microsoft has chosen to tease Apple with the prospect of running its notebooks for literally days at a time on a single battery charge thanks to ARM processors.
Over at the Qualcomm 5G Summit in Hong Kong, Pete Bernard, Principal Group Program Manager for Connectivity Partners at Microsoft, stated that the battery life while using an ARM processor is “beyond our expectations.”
“We set a high bar for [our developers], and we’re now beyond that. It’s the kind of battery life where I use it on a daily basis. I don’t take my charger with me. I may charge it every couple of days or so. It’s that kind of battery life,” claims Bernard. “I would consider it a game-changer in terms of the way people have experienced PCs in the past.”
Microsoft initially announced its ARM-based notebook program in December of 2016 with the aim of providing a full Windows 10 experience on the Snapdragon 835 chipset, as used in Google’s Pixel 2 and the Samsung Galaxy S8 in the United States. In theory, the scheme could lead to the creation of thinner and lightweight notebooks with longer battery lives, while still retaining the processing performance.
The initial three manufacturing partners involved in this are HP, Asus and Lenovo. Microsoft and Qualcomm have hinted that additional vendors will join at a later date.
Microsoft is already testing “hundreds” of the ARM-based notebooks at its headquarters, Bernard confirmed. “We have hundreds of these devices being used on a daily basis in Redmond.”
When Apple shifted to Intel for its hardware in 2006, CEO Steve Jobs said that they had been developing versions of OS X for Intel hardware in parallel with PowerPC for a long time. While there has been no code leaks definitively pointing to this with Apple’s A-series ARM processors right now, it stands to reason that there is a similar effort under wraps in Cupertino.
From a benchmark perspective, Apple’s A11 Bionic processor is remarkably similar to the 13-inch MacBook Pro. It is also more power-efficient —and under Apple’s control from a development standpoint from hardware, to firmware, all the way through the coding environment.
The A11 Bionic processor features six cores along with the addition of two high-efficiency cores. It represents the first A-series processor capable of asymmetric multi-processing, meaning that all six cores can be running simultaneously on one task, thereby making it more suitable for a desktop or laptop environment.
Should Intel fall down, and fail to deliver compelling processors for computers especially on the low end, Apple could likely make the shift to the A-series ARM processor in very little time.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.
Via AppleInsider