• librejoe@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Arm is not any better than x86 when it comes to instructions. There’s a reason we stuck to x86 for a very long time. Arm is great because of its power efficiency.

    • frezik@midwest.social
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      3 months ago

      Arm is better because there are more than three companies who can design and manufacture one.

      Edit: And only one of the three x86 manufacturers are worth a damn, and it ain’t Intel.

      Edit2: On further checking, VIA sold its CPU design division (Centaur) to Intel in 2021. VIA now makes things like SBCs, some with Intel, some ARM. So there’s only two x86 manufacturers around anymore.

    • skilltheamps@feddit.de
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      3 months ago

      That power efficiency is a direct result of the instructions. Namely smaller chips due to the reduced instructions set, in contrast to x86’s (legacy bearing) complex instruction set.

      • librejoe@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        Yes I understand that and agree, but the reason x86 dominated is because of those QoL instructions that x86 has. On arm you need to write more code to do the same thing x86 does, OTOH, if you don’t need to write a complex application, that isn’t a bad thing.

        • ProgrammingSocks@pawb.social
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          3 months ago

          You don’t need to write more code. It’s just that code compiles to more explicit/numerous machine instructions. A difference in architecture is only really relevant if you’re writing assembly or something like it.

          • librejoe@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Sorry, I should have been more specific. I am talking about assembly code. I will again state that I am pro-arm, and wish I was posting this from an arm laptop running a distro.

    • bamboo@lemm.ee
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      3 months ago

      We stuck to x86 forever because backwards compatibility and because nobody had anything better. Now manufacturers do have something better, and it’s fast enough that emulation is good enough for backwards compatibility.