A team of developers has tasted success in installing Windows 10 on Arm on the Samsung Galaxy S8 that comes preloaded with Android OS. The screenshots of the same were posted by their team lead Eviso0n.
Windows Latest reports that they were able to do so after fixing a memory leak bug in their Windows 10 Arm project for the Snapdragon 835 SoC. Interestingly, this comes just days after another developer was able to run the regular Windows 10 using just 192 RAM in a one-of-a-kind achievement.
Fixing the memory leak bug further opened doors for the Windows 10 Arm to land on even more Android smartphones running Snapdragon 835. The list of devices includes Xiaomi Mi 6, Xiaomi Mi Mix 2S, and OnePlus 6.
— Evsio0n (@boby2001820) April 14, 2020
Owing to the fix mentioned above, a Spain-based developer shared screenshots of his Windows 10 Arm installed on Xiaomi Mi 6, which also powered by SD835.
However, it’s worth noting that the installation on these devices isn’t flawless, and Windows 10 is yet to support the touch, camera, and other sensors. Still fixing the memory leak bug is a big feat that developers have achieved.
Back in 2019, a developer named NTAuthority was able to boot Windows 10 Arm on Google Pixel 3 XL and OnePlus 6T.
The project is in the early stages, and we can expect more development in the coming future with improved feature support. In essence, one big reason such projects invite attention is to enable dual-boot functionality on Android devices, let alone bring any practical usage benefits.
For the uninitiated, Windows 10 on Arm is a version optimized to run on processors based on Arm’s architecture. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon is the leading chip brand that utilized the architecture to the fullest and enjoys a dominating position in the market.
Windows 10 Arm got much traction after Microsoft and Qualcomm joined hands to release Snapdragon-powered Always-Connected PCs.
Moreover, the OS powers a recently released smartphone Emperion Nebulus that comes with Android app compatibility by making some technical arrangements.