(Credit: Brian Westover)
Microsoft held a small group event in Seattle today, ahead of the opening of its Build conference. Usually Build is all about Windows and Windows applications; a gathering for developers to network, and to learn about and marinate in what's next from Redmond. Today's unusual "pre-kickoff" to Microsoft Build was different than most Build appetizers, though. (Note: CEO Satya Nadella will start the show Tuesday, May 21, at 9 a.m. PT with a keynote.) Sussing out the significance of what we saw there on May 20 will take some mental cookery of our own. But it looks big.
The news on the menu ranged across enhancements to Windows Copilot (the operating system’s AI assistant); Windows’ search functionality itself (in the form of the new Recall feature); intriguing Live Captions real-time transcriptions and translations; and the rollout of a panoply of so-called “Copilot+ PCs,” laptops with the AI muscle to run demanding AI tasks locally. (The idea behind local AI processing is to boost AI performance and privacy.)
(Credit: Brian Westover)It was in the Copilot+ PC announcement that we saw two things that, if you told us a year ago would be happening today, we'd have flat-out laughed you off.
Ready, Player Three: Qualcomm Steps Up
We've seen Qualcomm Snapdragon-based laptops before. Typically, we see them in a brief cameo at a Microsoft event like this, where new Surface laptops and tablets are unveiled. A brief starshell of interest, then they typically fall from the sky under a haze of ho-hum reviews: “The battery life is great, the performance not so much. And Windows on Arm application compatibility and emulation? Where it works, it just isn't there yet.”
This event was different. Instead of a sad token Surface laptop or tablet kitted out with another wimpy Snapdragon 8cx, Qualcomm left the venue and came back with more than half a dozen muscular and, er, well-Armed friends. Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, and Samsung showed off a laptop or two each. In other words, this was far from the usual Snapdragon showing.
(Credit: Brian Westover)The machines are using Snapdragon X Elite, an SoC we have seen teased and previewed in various venues over the last eight months. But who was absent—AMD and Intel—was almost as noticeable as who was present.
At any given Microsoft Surface launch, we may see a Snapdragon-based Surface machine, and a configuration or two, perhaps, with an AMD Ryzen processor, with the Ryzen name typically appended with “Special Edition” to set the silicon apart from AMD’s generic mobile offerings. None of that today. Snapdragon had the stage to itself. Even Microsoft's own two new 2024 Surfaces debuting here, the Surface Pro and Surface Laptop, are Snapdragon X models only, designed for consumers. (For more, see our first look at the new Surface devices.)
(Credit: Brian Westover)Now, we wouldn't read too much into that, looking at the chip-production cycles of the moment in 2024. In a clear attempt at cloud-seeding rain over Qualcomm's parade, Intel pointed out today that its next-generation laptop processors coming in Q3, dubbed “Lunar Lake,” should be more than competitive with Snapdragon X Elite on multiple fronts. And Microsoft did introduce several Intel-based models (using older Silicon) in its Surface for Business line just a few months back. It's clear that Team Blue is not being kicked to the curb, or anything of that sort.
But the fact that Snapdragon X Elite was the star of the stage today says something about the perceived strength of Qualcomm’s new platform. Of course, the jury’s still out: We've tested X Elite only under controlled circumstances, with applications of Qualcomm's choosing, so we still have questions, and lots of ‘em. But this is undeniably the biggest push into the laptop market by a new chip maker in many, many years, and it augurs a future where the conversation around laptop chips might not be just Intel shouting and a whisper from AMD. And that’s revolutionary…if things shake out that way.
But Wait, Wait, Wait: It’s Still Windows on Arm!
Now, Microsoft and Qualcomm are, of course, not naive. In part what's held back Windows on Arm in the past has been the subpar performance of Windows applications that are not native to the platform (where they worked in emulation at all), along with generally so-so overall performance.
The two big pluses of earlier Snapdragon-based PCs were their battery efficiency, along with their always-on connectivity (often bolstered by wireless WAN support). The biggest minus, though, has been that, well, full x86 Windows, stubbornly, continues to exist. Why tie one arm behind your back with a less-than-optimized version of Windows if you don't have to? (And you didn't have to!)
(Credit: Brian Westover)Of course, “ordinary” x86 Windows 11 Copilot+ PCs based on Intel and AMD chips will live alongside these new Arm-based Copilot+ PCs based on Snapdragon. But for this many such Arm-based systems committed to hit the market all at once, something else has to be new here. We’re not betting on some kind of mass delusion at play. (One OEM? Sure. Nine? Not likely.) And that thing sounds like Prism.
We haven't had a chance, of course, to play with non-native Windows apps on Prism just yet. But the claim from today's event is that Windows applications that aren't native should just work. Assuming that is true, no longer should it be a guessing game of whether a Windows program works at all on Windows on Arm; the question should now be how well does it run. That remains to be seen, but we’d bank on matters being significantly improved for so many OEMs to put their Snapdragon foot forward today.
Plus, it's not just emulation. Windows on Arm has made some quiet strides in the last year. Google Chrome, the world's leading browser, just got a Snapdragon native version a few months back. (Hit the link for our initial tests.) The seminal Adobe suite is on board, as is DaVinci Resolve, all the kind of demanding applications that actually require robust CPUs (like the Snapdragon X family appears to be) to run well. After all, if all you're doing is sending email and browsing the web, you can get by with a lot less than an X Elite, an X Plus, or its professed Core Ultra 7 equivalent.
(Credit: Brian Westover)Now, of course, emulation that works passably, or better than passably, is mere table stakes if you want to compete on hardware with classic, straight-up Windows. But we're seeing starting prices for Snapdragon X PCs projected at $999, alongside those rich claims around “multi-day” battery life. If the performance story holds up, and if the battery life lives up to the hype, Snapdragon X has a golden window—basically, this summer—to prove its mettle, before, we suspect, Intel's Lunar Lake airs out some of the new-car smell from Qualcomm’s cabin.
To quote Winston Churchill, circa 1914, on the edge of seismic changes in history: “The terrible ‘ifs’ accumulate.” No doubt: We're operating on an untested scaffolding of public-relations assumptions here—from Qualcomm, from Intel, from Microsoft—without hardware and software in hand just yet that we can poke and prod in the comfort of PC Labs. We will have to see how performance shakes out on all the new platforms; whether the chip makers and the OEMs can deliver when they say they will; and whether Prism is the true game-changer it looks like it could be.
But one thing is for sure: May 20, 2024, could be a day we look back upon, as the start of a fundamental shift in the laptop market as we once knew it. Mark the calendar and strap in.