Windows 10 on a Snapdragon 835! #Helpful Post

hey guys this is Austin this is the

Google pixel - one of the most advanced

smartphones on sale today and it's

powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835

processor now this laptop beside me is

also powered by that same mobile

processor and that actually is kind of a

big deal

you guys might remember the original

Microsoft Surface now it was powered by

Windows RT a specific version of Windows

8 that was meant to run on ARM

processors which are typically found in

your phone now there are some advantages

here mostly with battery life but also

some smaller things like being able to

have quicker standby time however the

biggest issue was was that it didn't run

normal Windows apps which as you guys

might know it's kind of important for a

Windows computer now yes you could run

stuff in the Windows Store but well no

one wants to do that

however on the surface this looks to be

a much better execution of that whole

idea and yes I said surface that was a

bad joke wasn't it so this is the HP

Envy x2 the very first and the next

generation of Windows PCs that are going

to be powered by Snapdragon processors

and what makes these interesting is they

actually do run Windows apps which is

very important although it is with some

caveats

but with promises of 20 plus hours of

battery life it might be worth the

trade-off take a look at the specs and

it's going to look a little bit

different so it's powered by that

Snapdragon 835 and it's backed up with

four gigs of RAM and 128 gigs of storage

you know the almost identical spec that

you would find on a smartphone what

makes this kind of interesting is that

even though it is in a tablet form

factor a lot of these Snapdragon PCs are

going to be full-fledged laptops but

because it's being powered by a phone

processor as you can imagine it's going

to be a little bit thinner a little bit

quieter or well a lot quieter than

pretty much any other laptop out there

and so we see how to navigate the

Windows Start screen which is useful as

well as a bit of foam

well the real store this show is the

laptop and wow that's super super thin

wow that actually looks pretty cool so

this is very similar to something like

the surface and the idea that for which

everything is going to be in the tablet

section but it does come with a keyboard

which should be right

so this is a little bit of a different

design so it's almost more like a case

for the laptop which just happens to

have your keyboard as well as the

trackpad but when you actually put the

whole thing together snaps on here and

then I think we can just pull it back

yeah so we get a an adjustable kickstand

and yeah that uh that kind of looks like

a surface also included is going to be a

stylus again kind of similar to the

surface although the surface sectioning

you think comes with the stylus anymore

but as you expect or something like this

it is going to be a full touchscreen

device and that looks again exactly like

the surface last but not least you're

also going to be getting the power cable

which thankfully is going to be USB C

sorry not last but not least there's

also a USB see the USB a dongle does

this actually haven't USB ports that

would be a no okay so this PC is going

to be a little bit different from most

no again the Snapdragon PCs will be

available in normal sort of laptop form

factors now once you actually get into

Windows you'll find it well it looks

exactly like Windows 10 now it does have

some limitations because it is using a

Snapdragon processor but on the other

hand one of the big advantages here is

that we actually do have built in LTE so

if I slide a SIM card in here what we're

getting here is essentially well exactly

what you would expect with your smart

phone that is because the Snapdragon 835

has LTE and all the radios and stuff

built in it's as simple as adding a

couple antenna putting a SIM card slot

and you have a PC that in theory can be

completely connected all the time at

least when it comes to initial

impressions the performance is pretty

good on this guy just normal day-to-day

stuff feels snappy this guy's ships

running Windows 10s now that's fine but

I think pretty much everyone is going to

want to upgrade to Windows 10 Pro which

is going to allow you to run third-party

apps that are from outside the Windows

Store now the issue here is though while

this will run most apps it's not going

to run everything it needs to be at the

very least in x86 app so no 64-bit stuff

and as far as driver support essentially

doesn't support standard Windows drivers

you do need to get specific arm drivers

which at this point are basically

non-existent however for most games most

apps most programs they're at least

going to work somewhat on here out of

the box benchmarking the NV is going to

be a little bit difficult so while it

will run standard Windows

that are x86-based such as Geekbench for

the issue is running it in a

compatibility mode now it means that it

will work but you're not going to be

getting that full performance and you

can see that in numbers so take a look

at the scores compared to a Snapdragon

835 phone which is running on native

code you're seeing that you're getting a

little bit less than half the standard

performance it's fine but you do notice

a slowdown but keep in mind that that's

running in the x86 compatibility mode

basically the lowest performance option

that you can get on this computer if an

app such as Geekbench is recompiled with

Snapdragon in mind you're probably going

to be getting much more similar

performance though what you actually get

on android however all that being said

you have to keep in mind that while it's

not gonna be crazy high-end you're

getting pretty decent specs here I mean

that's Snapdragon 835 is going to give

you eight cores four gigs of ram it's no

slouch one area this is really

noticeable is when it comes to browsers

so Microsoft edge is natively compiled

to work specifically on Snapdragon

processors so you're on the web

everything feels snappy it feels pretty

much one-to-one like it would on your

phone or pretty much any other laptop

however download a third-party browser

such as Chrome or opera and things are

noticeably slower rather quick

JavaScript benchmark like octane 2.0 and

you can see that edge absolutely

destroys the opera's performance now

part of that is of course due to the

fact that there's some slight

differences between how edge and opera

perform but running in that

compatibility mode while it will get an

app to actually run on this guy really

does mean it's going to take a big hit

to the performance for me the difference

is enough that I would rather use edge

over any kind of third-party browser

think even beyond the benchmarks you're

really gonna get something that is going

to be nosily slower when you do install

something like Chrome or opera that just

wasn't designed with this in mind it

works but just not very fast but we do

have the compatibility mode for a reason

and in theory games will work although

the idea of how well they work is

probably a little bit questionable when

you consider that this is a phone

processor running an emulator for

Windows apps that is yeah let's just try

it first up I want to give csgo a try as

a slightly older game it has the best

chance of actually being able to run on

such a low-end processor again I say

low-end I mean obviously you can play

some pretty nice-looking games on

Android but Windows is a little bit more

challenging your graphics hardware does

not support all the features needed to

run this game okay not a great start

try something else hey okay so next we

have a rocket League and this is a games

that again should in theory be able to

be run on some sort of Snapdragon Class

hardware now the main question though is

how the actual GP drivers are going to

work because I mean this looks like

normal well that's slow it's like slow

rocket League might work though I'm not

really entirely clear on how Microsoft

is getting an x86 Windows app to run

natively on an ARM processor so it seems

like they're doing something to be able

to actually maybe in elated or I don't

know if it's some kind of like

hypervisor or something but this

actually looks like it might work

no what's interesting to me is the idea

that that's totally gonna go in great

good job guys what's really interesting

to me is the idea that this is

definitely something that can be

improved with software obviously there's

going to be a limit on what a processor

like the snapback and it's capable of

but the idea is I'm actually playing a

proper PC game here fully through

emulation or whatever they're doing to

actually make it work is impressive

although maybe not the greatest

experience in the world next I want to

try a game that actually should run on

Snapdragon the Windows 10 edition of

Minecraft now the big difference between

this and the steam games I was trying

earlier is the idea that the steam games

well they were just never meant to run

this kind of hardware whereas this is

something that actually I believe has

actually been optimized to run an ARM

processor if it hasn't I can't tell

because the performance is pretty much

on point to be fair I don't think anyone

is going to pick up a Snapdragon Power

PC with the intent of turning it into a

gaming computer now there are a few

things to keep in mind first of all this

is the very first system that shipping

so there's almost certainly going to be

some more optimization and the idea this

is going to be a pretty small

lightweight system that is able to

actually do all this emulation is

impressive however that being said even

in standard apps the performance just

isn't as good as it should be you can

definitely tell the difference between a

native app and something that's going to

be emulated it's good but there's more

work to be done there are definitely

some advantages with going with a

Snapdragon PC though one of the easiest

ones to spot is going into sleep so with

an Intel system usually takes a few

seconds between when you close the lid

wait for it to go to sleep open it up

whereas with this it's like a phone you

hit the power button it goes to sleep

hit it again it wakes up it's much much

faster having built-in LTE is nice as

well I think that's going to be a huge

selling point for a ton of people and

all Snapdragon PCs this as well as some

of the laptops are going

have it ready so what I need to do is

drop a SIM card in and it's going to be

up and running and it's nice to people

they'll be always connected between LTE

and Wi-Fi now that being said I'm

actually not a huge fan of the MVX twos

design in particular for me the tablet

stuff it's nice but it's not that much

smaller than just a normal 13-inch

laptop but thankfully there are going to

be Snapdragon laptops as well probably

the biggest selling point is going to be

the battery life so HP claims up to 22

hours of use on a charge or a thousand

hours of connected standby which for a

PC is totally crazy

now this mostly thanks to the idea that

the Snapdragon processor is usually

found in phones and I mean even

something that's going to be this small

it's going to give you a much much

larger battery than any phone will

however all that being said I haven't

tested it yet so I don't know exactly

how long it's going to last but if it

gets anywhere close to those numbers it

is going to be a game-changer

a Snapdragon PC makes a lot of sense for

someone who wants an always connected

computer that can run Windows apps I'll

be it a little bit slowly and has solid

battery life now with the HP Envy x2

it's a good system but for me it's hard

to justify the thousand dollar price tag

it was someone in the neighborhood of

like seven or eight hundred dollars I

think I would be fine with it but

considering that it's going to be a

little bit not optimized right now it's

very expensive and it doesn't even have

the Snapdragon 845 yet which I'm sure is

going to be coming soon it's kind of

hard to recommend that being said I

think there's a lot of potential and

Snapdragon PC's so what do you guys

think let me know in the comments below

and I will catch you in the next one