Categories: Tech

Will Project Volterra be Microsoft’s Mac Mini?

Project Volterra sarà il Mac Mini di Microsoft? thumbnail

Microsoft in the past few hours it has previewed a video in which it is unveiled Project Volterraand mini PC aesthetically similar to the Mac Mini, but which in reality has nothing to do with the famous Apple product. The device, in fact, is designed exclusively for developers and it will be based on architecture Arm.

Project Volterra, Microsoft’s mini PC based on Arm

Microsoft collaborated with Qualcomm once again to create a device dedicated to developers and based on Arm. Project Volterra, as it is called, uses a Snapdragon processor optimized for software development. It also includes a Neural Processing Unit (NPU) to allow developers to build cloud native AI apps.

Aesthetically, the device is a mini PC similar to an Apple Mac Mini, as it is a parallelepiped with reduced thickness and rounded edges. In reality, in addition to the shape, the PC is very different in the internal components and in the final purpose, since it is dedicated to developers. In any case Microsoft has not yet revealed the exact specifications, but Project Volterra will have tre port USB south retroBesides a DisplayPort and an Ethernet port. There are also due porte USB-C on one side of the device. The PC is then made from recycled ocean plastic and has a stackable design.

Photo credits: Microsoft.

The Arm64 version of Visual Studio 2022 is here

In addition, Microsoft is said to be working on a native Arm64 version of Visual Studio 2022, as well as the miniature PC Arm. A preview version of Visual Studio 2022 Arm will be available “in the next few weeks” and is expected to arrive permanently later this year along with Arm64 .NET support.

Although Arm devices such as the Surface Pro X are capable of running Visual Studio via x64 emulation, some features are not supported and performance has also suffered. What Microsoft defines as “Arm-native toolchain”, will include native Arm support for Visual Studio 2022 and VS Code, Visual C ++; .NET 6 and Java, WSL and WSA to run Linux and Android applications and much more.