Microsoft launches its “personal” version of the Mac mini: a PC designed to allow developers to create App Arm native per Windows 11. Previously known as Project Volterra, Windows Dev Kit 2023 is available in Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. Let’s go then to discover its characteristics.
Wondows Dev Kit 2023: all the features
To meet the needs of developers, Windows Dev Kit 2023 is powered by the platform Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 , and equipped with 32GB of RAM and 512GB of NVMe storage. Additionally, the PC features two USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 ports on the side and three USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 ports on the back, along with an Ethernet port and Mini DisplayPort. But that is not all. The PC also boasts aneural processing unit (NPU), just like the 5G Surface Pro 9, which will allow developers to run hardware-accelerated AI tasks and machine learning workloads. On the other hand, Microsoft has begun to take advantage of NPUs in Windows 11 to enhance features such as Voice Focus, an impressive background noise removal algorithm that does not “hit” the CPU or GPU.
The software side will be the coolest part of this Windows Dev Kit 2023. Microsoft is working on launching one toolchain completa of Arm’s native apps that developers can use – like Visual Studio 2022 17,4 e .NET 7 -. Additionally, previews are available for Arm versions of Visual C++ e Windows App SDK. “More apps, tools, frameworks and packages are being ported to natively target Windows on Arm and will arrive in the coming months,” explains Pavan Davuluri, CVP, Windows Silicon & System Integration. “In the meantime, thanks to the powerful emulation technology of Windows 11, developers will be able to run many unmodified x64 and x86 apps and tools on their Windows Dev Kit.” And all this because Microsoft hopes this device will encourage the development of Windows on Arm apps.