It’s good to see Microsoft being refreshingly upfront about Windows 11 on Arm
Microsoft has admitted there are some shortcomings of Copilot+ PCs that run Arm processors – which are the only type of those devices to have gone on sale so far – and outlined these weak points.
Of course, there are strengths with the Copilot+ PCs that run with new Snapdragon X (Arm) CPUs, and we’ll come back to that, in the interests of balance. But let’s go over Microsoft’s clutch of admissions first, of which there’s a list of five ‘limitations’ of a Windows 11 Arm-based PC provided in a support FAQ (noticed by Windows Latest).
First off, Microsoft points out that: “Drivers for hardware, games, and apps will only work if they’re designed for a Windows 11 Arm-based PC.”
This is a thorny one as it has a knock-on effect elsewhere. Obviously, this means that you can’t use peripherals or hardware that haven’t had Arm drivers released (unless the device already has support built into Windows 11, that is).
However, it also leads to drawback number two, which is that “certain games won’t work,” and one prominent reason for this is if they have anti-cheat drivers that haven’t been coded for Arm-based PCs. (These kinds of anti-cheat countermeasures are popular in competitive online games for obvious reasons).
A further downside Microsoft highlights is that some antivirus apps don’t work, and again, this is often wrapped up in driver issues.
