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The performance of Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon X2 Elite designed specifically for PCs was announced on the channel of Hardware Canucks, a well-known Canadian technology YouTuber. Although the WoA momentum is not as good as before, at least the chip itself performs well: compared to the previous generation X1E-78-100, the multi-core processor performance of the high-end X2E-88-100 has increased by 50%, and the single-core performance has also increased by nearly 35%. In this era where processor iterative performance upgrades are becoming increasingly rare, this is really rare.

In terms of practical applications, Snapdragon X2 Elite also delivered similar excellent performance: CPU rendering time was reduced by nearly 35%, and audio and video transcoding time was also reduced by 37%. Although these performance results are mostly carefully selected by Qualcomm, they also reveal that the new Snapdragon X2 Elite itself is not bad at competitiveness.

(Source: Screenshot from the video)

But if you look closely at the discussion below the video, you will find that the focus of the villagers is on support for Linux, indicating that if Arm for Linux support is better will certainly get the Snapdragon X2 Elite immediately. In my experience, usually when the review of a new chip is released, the focus of discussion will be on the match between competitors in the same class, but this is the first time I have seen that the discussion of the new chip is focused on whether it supports operating systems other than Windows. In contrast to the numerous recent market criticisms of Windows, one can’t help but ask: Once upon a time did we have to use hardware to save the operating system?

Users have deep complaints about their Windows experience

It is true that the new chips launched recently have performed well. First, Panther Lake, launched last month, has made a huge leap forward in energy efficiency and internal graphics performance, making it the most revolutionary x86 processor after Lunar Lake. Then there is the Snapdragon X2 Elite, which has been warmed up since last year. The recent performance exposure confirms that Qualcomm is still competitive on the PC side.

However, as the author said in the previous article, although Panther Lake performed well, the market has begun to hear noise about its main operating system, that is, Windows. The most terrible thing is that these noises do not come from Microsoft’s single updates or new features for Windows, but from users’ deep-rooted complaints about the increasingly poor Windows experience, such as Windows Update that has problems all day long or the confusing UI/UX that coexists the old and new generations. Microsoft’s strong promotion of AI has not only failed to win the favor of users, but has become the main reason why the market has accelerated its dislike of Windows.

Therefore, as the hardware continues to introduce new products and can indeed provide upgrades that consumers appreciate, the rapid evolution and even negative optimization of the operating system have made users of the x86 platform increasingly impatient with Windows, and have even begun to affect consumers’ willingness to choose x86. But the author believes that this situation will help accelerate the decoupling of chip manufacturers and OEMs from Microsoft and accelerate support for third-party operating systems such as Linux. Linux has indeed proven to be more and more convenient not only for professional use, but also for daily use. Only this kind of pressure can make Microsoft, which has been in the comfort zone for too long, seriously optimize this operating system that has been around for more than 40 years.

(First picture source: Qualcomm)

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