Programmers are beginning to respond to Mickey's offer of an emulator set up in Win10.   They ask a simple question -- if it was worth emulation effort wouldn't it already have a native Android app sitting in the Play Store already ???    Any worth doing have done this already.

They say it is always better to rewrite the software as a NATIVE app.  Emulators historically suck for performance and historically have made no money for their programmers.  

Micky is proposing the same (or more) level of work with no proven payback for the programmer.  He'd be much better off to put his app directly into the Google Play Store as a totally rewritten native Android app and tap into that HUGE market.

Google Play is slam full of apps for every purpose already, doing emulation on top of the bulk and slow of Win 10 isn't wanted or needed.

Microsoft is really just admitting they have TOTALLY LOST their programmer base and are now desperately trying to stay afloat by "borrowing" a software base from Android just so they can sell their OS's "software system" for yet another year or two.

And who is going to pay 2-3x more $$$ for some extra slowness running those Android apps -- and then put up with Mickysoft's ongoing nightly strangenesses to boot?


Clarification on Andromeda

The current Android code mass running on the newest touch screen Chromebooks that have just come out is indeed the Andromeda code mass -- but Google is sensing Chromebook is actually the stronger brand name right now and may stick with "Chromebook" for a while due to that reason alone.

And it would be stupid to do things to confuse Joe and Rita Sixpack during the Christmas buying season, Rita and Joe having just figured out what a Chromebook is ......

DON'T GO CONFUSING GOOD 'OL RITA AND JOE AT CHRISTMAS TIME ....   at least not until the new Andromeda code mass is rolled out completely out over that huge list of existing Chromebooks ......    

Chromebooks are showing some stronger user loyalty, and just the act of switching brand names around might be damaging to the current Chromebook momentum.  

Pixel is a better upper crust Google brand name for their better grade of stuff.   Nexus is another excellent brand name that means high value and state of the art innovative products, but simple plain old Chromebook does carry a brand image that Google may not want to ditch until later next year AFTER they get everything running totally right on all the new Andromeda Chromebooks.  

But Google is now discovering the Chromebook brand name really isn't a bad one, really, it actually has great customer recognition and quite a bit of strong user loyalty associated with it, especially with younger people who grew up with them.

    ..... and now with Andromeda hanging out there over their heads and with Intel hitting the road on them  'ol Mickysoft is jest having anxiety attack after panic attack, seeing "the end" a coming up the road within the next 5 years --- and FOSS and Linux and Android everybody else is jest a savoring those MS panic attacks like a glass of fine wine.


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Press Release

TrendForce Reports 2016 Chromebook Shipments Exceed Expectations with Annual Growth Projected Around 30~40%
Wednesday , 10 / 05 / 2016 [ Analysts: Anita Wang ]

"All Notebooks" shipments worldwide for 2016 are projected around 156 million units, down 5.1% from 2015, according to the latest report from the global market research firm TrendForce.

Chromebook shipments, however, has been expanding against the general trend of decline and are projected to achieve an impressive annual growth of 30~40%, totaling over 10 million units.

“Price has been a major factor behind the stronger-than-expected growth of Chromebook shipments this year,” said TrendForce notebook analyst Anita Wang. “The notebook market remained in a slump through the first half of 2016. Struggling sales of higher-end models compelled branded notebook vendors to promote the lower-priced Chromebook products to gain market shares during the period. Another important factor is Microsoft’s attempt to raise license fees for Windows. This encouraged notebook vendors to shift some their sales focus to Chromebooks, which feature a royalty-free operating system.”

Wang also pointed out that the Chromebook market has attracted a much larger group of device vendors beyond the major players in the traditional PC industry. “As Chromebooks gain tractions with consumers, even appliance makers such as China’s Haier and Hisense are entering the market,” noted Wang. “New entrants with their versions of Chromebook products further contribute to the overall shipment increase.”


Read more at http://press.trendforce.com/press/20161005-2641.html#gYMKmPQXv7xqPEv6.99


This tracks pretty well, the whole pie loses 5.1% on the total market pie size due to phones, etc.   Apple loses another considerable chunk of that smaller total pie size and Chromebooks pick up "an impressive annual growth of 30~40%" for the 4th year in a row.      

And MS refuses to say what they lost in unit volume, but mathematically it has to be considerable.  
(MS is ~ 51% ~ of the total pie at this moment)    

A NEW WAVE OF WIN 10 BASED INCOMPATIBILITIES HIT UP THE OLDER COMPUTERS

Drop drawers and grab your ankles, boys ..... your old equipment and your alternative OS products are getting ready to hit a rough patch again because "the various restrictive MS OS requirements" are just starting to become real with the nightly push of "improvements" .... and this will complete the load out and will be completely real in 5 more days.

I am typing this on a MS machine at work because my machines at home can't seem to get the SS site to open --- can't reach it, actually.

This has happened before when MS put some new "compatibility standards" in play that intentionally screwed up older machinery and any FOSS products up on purpose.  

It may last a month or so before it gets fixed by a Torvalds Linux kernel release.    I may be scarce for a while, accordingly.  

Or else posting off a phone, which is jest a pain in the butt.

https://liliputing.com/2017/01/qualcomm-snapdragon-835-chip-details-leaked.html

The 2017 Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas is getting ready to go this week.    

Something to watch is Microsoft and Qualcomm both saying this one is a laptop capable chipset (because it is).    

Listen to them talking about "2 day laptop battery life" too.



Half the physical size of the 2014 chipsets, it actually pulls about 50% of the power draw and runs up to 45% faster at MUCH better graphics resolution and speed compared to the 2014 Snapdragon chipsets.    AND IT DOES NOT OVERHEAT AND CHOKE ITSELF DOWN TO  HALF SPEED LIKE THOSE OLD SNAPDRAGON 801-805-808-810 CHIPSETS SO LOVED TO DO.

(yep, Qualcomm has tweeked the stock A73 a little bit to make up their custom Kyro cores).  

The only real competition out there for this one has is the Kirin 970 chipset in it which is a box stock ARM A73/A53 6-8 core design run at 16nm.

And when Apple finally unveils their laptop ARM chipset, it will also be based off a customized A73 core design with very similar capabilities but run down at 10nm.

So yes, when MS promises the full Win 10 (equal to the main PC release) can run on an ARM chipset these are the ones they have planned to run it on.  

And this also explains why Intel simply discontinued two entire family levels of their dual core lower end x86 chipsets so abruptly several months ago  --- they weren't complete SOCs at all and they didn't have good on board graphics and on board wifi and cell tower radio capability --- but they ACTUALLY COST MORE TO BUY THAN THESE ARM FULL SPECTRUM SOC CHIPSETS are gong to cost by year's end.

Intel looks to immediately lose most of the low end laptop space to these sorts of ARM chipsets whether they run Chrome OS or Windows 10 -- the low end laptop space will have no  "Intel Inside" it ever again.  

No phones as of last year, now no low end laptops.   No Intel, shortly as AMD has taken over console game boxes and is hitting up on laptops and desktops again.   Where is the slot for Intel ???? when Qualcomm just went after data farm servers again with a lower cost higher performance current gen 16 core ARM chipset ......


=======================================

new info just out .......

First Benchmark Tests on Qualcomm 835 VS the Kirin 960 show the Qualcomm chipset is getting enough advantage off of the 10nm vs 16/12nm TSMC lithography stages to keep the Qualcomm chipset the clear winner in the ongoing performance battles between Qualcomm, Mediatek and Huawei/Kirin.

It also explains why the Kirin is now going to step directly down to 10nm lithography ASAP, pretty much skipping over the 12nm half step that was currently planned just a month ago.

Samsung is actually the foundry that is making the Qualcomm 10nm chipset, so they will likely use it themselves in their premium phone offerings.    

Because of lower costs of production TSMC actually makes the Huawei Kirin 960 and the various decacore Meditek offerings.    Look to see all of the foundry guys leaping down to 7nm just as fast as they possibly can (it uses the same equipment that 10nm uses).

https://liliputing.com/2017/01/mirabook-another-dock-turns-smartphones-pcs.html




While you wait for your $1000+ MickySoft ARM based WIN10 laptop to become real, take a look at this cute little trick ......  

ANY decent phone from the last few years can do this trick right now, using USB-C connectors or a HDMI adapter cable for the older USB form phone connections.

Requires Android 7.1.1 or higher to operate and it isn't particularly cheap at the moment -- although before very long the copycats from the orient WILL become quite inexpensive.

The company is planning a no-cable Bluetooth 5.0 version to come out later this year.   Your phone stays safe in your pocket and if they steal the laptop shell, no big deal.   Your data is always safe in any case.

You have seen phones come out with 8 gigabytes of systems memory this past year.   This is what 8 gigs of phone systems memory currently looks like in a single 8 gig chip -- it is still fairly large but also one that is currently up for a 2x lithography die shrink soon.

The newer, much faster 3-D Xpoint (Optane) style of memory is stacked memory, and is 1/3 to 1/2 this same size when run at the same old lithography level -- and it can go up to 32 gigs of systems memory in that lesser but thicker stacked space.   It too is up for a die shrink.

Cost is still high at the moment but 16-32-64 gigs of 3-D Xpoint will eventually cost what this 8 gig chipset does now ....   and given a year or two it will get yet half again smaller as 5nm memory lithography is now considered both real and "very possible" in year 2019-20 as production level lithography.    

Remember, they always downsize memory chips first as it is considered "easier to do" than downsizing CPUs and GPUs.  

They use memory production to shake the bugs out of new lithography equipment as they can run it and run it and run it -- the production chips will always sell no matter how much of the individual chip tests bad and gets lasered off in the sorting process.   The truncated 64s become 32s and the truncated 32s become 16s.   They are all physically the same die size and ball-grid array anyway.  Then when the Foundrys get good at it, then the massive flood of fully populated memory chips become CHEAP and everybody uses them for everything.


=======================================


Samsung is now rumored to be working on their "the one after next", the Galaxy 9 phone which is rumored to have the ability to light a big screen through USB C and/or by using Bluetooth 5.0 casting from your pocket.   Android 7.1.1 currently supports this sort activity, but it is not 'systems default' the way it will be with 2018's Android 8.0 version.   This gives Samsung a 1 year window to put the feature into their new phones as a "Samsung Deluxe" feature and steal a march on Apple as well by doing so.

This is what it will look like, care of the new Sammy Chromebook that was just released at CES wearing the new "Deluxe" SammyChromeAndroid mash up which is showing 3 independently running Android softwares in separately siz8ed and placed windows.



(yep, Oreo is the proposed name they got on tap for Android 8.0)

If Sammy fails to pull this same sort of software together in time for this summer's Galaxy 8 release, then it may be coming as this year's Galaxy Note phone which will launch later in the fall.  Or, as predicted, in the Galaxy 9 next year.

  Some of the Andromeda code mass that is out now in Chromebooks is a part of this "phone as PC" effort, as will the new Qualcomm 835 generation of super chips.   Both the CPU and VR level GPU power, the Android/Andromeda code and the faster smaller systems memory are all coming together in a perfect storm effect for later this year.

This phone as PC thing may simply be "casting your phone screen to your monitor" by the time it becomes a widespread phone feature, as by then the standard phone will be a full powered VR capable device and the Phone/PC stuff will really be a minor feature that they all can do naturally.   All 7.1.2 and later Android phones going forward support video out, keyboard and mouse on USB-C and BlueTooth 5.0 supposedly.  

So cast your Android phone screen to your big screen or to your goggles, same same same 'ol stuff.   Yawn.   It will still take away from laptop and desktop sales, as you phone will be able to do that duty too.

Look to see further erosion of the bottom end of Intel's current line of chipsets in the next year, with Intel abruptly dropping production on anything that is about to get upstaged by ARM chipmakers (just in time for the Intel warehouse stocks to be sold off for cheap right before the existing stocks goes useless & obsolete).


=======================================


Apple major stockholders consider Apple to be in trouble and have JUST DISCIPLINED Apple's upper level managers for poor planning and lack of performance / execution --  for example, Tim Cook's bonuses just got cut for this year because Apple is losing a chunk of their Mac PC market share due to NO NEW INTEL SUPER CHIPSET sitting ready in the wings AND the fact that the A10 chipset for iPhones and tablets isn't clearly superior to the existing Android ARM chipsets any more. leaving the iPhone in some danger of losing market share as well.  

So Tim Cook's job is on the line now, and he HAS to rally the troops ASAP to regain Apple's tech lead again.

APPLE ALWAYS HAS TO STAY A YEAR AHEAD OF THE PACK to justify their very high profit margins, and they have lost most of that 1 year advantage as of right now.  

Right now Apple is losing sales to deluxe Windows 10 Surface units on the top end and to the upswell in deluxe Chromebooks on the low end of things.    Mac has shown no real "excellence" in the last 3 years running and folks see better stuff out there from other vendors on both the top and bottom market ends.    Tim Cook's Apple has got to learn how to make BIG progressive innovations again, ASAP.



MickeySoft has a problem -- they are NOT NEARLY READY with their ARM port of Windows 10.   Just getting started on it, actually.    Look to see the Chromebook invasion continue all this Spring, Summer and Fall.  Apple is cranking up the heat as well as is Samsung, with BOTH of them trying to get an edge over each other and the industry by getting there first by running well on the new generation of ARM superchips.  

The Andromeda code mass is written and is being rolled out over all existing Chromebooks as we speak.   Google isn't sitting on their hands either, the Android phone PC is getting closer by the month.  

VR progress at Google Android is also driving the use of more systems memory, MUCH better graphics and faster MUCH more capable A73 based SOCs using the ARM Mitgard G71 VR graphics system.   VR is going to do more to make phones into PCs much more quickly than any threat from MickySoft's trying to put Win 10 on to ARM processors.

MickeySoft is sorta the fat slow kid in this 2017-18 ARM foot race, FAT and SLOW is what you don't want to be right now.    Both Mickey and Apple actually depended on Intel -- and Intel suddenly leaving the playing field has left both of them with their drawers pulled down around their knees.

Samsung projects increased "good volume" sales in 2017,  TSMC projects flat sales to a 3% decline in 2017.

Samsung is making two of the 10nm "power chips" that are already shipping at 10nm, while TSMC has both of its 10mn production lines locked up in producing Apple A10 chipsets.  7nm is planned for all future lines, no more 10nm lines go in at ether company.

Samsung is not having yield issues with their process, TSMC is rumored to have some yield issues at final test (Apple has very stringent requirements and TSMC has no pathway to use a sub-standard chipset).    Apple will sequester bad phone chipsets and use them in tablets if say the gyro component is sub-grade (some tablets don't use gyro functions).

Both Samsung and Qualcomm do have open and honest downgrade pathways that can take a substandard chip and sell it "spec'd correctly" for what it can really really do.

Right now nobody wants a 20nm chipset, nor a 16nm chipset, and 14nm isn't super popular beyond the mid grade phones.   12nm has been "renamed" 10nm by TSMC, so the TSMC lying specs trick continues unabated.

Look to see your 7nm chipset have larger traces and smaller gates, which isn't a bad thing as the chips are more robust when built that way.

Voltage is what you should look for, as the out of date stuff will be using 20nm radios, GPS, gyros, etc. etc. and will still be at 5 volts at the battery.

Only buy chipsets containing A73 big and A53 little cores produced at 10nm using a 4 volt or LESS battery, or else you are getting shilled a wee bit and may be actually buying year before last's tech.

http://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-plans-lay-2850-more-employees-end-jul...

MickeySoft has some issues at the moment.    They have finished up Win 10 (sorta) but consumers are not flocking to buy large amounts of new Wintel products and both sides of the Wintel alliance are suffering new bouts of shrinkage accordingly.   Chromebooks are still positive, and MS is selling top end Surface machines somewhat better, but the rest of PC land is flat to negative.   Apple is negative on their PC side as well.

This 2,850 shrinkage is just the latest round of job cuts at Microsoft that have been going on for the past two years. It began in mid-2014 when the company announced plans to cut 18,000 of its workers by the end of June 2015. In July 2015, Microsoft revealed another set of job cuts, affecting 7,800 more of its employees. In October, Microsoft confirmed it had made more reductions in its workforce, which were rumored to have affected 1,000 more team members. With May's announcement and today's filing with the SEC, Microsoft has confirmed plans to lay off 4,700 more workers.

Part of this is letting go of all the contract programmers it took to rewrite Win 10 so many many times in that last final rewrite year.

Part of this is an effect of the shrinking PC / Laptop industry total market pie, in general PC / Laptop has shrunk 5-6% per year for the last 8 years running.   This is due to phones and tablets taking over with functionality they never had before.

MS aggravates this market shrinkage by killing off its old OS versions by screwing up the OS vs the old hardware by their midnight installed "approved drivers only"  (non-functional for the existing old hardware new MS drivers again, of course).    We just went through a bout of this this past couple of weeks.

Some of this is growth & obsolescence, with the new phone based hardware world making a lot of old software/hardware systems completely obsolete and costing the support personnel at MS their jobs when this becomes apparent to management.   For example, see Adobe Flash finish its trip on down the river inside of the next calendar year.

https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/18/intel-layoffs/

Intel has its own troubles to deal with.   Wearables isn't working out for Intel and that leaves Automotive as the last announced "where do we go now?" for Intel.   Internally, Intel has put together a wearables exit layoff strategy and is busy selling off the chunks that can be sold as we speak.   Intel's payroll will shrink with each sale of the acquired Wearables companies, and then the residual wearables people will be cropped in a single set of layoffs.

Intel is showing some interest in PC again, but having left the market place in Consumer Electronics for over six months --- now Intel is trying to come back into any sort of front runner position ???

       

This return/recovery will be very hard as Intel forfeited a lot business partner confidence by leaving their partners sitting out in the cold and wet just recently.   Plus, the partners have been actively working on the replacement ARM chipset conversions for the last 4 months, with new product designs getting ready for production as we speak ....

Going back to a more expensive Intel chipset will be neigh on to impossible when your competitors are all shipping naturally less expensive ARM based systems.

Intel has already made the first 3 miles of the canoe trip downstream towards irrelevance, and paddling 4 miles back upstream into Consumer Electronics leadership will be Very Hard to do as Intel is currently 2 full lithography generations behind the leaders and a reversal in direction now means first Intel must first be chipping off all those layers of residual ill will and techno-inertia build up.

What do you mean, "You can't see the light" ????    We are the world's foremost lighthouse company, what utter nonsense.   It is the same light as it has ever been.  "We can't see the light" indeed !!!!



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TSMC announces USA manufacturing plant plans (to make President Trump all happy).   Samsung and various other Apple suppliers are to do likewise.   They trust that Trump's import duty threat is indeed a credible threat.   Ford and Toyota also agree it is a credible threat and are moving some car production back to the USA accordingly.

TSMC 7nm EUV production is planned for later this year, to include three Quad Core A-73 based superchips at first, then phasing on down to 5nm on the same equipment in 2018.    Apple production goes off first, followed by others as production lines become available.   Movement away from Silicon to Gallium progresses apace with these lithography downsizing moves.

ARM is now working on a brand new big core and a brand new little core, each aimed firmly at the 5nm EUV multi-gate-all-around type Gallium laced lithography which is coming in 2018-19.  

Once again, nothing more will be said on new Cortex designs by ARM until a customer actually releases a product built using those new ARM Cortex designs.  Look for a new much more powerful Bifrost G7x graphics system to come out at the same time, with much better graphics output and faster refresh speeds to make up a stronger VR world system  that will be living inside each PC strength phone.

Good VR looks to be the tech that will drive replacement phone purchases in 2018-19.

Look to see the first VR movies to be made in 2019-20.