Can computers powered by the Snapdragon X Series work in enterprise?
Can ARM-based computers be used as a replacement for traditional x86 systems in a corporate world?
After the honeymoon period ended after about a week of use, I completely forgot I was even using an ARM-powered computer; I was just using it like I normally would use any computer. This, of course, was because everything still ‘just worked’. And whether that was through native-ARM applications or through Microsoft’s Prism emulation layer, it doesn’t matter. At the end of the day, a computer is a tool you need to use to complete your job, and if that computer so happens to be powered by an ARM-based chip like the Snapdragon X Elite, even better.
Performance
One of the biggest things I noticed was how responsive everything was compared to my previous Intel powered notebook. There was no strange ‘hitching’ when dragging windows around, menus appeared instantly, and everything about the OS was just smooth. Not only that, but the computer was silent. My outgoing computer sounded like a jet engine at the best of times, sitting at or near the thermal limit which led to severe performance throttling (and this was just sitting at the desktop or using a web browser, most days).
Another huge benefit is battery life. You can now free yourself of the power cord and roam around with your computer without fear of the battery dying or losing performance. This was actually one thing that surprised me and my colleagues most of all. For too long using a laptop on battery power meant a short run to yet another plug and usually poorer performance during that trip.
This was especially evident in an experience I had during an in-person meeting at one of our offices. Over 20 people sitting around a boardroom and I was the only one not plugged in, with everyone else wondering how long until my battery died. As a fun little test, I told my colleagues that I would charge the computer in the morning and see how long it could last. Spoiler, it lasted the entire day, and everyone was very jealous.
But what about applications?
By now you are probably wondering “that’s nice but I bet none of your applications work”, since that’s the main concern I hear from people. Well, I hate to continue my positivity train, but like I said before, everything “just works”.
Let me dive into some details.
In our environment we have, like many other organizations, a standard suite of software that come with every system we provide to employees. I won’t get into most of it but some of the more unique software is an always on VPN, several specialized Outlook add-ins and a cloud-powered antivirus solution. Our systems are managed primarily by Configuration Manager with some workloads managed by Intune. Again, not getting into specifics but the VPN and the antivirus had native-ARM versions which worked a treat, and the rest ran perfectly fine under emulation. Configuration Manager is now ARM compatible (and has been for a while), and the Intune Management Extension has a native-ARM version that gets installed when joining the domain. M365 applications (like Outlook) run in what’s called ARM64EC mode, which means parts of their codebase are compiled to run natively, while others are running in emulation to ensure compatibility with legacy components, in this case, the plethora of add-ins available. This was another area I was quite surprised at since some of the add-ins we use are very specialized, but they all worked perfectly well (in one case the vendor explicitly said it would not work on ARM based systems, but it did).
I even tested several internally built applications that ran fine under emulation where I thought they would not work at all. This surprised me the most.
And how does this work in an IT role? Well, more and more of the tools we use these days are just web management portals, and our main browser is ARM-native. Even the specialized tools that we utilize outside of this work fine, including Microsoft’s Hyper-V for creating VMs to test with.
Challenges and potential issues
Moving on from these tasks, there are some roadblocks that I hope in the future will be resolved by applications recompiling to native ARM versions, or by improvements to the Prism emulation layer, like the recent addition of AVX emulation for x64 applications.
Applications such as VMWare workstation, Autodesk applications (even though I’ve heard varying success running in emulation), some privilege access management, and some specialized CAD software are the few I’ve run into with issues or not working at all. I’ve also noticed that there are some specific security software versions and corporate VPN’s that still don’t have ARM-native versions, but that list is dwindling as weeks go by as more and more applications are releasing compatible software, if not fully native then running in ARM64EC or other compatibility modes.
Overall thoughts
So, as someone who manages hardware in an enterprise, are these newly released ARM-powered systems viable? Short answer is yes. These Snapdragon X Series powered laptops are absolute game changers, especially in battery life and performance. You are no longer required to be tethered to a power cord to get the best performance. And I would say that any fears about app compatibility are greatly overblown as I have said before, most everything ‘just works’ and works better than the alternative.
Have any questions about using an ARM based computer in an enterprise environment? Hit me up in the comments and I will be happy to answer any questions!