Windows is coming back to ARM, this time with 32-bit x86 compatibility

At its WinHEC hardware conference in Shenzhen today, Microsoft announced a range of hardware-driven initiatives to modernize the PC and address two big goals. The first is expanded support for mixed reality; the second is to produce a range of even more power-efficient, mobile, always-connected PCs powered by ARM processors.

Mixed reality is set to be a major part of next spring's Creators Update, with Microsoft promising a range of head-mounted displays (HMDs) with prices starting at $299. The Creators Update will include a 3D user interface derived from the one already used in the HoloLens, along with 3D modeling tools to allow people to explore 3D development.

To support this move, Microsoft and Intel have announced a collaborative effort named "Project Evo" that outlines the capabilities of modern PCs. Project Evo systems will include certain capabilities that are otherwise optional. Specifically, they'll include far field array microphones to support voice commands from across the room; they'll include biometric authentication using the Windows Hello framework; they'll have sufficient graphical capabilities to drive HMDs; and they'll support a range of audio-visual capabilities such as 4K pictures, high dynamic range and wide color gamut displays, spatial audio, and Xbox controllers.

Together, these features will make Project Evo systems able to handle the demands of new media, such as UHD Blu-ray, and new styles of interaction that use voice and 3D. This may also fill one small area in which the PC platform has fallen behind the Xbox One S and PlayStation 4; both systems support HDR-10 displays, images, and games, but play those same games on Windows, even if they're Xbox Play Anywhere-branded, and they lose their HDR capability. Project Evo should fix that.

Terry Myerson, executive vice president of the Windows and Devices Group, says that the company wants to make mixed reality mainstream in 2017, with multiple avenues of attack. The HoloLens headset has been submitted for government approval in China and should go on sale within the first half of 2017.

A full spec has been published for the systems needed to drive the new range of affordable HMDs, providing more details beyond those that had been inferred previously. As expected, the graphical requirements are quite a bit lower than those demanded by HTC for the Vive or Oculus for the Rift:

• Processor equivalent to a mobile Core i5 (dual core/four thread)
• DirectX 12-capable GPU equivalent to the Intel HD Graphics 620 (the mid-range Kaby Lake integrated GPU)
• 8GB RAM in dual channel mode
• HDMI 1.4 for 2880×1440 at 60Hz, or HDMI 2.0/DisplayPort 1.3 for 2880×1440 at 90Hz
• 100GB of disk space (SSD preferred)
• USB 3.1 generation 1 Type-A or Type-C
• Bluetooth 4.0

This spec should be well within reach of even low-end systems, offering much greater market reach than the first-generation HMDs can boast. It remains to be seen what the difference in visual quality will be.

When the Creators Update was first announced, Microsoft said that there would be HMDs from Asus, Acer, Dell, HP, and Lenovo. These systems should be launched next year, and they'll be joined by support for the 3Glasses S1 headset. More than 5 million of these headsets have been sold in China already.

Microsoft is also building up 3D support within Windows; in addition to offering the 3D shell, Edge is going to add support for WebVR, and 360 degree videos will be available in the Movies & TV app. Universal Windows Apps will be usable within the 3D world in a manner similar to that used already in HoloLens.

HMD developer kits are due to become available at the Game Developers Conference in February.

Windows 10 on ARM

The second aspect of the push to modernize the PC is the desire for ever longer battery life, greater portability, and connectivity. To that end, Microsoft is bringing back something that it had before: Windows for ARM processors. Qualcomm-powered Windows 10 PCs will hit the market in 2017.

The truth is that Windows for ARM has never really gone away. The first Windows on ARM iteration was dubbed Windows RT, and it launched on the first Surface tablet. Although this system provided almost every part of Windows, just recompiled for 32-bit ARM processors, Microsoft locked it down using a certificate-based security scheme. Built-in desktop apps, such as Explorer and Calculator ran fine, as did the pre-installed version of Office, but third-party desktop apps built using the Win32 API were prohibited. The only third-party apps that were permitted were those built using the new WinRT API and distributed through the Windows Store.

With few such apps available, Windows RT and Surface didn't see much market success. Nonetheless, Microsoft continued to develop Windows on ARM, as it's an essential part of both the Windows 10 Internet of Things Core variant of the operating system and the Windows 10 Mobile version.

With today's news, the full desktop Windows 10 variant is coming to ARM. It will be a 64-bit version, running on Qualcomm's latest and greatest processors (probably the Snapdragon 835), and the way Microsoft describes it, this time around, it will offer a full Windows experience, with the ability to run not only Universal Windows Platform apps from the Store but also regular Win32 desktop applications.