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These ARM cpu/boards has a cheaper replacement for x86 in real world general computing are becoming a “Year of desktop Linux” by now. I’ve been hearing these n

These ARM cpu/boards has a cheaper replacement for x86 in real world general computing are becoming a “Year of desktop Linux” by now. I’ve been hearing these news for more than a decade and still hasn’t materialize in anything meaningful if you take into account how much “fraction of a cost” they are advertised. Edit: I was referring to a regular person or SME buying something like a couple "ATX" boards or "regular servers". Since it's a "fraction of the cost" I don't get why it hasn't spread like wildfire yet. I wasn't talking about giant cloud companies who place orders on the hundreds of thousands at least and many of them design their own hardware by now. Neither I was talking about a CPU that's attached with +$1000 of gray aluminum. Raspberry Pi and it's "clones" are what it's closer to what I was talking about, but not really.

selfhoster11 5y ago
ARM has been pretty weak for more than a decade, and only started getting decent CPU performance and RAM sizes with a reasonable pricing very recently. Even x86 computing took a while to develop into something useful.
nine_k 5y ago
ARM-based instances on AWS are a thing, and they do cost less. Not dramatically less, like 15% of x64 instances, but still.
matwood 5y ago
Not sure if it's 'real world' enough, but for many workloads Graviton2 (AWS ARM) is a drop in replacement for x86. Last year I moved a lot of workloads over with very little effort.
jagger27 5y ago
What? General computing as in supercomputers? https://www.fujitsu.com/global/about/innovation/fugaku/ https://www.fujitsu.com/global/about/innovation/fugaku/ Apple’s entire Mac lineup is going to be Arm-powered by year end too. Cost comparison is almost useless in this market because there simply are not enough wafers to meet demand. The price per core per watt is the real world comparison, and my inaudible MacBook fan demonstrates that beautifully.
- formerly_proven 5y ago
  TOP xx supercomputers are not general computing. The software stack basically doesn't matter because everything is going to be custom anyway. That's why you see custom ISAs, funky ISA extensions, one-off accelerators and single-purpose operating systems in them. None of that would fly for commercial applications.
  - thrwyoilarticle 5y ago
    There was a time when people were sceptical about patches to get Linux running on those little 32 bit microcontrollers.
  - rbanffy 5y ago
    > and single-purpose operating systems in them Do they? Aren't most of them running Linux?
    - smoldesu 5y ago
      Linux isn't an operating system. There are many single-purpose operating systems built with Linux though, which is why I think the parent comment is still correct. As I'm sure you can imagine, those machines are multiplexed into hundreds or thousands of containers, VMs and supervisor kits, and those are definitely designed to run extremely niche containerized software or specialized distributions.
      - rbanffy 5y ago
        > Linux isn't an operating system. While some of those VMs may be running trimmed down OSs tailored for their individual workloads, the fact remains they are all running under some sort of GNU/Linux or, at least, relying on the services of a Linux kernel. Now that you mention it, WSL1 should be called GNU/Windows instead, because it's the GNU userland on top of a Windows kernel with Linux lipstick.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
thrwyoilarticle 5y ago
Not counting cloud computing (and, presumably, Apple computers) is akin to the Linux naysayers not counting Android after the very essence of desktop computing was uprooted. Standardisation and critical mass is the hard part of the puzzle for Arm64 desktops. But it was also the hard part of the puzzle for supercomputing and cloud servers, where it now has a firm foothold. Personally, I work in an industry where everyone is moving away from x86 and developing on physical Arm64 machines because x86 simply can't fit the power budget in production.
swdev281634 5y ago
Oracle’s cloud servers are OK. Their physical servers have 160 cores (2x Ampere Altra Q80-30, 80 cores/each), 1TB RAM, and 100 Gbps network bandwidth (2x 50Gbps cards). They can also cut these servers into VMs and offer these smaller VMs. The software story is OK by now. I had little to no issues with that aarch64 Linux in their VMs. I didn't need a lot though, only mysql, asp.net core runtime, and related OS setup (SELinux, built-in firewall, etc).
rbanffy 5y ago
The CPU costs a fraction of the equivalent Xeon, but the CPU is not the only part in a server BoM nor is the most expensive subsystem of the box. When you add a terabyte of RAM, extra networking, and a bunch of SAS SSD's and HDD's, the CPU cost is almost negligible. Most companies that buy x86 servers have no desire to recompile their software for a new architecture - they want to run PowerBI or SharePoint. They don't really benefit from a machine like this.
- c_o_n_v_e_x 5y ago
  Agreed. The article treats ARM (RISC) vs x86 (CISC) as an apples to apples comparison. Not everyone has the wherewithal to convert their workloads.

selfhoster11 5y ago

ARM has been pretty weak for more than a decade, and only started getting decent CPU performance and RAM sizes with a reasonable pricing very recently. Even x86 computing took a while to develop into something useful.

nine_k 5y ago

ARM-based instances on AWS are a thing, and they do cost less. Not dramatically less, like 15% of x64 instances, but still.

matwood 5y ago

Not sure if it's 'real world' enough, but for many workloads Graviton2 (AWS ARM) is a drop in replacement for x86. Last year I moved a lot of workloads over with very little effort.

jagger27 5y ago

What? General computing as in supercomputers? https://www.fujitsu.com/global/about/innovation/fugaku/ https://www.fujitsu.com/global/about/innovation/fugaku/ Apple’s entire Mac lineup is going to be Arm-powered by year end too. Cost comparison is almost useless in this market because there simply are not enough wafers to meet demand. The price per core per watt is the real world comparison, and my inaudible MacBook fan demonstrates that beautifully.

formerly_proven 5y ago
TOP xx supercomputers are not general computing. The software stack basically doesn't matter because everything is going to be custom anyway. That's why you see custom ISAs, funky ISA extensions, one-off accelerators and single-purpose operating systems in them. None of that would fly for commercial applications.
- thrwyoilarticle 5y ago
  There was a time when people were sceptical about patches to get Linux running on those little 32 bit microcontrollers.
- rbanffy 5y ago
  > and single-purpose operating systems in them Do they? Aren't most of them running Linux?
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    Linux isn't an operating system. There are many single-purpose operating systems built with Linux though, which is why I think the parent comment is still correct. As I'm sure you can imagine, those machines are multiplexed into hundreds or thousands of containers, VMs and supervisor kits, and those are definitely designed to run extremely niche containerized software or specialized distributions.
    - rbanffy 5y ago
      > Linux isn't an operating system. While some of those VMs may be running trimmed down OSs tailored for their individual workloads, the fact remains they are all running under some sort of GNU/Linux or, at least, relying on the services of a Linux kernel. Now that you mention it, WSL1 should be called GNU/Windows instead, because it's the GNU userland on top of a Windows kernel with Linux lipstick.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]

thrwyoilarticle 5y ago

Not counting cloud computing (and, presumably, Apple computers) is akin to the Linux naysayers not counting Android after the very essence of desktop computing was uprooted. Standardisation and critical mass is the hard part of the puzzle for Arm64 desktops. But it was also the hard part of the puzzle for supercomputing and cloud servers, where it now has a firm foothold. Personally, I work in an industry where everyone is moving away from x86 and developing on physical Arm64 machines because x86 simply can't fit the power budget in production.

swdev281634 5y ago

Oracle’s cloud servers are OK. Their physical servers have 160 cores (2x Ampere Altra Q80-30, 80 cores/each), 1TB RAM, and 100 Gbps network bandwidth (2x 50Gbps cards). They can also cut these servers into VMs and offer these smaller VMs. The software story is OK by now. I had little to no issues with that aarch64 Linux in their VMs. I didn't need a lot though, only mysql, asp.net core runtime, and related OS setup (SELinux, built-in firewall, etc).

rbanffy 5y ago

The CPU costs a fraction of the equivalent Xeon, but the CPU is not the only part in a server BoM nor is the most expensive subsystem of the box. When you add a terabyte of RAM, extra networking, and a bunch of SAS SSD's and HDD's, the CPU cost is almost negligible. Most companies that buy x86 servers have no desire to recompile their software for a new architecture - they want to run PowerBI or SharePoint. They don't really benefit from a machine like this.

c_o_n_v_e_x 5y ago
Agreed. The article treats ARM (RISC) vs x86 (CISC) as an apples to apples comparison. Not everyone has the wherewithal to convert their workloads.