Could be something to do with keeping Intel going on the CPU side as well. So that the processor market doesn't all go to AMD
this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2025
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This is the type of thing that happens during dictatorships...
Does this mean Intel is shutting down Arc?
That’s disappointing.
Man I sure hope not. The fact that it doesn't say they are alongside this announcement does make me feel a little better about it given how generally happy they've been to announce all their cost-saving measures lately.
Unfortunately ARC is about the only competitor in the reasonably priced GPU market right now. I would love a 5090 Ti or an RTX 6000. My wallet, not so much.
It would be very bad news; it's possible they want to delay it.
This puts them in a very odd position though. It's not an experiment like Kaby Lake G, it sounds like a whole graphics partnership that would be in direct competition with Arc (and its integration with Intel CPUs).
Imagine wasting billions of dollars on stock buy backs for a decade...
Then having to be bailed out by US Treasury and your competitor
This was absolutely not on my bingo card
What kind of shady anti competitor deal did NVidia get out of this is what I'm wondering.
Intel is on fire sale right now and NVIDIA was able to buy in for essentially their 2 week pay cheque.
Nvidia probably figures Intel is an unsinkable investment because the U.S. government won't let it now that they bought in. Since China just told their tech industry not to use certain Nvidia chips, I imagine hedging a small bet on the U.S. instead of globally is in their best interest.
Also yeah, Intel stock was double what it is now, 4 years ago...
Well the B50 is the best selling workstation card at the moment, so Intel is probably going to drop that so nvidia can maintain market share
This is a major development.
I did not expect Nvidia to de facto give up on their Windows-on-Arm efforts. I guess they are smart enough to recognize that WoA is a joke (especially when WoA devices are priced higher than average) outside using WoA as a browser/office/media player device.
This honestly sounds like it was driven by pressure from the US administration.
That being said, we might see some interesting developments from this collaboration.
The article mentions nothing about nvidia giving up on WoA and I highly doubt they have. This seems like a great choice to give people what they want in the short term while they work on bringing WoA to reality in the long term.
x86 dominates consumer desktop/gaming space now...but i believe long term x86 is dead. The future is arm.
But they are hedging their bets (or perhaps being pressured by the US administration to partner with Intel).
I will strongly disagree with ARM being the future and x86 being dead in the long term (we've heard this for over a decade).
Beyond gaming and peripheral drivers (even though this is massive issue), there are multiple other problems with WoA that tend to be ignored:
- Global Line of Business apps that don't have WinARM versions and either have known issues with emulation or don't offer support for WoA x86 emulation even if you have a license. Examples include Adobe Reader and the desktop version of Tableau. I am not going to bother wasting time with WoA specific issues with desktop Tableau with no official support for a paid license.
- Regional Line of Business apps only certified for x86. Beyond the english-speaking, "western" world there are tons of local LoB apps (think accounting, ERP, tax management systems) that are only available for Win64.
- Cost - In countries where people actively use the second hand market and use for laptops/desktops for as much as ~10 years, WoA is not viable. WoA devices are priced noticeably higher, tend to not have official support in business type support contracts, have much higher repair costs for consumers, lower resale values.
Don't get me wrong, I've been using ARM for 7 years in my Raspberry Pi DIY home server, but the above-mentioned issues are real. With ARM competing directly with its license clients, it's more likey RISC-V is the more viable long-term option.
x86 dominates today. Its a smart move.
I don't think legacy software will keep x86 around and winning forever. Things change and its not always easy to see it before it happens. I believe all the reasons you listed will keep x86 around for quite a while.
As I told another, I want RISC-V to win so badly
I would argue it is incorrect to categorize x86 software as "legacy software". Outside of some Apple ecosystem products (which benefits not from ISA, but from vertical integration), all software/peripherals treat x86 (windows specifically) as the primary platform, with WoA being completely ignored in the vast majority of cases or treated as a low priority, tertiary platform.
Look at the ratio of WoA only games to Win x64 only games. Or WoA only hardware peripherals; they don't exist (just like WoA only games don't exist).
I've been tracking the release of Snapdragon X Elite pretty closely. The benchmarks on the CPU side are disappointing to say the least. Qualcomm also knowingly engaged in what is de facto fraud by showing unrealistic preliminary benchmarks using custom cooled laptops devices and running a "for benchmarks only" build of Linux (look at the state of Linux support on X Elite devices almost a year after release). GPU benchmarks are an even bigger joke. Even with alleged battery life benefits of Snapdragon X Elite WoA failed to materialize on a "apple to apples" comparison basis.
On a market share basis, they barely unable to hit 1% during the immediate full quarter following release, a bit of strange situation for something that supposed to be competing against a legacy platform.
And keep in mind, market share data for shipments/POS is typically on a gross basis, market research companies don't account for returns and don't make historical adjustments based on returns (this would be impossible for shipment into channel data). WoA devices were noted to have higher return rates. Qualcomm says it's not true, but they also have the capability (they have the data and the legal authority) to publish specific numbers and they didn't do it.
Note, I am not pro or anti anything. I care about lower prices for the same level of performance or features. I am pro intense competition where margin tend towards zero and companies simply can't increase them as all money goes back into R&D and maintain lowest prices possible. A real free market, not the polemical version pitched by oligarchs.
If it was up to me, I would change IP laws for computer hardware to make all relevant copyright assets (drivers, firmware, EDA files, internal tooling critical to delivery) and patents last 5-10 years. Essentially anyone would have access to everything needed to replicate a 2080 Ti (or Zen3 or M1 or Snapdragon 855) at the cost of materials (plus 2-3 % percentage). Literally running the Nvidia driver with minor changes to update the branding and copyright text.
When I say arm will win in the long run, I don't mean that WoA will have anything to do with it. WoA as it exists today will likely be abandoned.
I do think in the next decade Microsoft will focus on creating a full abstraction layer so it's software can run on any HW. This would be a longterm play. At launch, Would it be feature parity with what exists today...no. but over time it will build up the codebade, drivers, etc. To over take the current windows ecosystem.
*RISC-V
I want RISC-V to win so badly.
I think it will since China has began to fund support for it pretty heavily.
It's a bit funny how China has been heavily investing into open source, but I guess it makes sense - it's tech they can use readily and save money on using while also disrupting the profits and influence of western corporations. It's clearly for political reasons but hey at least the open source community wins
Has there been any disruption of profits and influence of western corps due to RISC-V? To my knowledge, not yet and its not a sure thing.
Im not entirely sure your point of view is a win for OS. When other nation states view it as a threat instead of an option it leaves the door open for all the sabotage, etc. that nation states to to each other.
This was absolutely not on my bingo card