Qualcomm unveils Developer Kit for Windows developers

Windows 10 devices running ARM chipsets are becoming increasingly popular. Therefore, the demand for developing Windows 10 ARM applications is huge. Grasping this trend, Qualcomm has officially launched a dedicated Windows 10 ARM application development toolkit for programmers.

Named Snapdragon Developer Kit, this toolkit is expected to make it easier for developers to check whether their applications run stably on Windows 10 ARM or not, especially with Snapdragon-powered devices. , and at the same time help significantly save on hardware investment costs. It can be said that this is the first official and first Windows 10 ARM application development toolkit that Qualcomm or even Microsoft has launched for programmers, and has many similarities with the Mac mini Dev Tool Kit that Apple has released. eye.

Unlike most Windows 10 ARM PCs out there, the Snapdragon Developer Kit is a desktop-style kit, so it doesn't have a screen or anything that dramatically increases the cost. It's simply a small PC you can use with your existing monitor, making it more affordable for developers to test their apps on ARM devices.

In terms of hardware configuration, the Snapdragon Developer Kit is equipped with the newly launched Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 SoC, which is one of the most affordable ARM chipsets that can run Windows 10 on the current market. Although not really powerful, this SoC can still ensure the most basic compatibility check. Again, this provides significant cost savings for developers, but still ensures that apps are optimized even for low-performance devices.

More specifically, Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 is manufactured on the 8nm process and possesses a custom 8-core structure, including 2 Kryo 468 Gold cores (customized from Cortex-A76) and 6 Kryo 468 Silver cores (customized from Cortex-A76). Cortex-A55). In which 2 strong cores have clocked at 2.55GHz - slightly upgraded compared to Gen 1 which is 2.4GHz. In addition to the upgrade in clock speed, there is almost no difference in Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 compared to the first generation. In terms of connectivity, the Snapdragon Developer Kit will also only have basic connectivity ports such as a USB-A port, and an SD card slot.

The Snapdragon Developer Kit is expected to be released this summer, but the timing and pricing information is yet to be revealed by Qualcomm. We'll hear more about this toolkit at the Microsoft Build event this weekend, stay tuned!

Micah Soto

Update 26 May 2021