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Well. I haven't heard of ARM netbooks being a big thing. But yes, smartphones and other non-desktop-operating-system devices have been ARM for a long time. A
by comex 6y ago
Well. I haven't heard of ARM netbooks being a big thing. But yes, smartphones and other non-desktop-operating-system devices have been ARM for a long time. And other architectures still show up on other embedded devices, like MIPS on routers.
By "everything that mattered" I guess I should have said "everything that mattered that you have a shell on".
For some of those non-desktop-operating-system devices, getting a shell is impossible without bypassing lockdown measures. For others, it's possible, but not particularly common as far as I know, for a variety of reasons. They tend to run stripped-down OSes; they don't have great keyboards; they were pretty slow compared to desktops until recently.
Yes, this is a huge overgeneralization. Plenty of people do run shells on their phones or routers. But I do believe that a major desktop platform switching to ARM is qualitatively different from what we'd seen before.
- LordDragonfang 6y agoMany chromebooks are on ARM, and chromebooks all have the native ability to run a true linux shell at this point, and have for several years now.
- greyandgreen 6y agoI know a guy who long ago gave up MacBooks for Chromebooks for development. He programs the systems that keep HVAC/large refrigeration systems running. He buys a new machine every year and his company pays for it. Cheap. His last Chromebook had 8 GB RAM and his current one 16. For all intents and purposes, it's faster than any Mac or PC that you would use for programming and the horsepower needed is on a remote server. He can never lose any code or other project notes, photos, since they, too, live in the cloud. Not for everyone, obviously.
- LordDragonfang 6y agoOh, yeah, I have a chromebook with 8 GB of ram. It's a good dev machine.