The Hot Take: Question is - Why do they really want us on AMR instead of x86/CISC chips?
A new powerful chipset has arrived to take on x86 CPUs and Apple's M5, writes Wccftech.
The blog Windows Central writes that "Qualcomm's Snapdragon X2 processors are here" â and they run Windows:
Microsoft has done a massive amount of work to improve compatibility and has also convinced developers to embrace Windows 11 on Arm. Users of Windows 11 on Arm PCs spend 90% of their time on Arm-based apps that run natively. Additionally, apps that do not run natively can often run through Prism emulation, which has improved dramatically since launch...
[A]pp compatibility issues are overblown by many, and unfortunately those sharing false information are the same folks people rely on to make purchases... Works on Windows on Arm maintains a list of compatible apps and games for the platform. There, you'll see well-known apps like Google Chrome, the Adobe Creative Suite, and Spotify. We also have a collection of the best Windows on Arm apps to help you out. Snapdragon X PCs aren't gaming PCs, but there is a growing library of games that can run on the chips.
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The Hot Take: And the push beings it's fifth or sixth try for Windows & ARM....
Windows 11 on Arm has come a long way, but many reviewers and commenters fall back on horror stories of incompatibility that haven't been true for years.
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The Hot Take: Is this the beginning or Ai push back across the market that might include hardware soon?
Microsoft has started stripping Copilot branding out of Notepad in Windows 11, replacing the old Copilot menu with a more generic "writing tools" label. The AI features themselves aren't going away, but Microsoft seems to be backing off the heavy-handed Copilot branding and extra entry points. Windows Central reports: As promised, Microsoft is now beginning its effort to reduce and remove Copilot branding across Windows 11, with the latest Notepad update for Insiders outright removing the Copilot icon and phrasing. Now, the AI menu is simply called "writing tools," and maintains the same functionality as before. Additionally, Microsoft has also removed references to AI in the Settings area in Notepad. Now, the ability to turn on or off these AI powered writing tools are now listed under "Advanced features."
This change is present in the latest preview build of Notepad which is now rolling out to all Windows Insiders. The app version is 11.2512.28.0, and you'll know you have it if you see the Copilot icon replaced with a pen icon instead. [...] For Notepad, it appears Microsoft has opted to replace the Copilot menu with something more generic. It's still the same functionally, but it's no longer leaning on the tainted Copilot brand. Of course, you can still easily turn off all AI features in Notepad if you don't want them. The Verge reports that the "unnecessary Copilot buttons" are also disappearing from the Snipping Tool, Photos, and Widgets.
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The Hot Take: Trying to win customers over again as many are eyeing Linux alternatives. Only problem, I'm hearing things about Opensource possibly going to subscriptions just like others because coding for free doesn't help peoples bottom lines.
Weren't these supposed to be 'atypical'? Microsoft is preparing another out-of-band update to address its latest problematic update following reports of installation errors.âŚ
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The Hot Take: So does this mean Microsoft Edge won't be consuming ALL of my RAM? I mean this is probably in response to the RAM usage I would think.
Microsoft has confirmed it will build 100% native apps for Windows 11 and form a new team to spearhead the project. Itâs unclear whether all new apps will be built on a native UI framework like WinUI, but Microsoft has assured that at least some wonât rely on web-based components.
Back in 2020, Microsoftâs Windows boss, Panos Panay, said the company wants you to love Windows, not just need it. However, nothing really happened, and Panos eventually left the company.
Fast forward to 2026, Windows leadership is promising another revival, but this time, Microsoft appears serious, and weâre seeing internal efforts.
Microsoft has announced a major Windows 11 update to address underlying performance issues, make the context menu load faster, reduce File Explorer launch time, move the Start menu to WinUI, and add the ability to move the taskbar. In fact, youâll be able to resize the taskbar and switch to a compact layout, similar to the Windows 10 experience.
But it turns out Windows improvements wonât be limited to OS-level components, as Microsoft has also pledged to improve apps.
Rudy Huyn, a Partner Architect at Microsoft working on the Store and File Explorer, says he is forming a team focused on building better apps for Windows 11.
âIâm building a new team to work on Windows apps! You donât need prior experience with the platform.. what matters most is strong product thinking and a deep focus on the customer,â Huyn wrote in a post on X. âIf youâve built great apps on any platform and care about crafting meaningful user experiences, Iâd love to hear from you.â
Many developers are already applying, but some are questioning Microsoftâs approach. One user asked whether these apps would be PWAs (Progressive Web Apps).
To our surprise, Huyn dismissed that idea and said the new Windows 11 apps will be 100% native.
That said, â100%â is a strong claim.
Some so-called native apps today are only partially built with WinUI, with certain features still relying on WebView. A truly native app would be fully built on the WinUI framework, without loading components through WebView.
At the moment, we donât know what the new ânativeâ Windows 11 apps are coming our way, and itâs also not clear if Microsoft plans to update existing web-based apps with a native UI.
Right now, Microsoft rarely builds native apps for Windows 11. In fact, Windows 11âs built-in video editor, Clipchamp, is also a Progressive Web App.
Microsoft Clipchamp is a WebView2 powered video editor
Moreover, Microsoftâs two flagship products, Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot, are now web apps.
Over the past few years, Microsoft has shown little to no interest in building native apps for Windows 11, and third-party developers have followed the companyâs lead.
WhatsApp is one of the popular apps that dropped the native WinUI framework in favor of a Chromium-based web app.
It remains to be seen whether Microsoft can convince Meta and other companies to build native apps for Windows 11, or if it will make Microsoft Store rules stricter.
We also donât know if Microsoft plans to update existing web-based apps with a native UI.
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The Hot Take: Something they've been screaming about for a long time. What about options to disable all the Ai in the OS? /crickets
Movable and resizable Taskbar is confirmed to be making its way to Windows 11 this year. Here's everything you need to know about how it will work!
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The Hot Take: Yeah Microsoft and all companies could have done this long ago but now that RAM is priced through the roof is the only reason they're now looking at this. I wouldn't doubt all the browser folks are going to suddenly start looking at their usage here soon.
A former Windows leader recently discussed a project that promised a 20% reduction in Windows 11âs memory and storage usage.
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The Hot Take: Finally listening to the customers? Nah, this is to quiet them just enough to continue moving to their goals.
'Doze boss admits quality is down, promises smaller memory footprint and fixes for many well-known issues Microsoft has acknowledged that it needs to improve the quality of Windows 11 and outlined its plan to get the job done.âŚ
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The Hot Take: I wonder why given that Windows has gotten bashed for the lack of performance vs Linux.
Microsoft has blocked the registry trick that allowed Windows 11 users to enable a native NVMe driver on their PCs. However, third-party tools can still help with a workaround.
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The Hot Take: Did they set the goal AFTER stating 32GB ram is more than enough for windows 11? I'm sorry loving my 64GB and would double it if I didn't have to sell a kidney.
A recent X post by Mikhail Parakhin, who was the former boss of Windows and Bing, revealed that years ago, Microsoft engineers had an internal â20/20 projectâ that had a goal of reducing Windowsâs idle RAM usage and installation size.
Parakhin, who had several titles at Microsoft, was replying to a post by the present Windows President, Pavan Davuluri, about Microsoftâs commitment to Windows quality, which, if you havenât heard already, is the companyâs attempt at fixing Windows 11 from the ground up.
Mikhail Parakhin talking about 20/20 project that couldâve reduced RAM usage by 20%
The then Microsoft executive expressed appreciation that Pavan Davuluri was ârestartingâ a push he and Jeff Johnson (present-day CTO at Microsoft) had started many years ago, called the â20/20 project,â which aimed to reduce Windowsâ idle memory consumption and the fresh install size on disk, both by 20 percent.
If it worked out, the idle Windows 11 RAM usage wouldâve been around 4.8GB, but unfortunately, as Prakhin said, âWe never got to finishâ.
Now, fast forward to 2026, and Microsoft is once again talking about improving performance, responsiveness, and memory efficiency. Itâs the same problem Microsoft tried to solve years ago.
Which brings up the obvious question. If Microsoft couldnât complete something as fundamental as reducing RAM usage back then, what has changed now? And more importantly, can Windows 11 become efficient, or is this just another attempt that may run into the same challenges?
Why is Windows 11 RAM usage high?
Windows 11 runs more background services than all previous versions, including telemetry systems, indexing, and security features. Components like Windows Defender run continuously, search indexing is always active, and features such as Widgets and feeds keep refreshing content in the background. Add cloud integration like OneDrive syncing, and the system is constantly doing something even when it appears idle.
Everything is preloaded, pre-indexed, and always available, which improves perceived responsiveness but increases baseline memory usage.
Web-based apps are inflating memory usage in Windows 11
Even if Microsoft optimizes Windows itself, there is a much bigger problem sitting on top of it.
A large number of popular apps today are built using Chromium-based frameworks like Electron or on WebView2 inside Windows. Apps like WhatsApp Desktop and Discord are well-known examples.
âWhatsAppâ is new version and âWhatsApp Betaâ is old UPW/WinUI in the screenshot
Even Microsoftâs own apps, including Teams, Clipchamp, and Widgets, are already using WebView2, and these come built in.
Whatâs surprising is that despite pushing AI like itâs the most important technology in the world, Microsoft is apparently ditching the native Copilot app in favour of a web wrapper.
Web apps like thus runs its own instance of a Chromium engine, along with multiple processes for rendering, scripting, and background tasks. So, a single app can easily consume hundreds of megabytes of RAM. Now imagine using them togetherâŚ
Fragmented UI stack increases overhead
Windows 11 is not based on a single unified UI framework. Instead, it uses a mix of legacy Win32 components, UWP elements, modern WinUI layers, and web-based technologies like WebView2 and React.
Microsoft developers explaining the use of React Native in Windows 11 Start menu in 2023
This hybrid approach gives Microsoft flexibility, but when different parts of the OS rely on different rendering pipelines and system resources, it leads to additional memory usage.
Microsoft has already acknowledged this problem and is now moving more components toward WinUI3, which, being a native framework, will have lower latency and better efficiency. However, this transition will take time because Microsoft developers have to rewrite core parts of the OS.
Why the original 20/20 project likely stalled
Mikhail Parakhin hasnât mentioned why the 20/20 project never got finished, but itâs safe to assume that it needed more time and resources. Reducing RAM usage in Windows requires some deep architectural changes.
To cut memory usage, Microsoft would have had to remove or rethink background services, simplify its UI stack, and potentially limit the expansion of web-based components. But at the same time, the company was adding more features, integrating cloud services, and later pushing AI experiences into the OS.
You cannot aggressively reduce system overhead while simultaneously expanding platform capabilities.
The 20/20 project likely ran into these trade-offs and became impractical without sacrificing features or slowing down development. And instead of making those compromises, Microsoft chose to continue expanding Windows.
Can Microsoft fix Windows 11 RAM usage in 2026?
In its latest Windows Insider communication, Microsoft says itâs working to lower the baseline memory footprint of Windows, which should make more available RAM for apps and smoother day-to-day usage.
Windows 11 PCs are getting a performance boost in 2026. Source: Microsoft
At the same time, Microsoft is targeting responsiveness under load. Instead of Windows slowing down when multiple apps are open, the goal is to keep interactions consistent throughout the day. That also includes improving multitasking behavior so switching between apps feels instant.
Microsoft is focusing on reducing interaction latency, improving the shared UI infrastructure, and moving more components toward native frameworks like WinUI3.
Why 2026 might be different for Windows 11
Windows is facing more public scrutiny than it has in years. Performance complaints have become mainstream conversations. Microsoft cannot afford to ignore that anymore.
Then thereâs the hardware and market pressure. Appleâs efficiency-focused chips have reshaped expectations, and the MacBook Neo has brought RAM usage into the limelight. Add to that the global rise in memory prices, and Windows 11 performance improvements become a business priority.
For the first time in years, user expectations, competitive pressure, and Microsoftâs internal priorities are all pointing in the same direction.
The post Microsoft once tried to cut Windows 11 RAM usage, install size by 20%, now itâs trying again in 2026 appeared first on Windows Latest
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