform that quickly disappears.
Indeed. Windows RT and Windows Phone/10 Mobile are still vivid memories.
Windows RT and Windows Phone/10 Mobile disappeared because of lack of software you can run on them.
Windows 10 ARM can run almost all Windows software except for 64 bit which is being worked on and will surely come to future versions. Windows 10 on ARM is here to stay!
So close… If Microsoft took their heads out of their butts and unlocked win32 and win64 for ARM we ‘d have apps like LibreOffice, OpenShot and MPC-HC recompiled to ARM (without the devs having to do a full port to Metro), with x86 for the legacy stuff.
At their current state, not supporting any win64 apps and with win32 apps on their way out, these WOA laptops are not of much use…
Edited 2018-08-31 16:41 UTC
WAT?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZtVBDeVqCE
Yes, “WAT?” …Win10 on ARM supports win32 just fine; one of first recompiled apps was VLC.
This isn’t the current state. Windows for ARM will run whatever Windows code you feel like building. The Win32 ARM SDK has been out for a while now.
This isn’t Windows RT. This is Windows 10. It runs Win32 apps, console apps, .NET apps, UWP apps, whatever you want.