In reply to a post by andynormancx:

Windows on ARM isn’t awful.

It is awful on the current non Apple ARM machines it runs on, but it runs really well in a VM on Apple silicon.

And as to there being no software available, Office (or at least most of it) and Visual Studio are already ARM native.

But it doesn’t really matter that most things aren’t available built for ARM. Microsoft’s layer for running x86 code on ARM might not be as good as Rosetta, but it still does a good job of running apps. For example I got a friend setup running Autocad in an ARM vm on his Mac mini and it runs better there than it does on his two year old Windows Intel laptop.

He is also running Office in the Windows VM, as the Mac version still isn’t quite in line with the Windows one.

Unless you are trying to play games or are unlucky enough that your x86 app doesn’t run, ARM Windows in Parellels on the Mac is a good and usable solution.

Fair enough, not that I would spend a load of money on Mac hardware to run Windows.
I still think it will be a few years before ARm chips replace the x64 chips on the majority of windows machines

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

I still think it will be a few years before ARm chips replace the x64 chips on the majority of windows machines

Plenty of ARM chips in servers in the cloud data centres

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Plenty of ARM chips in servers in the cloud data centres

I did mean for the home user, and you knew that.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

In reply to a post by andynormancx:

Windows on ARM isn’t awful.

It is awful on the current non Apple ARM machines it runs on, but it runs really well in a VM on Apple silicon.

And as to there being no software available, Office (or at least most of it) and Visual Studio are already ARM native.

But it doesn’t really matter that most things aren’t available built for ARM. Microsoft’s layer for running x86 code on ARM might not be as good as Rosetta, but it still does a good job of running apps. For example I got a friend setup running Autocad in an ARM vm on his Mac mini and it runs better there than it does on his two year old Windows Intel laptop.

He is also running Office in the Windows VM, as the Mac version still isn’t quite in line with the Windows one.

Unless you are trying to play games or are unlucky enough that your x86 app doesn’t run, ARM Windows in Parellels on the Mac is a good and usable solution.

Fair enough, not that I would spend a load of money on Mac hardware to run Windows.
I still think it will be a few years before ARm chips replace the x64 chips on the majority of windows machines

Been happily running W11 Pro on my M1 Max MacBook for a few years now - well since I got the machine in October 2021. It runs perfectly fine.

Found the Mac runs Windows better under Parallels than Microsoft does natively with their Voltera (Snapdragon) dev boxes - although to be fair its not an equivalent / fair fight between the Voltera and an M1 box.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Been happily running W11 Pro on my M1 Max MacBook for a few years now - well since I got the machine in October 2021. It runs perfectly fine.

Found the Mac runs Windows better under Parallels than Microsoft does natively with their Voltera (Snapdragon) dev boxes - although to be fair its not an equivalent / fair fight between the Voltera and an M1 box.

I'm looking forward to 2024 when Qualcomm and Nvidia are apparently going to introduce their new ARM architecture processors for laptops; might be the start of an interesting speed race. I doubt they will have Apple's video processing hardware, but not everyone needs that.

Doesn't Win11 for ARM still have no DirectX, so no games?

You could run CrossOver for DirectX support for gaming stuff...

https://9to5mac.com/2023/08/16/crossover-23-directx-12/

I just discovered Apple released a Game Porting Tool for Sonoma earlier in the year. Has some interesting features like translate DirectX 12 to Metal 3 in real time. As you can see I'm not much of a gamer (that's my teenage son, but his tool of choice is the PS5)

https://9to5mac.com/2023/07/04/apple-game-porting-to...

Watch Video

Can download it directly from the Apple Developer site:
https://developer.apple.com/games/

both interesting options!

Happy Bunny here.

Just loaded up Solidworks '24 (on evaluation). Sales bloke sucked in through his teeth when I said I'd be running it on a Mac with Windows and Parallels 🤔. I did say it was a meaty little Mac Studio and wont break a sweat. He was skeptical. I daren't mention it was an ARM/Apple Silicon Mac rather than Intel. He may have just fallen off his seat 🤣

So I spun up fresh/clean install of Windows 11 for ARM (via Parallels 20) last night. It's all done seamlessly from within Parallels so you don't have to look around for a download link etc. Gladly it's now pulling down the 24H2 version too. The whole Windows install was downloaded and fully installed and running in under 10 minutes. S/Works took another 25 minutes to download and install completely. Pretty good I thought for both.

Runs sweet as a nut! Though I'm not using the CAM module, which I'm told has compatibility issues. However I've thrown resource at it; 96GB of RAM and 12 vCPUs. The Studio is fully kitted though, so that not even half the physical RAM or the processor cores.

Have saved the Win11 / Solidworks VM image in shared cloud, so I can open it up on my MacBook. Brought up the VM this morning and works like a dream on the M3 MacBook Pro.

Seems like Windows for ARM (on a Mac) has finally come to maturity and a level of stability and compatibly that we've not had before. Solidworks is a fussy and demanding application. So I'm impressed.

Edited by Pheasant (Thu 24-Oct-24 11:27:04)

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Seems like Windows for ARM (on a Mac) has finally come to maturity and a level of stability and compatibly that we've not had before. Solidworks is a fussy and demanding application. So I'm impressed.

Excellent news. The corporate I work for, and our customers, are all full of lawyers, and are unhappy with both Parallels and (Broadcom owned) VMware fusion licence agreements, as well as how to buy Windows for ARM - so we can't use this at work. My family's M1 Mac Mini is running VMware Fusion with Windows 11 Home for ARM without issue (Fusion also includes the download link and automates the install).

I really want to try one of these new Snapdragon Elite X powered laptops that claim to be similar to the Apple M3... or even next year's intel CPU that is fighting back on laptop performance.

Apple's push has woken the industry, its great to see. Reminds me of the late 1980s/early 1990s when NT3.5 came with support for about 4 architectures !