Just got a new X2 Elite Extreme Snapdragon laptop. The CPU single and multi core speed is insane. Performance could be much better with native ARM64 support.

x86 emulation hits these chips harder than Apple Silicon on MacOS. Please consider adding native Windows ARM64 support. I would be happy to test this out.

I can also do the work myself if I get access to relevant project files. My 18-core setup is ready for testing. Data shows native apps run much faster than emulated ones on Oryon.

Let me know what you need from me.

the project source code is here:

https://github.com/AsteroidsAtHome/PeriodSearch

you should also start with the BOINC source code and build a native BOINC client. it will help a lot more.

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Thanks for the link to the source code.

I will attempt to build a native Windows ARM64 version of the application for testing on my 18-core setup.

If I succeed with the compilation I will return with the results and data here in the thread.

I already have a build ready, feel free to try
https://github.com/ahorek/genefer22/blob/winarm/arm/Period_search_Windows_10.0_ARM64_SIMD_Release.exe

I was fighting with Clang, and it doesn’t seem to work properly. This version is built using MSVC.

Of course, it’s the CPU version. As mentioned in other threads, Adreno GPUs don’t support FP64, so building the GPU version isn’t possible.

Thanks for also providing a build for this project. I'll test this soon as well :)

Update: Success with Native ARM64 MSVC build

I have now successfully tested the native ARM64 build on my Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme (18 cores) using the official BOINC 8.2.9 native client.

Performance Data:

Throughput: Running 18 concurrent tasks.

Average Runtime: ~2,780 seconds (~46 minutes) per task.

Efficiency: CPU draw is only 25-30W (SoC 31W) during full load.

Status: First 5 tasks are already Pending Validation with no computation errors.

The performance-per-watt is staggering compared to x86 emulated runs. Stability is 100% on the Oryon architecture with this MSVC SIMD build. This confirms that native Windows ARM64 support is a massive win for the project's efficiency.

First validated task right here:

https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/results.php?userid=648331&offset=0&show_names=0&state=4&appid=

Nice! So the efficiency is comparable to Apple’s ARM architecture.

Just curious, does the x64 emulation work? If so, are SIMD instructions SSE/AVX supported, and how does performance compare to running a native ARM build?

Not sure about the SIMD instructions SSE/AVX being supported, whatever that is, but x64 tasks download and run normally too, with performance being about the same seemingly.

However, native is still native, probably using less power, and therefore being more efficient.

The bigger issue is when downloading the boinc manager, the green download button still defaults to the x86 version, which means you have to click "all versions", and then download the ARM64 manager.

The website should know that it's being accessed from a WoA device, and default to the ARM64 manager, for a seamless plug and play experience, regardless of platform.

Windows 11 on ARM can run x64 binaries through emulation. This means SIMD optimizations written for x64, such as AVX, are translated into equivalent ASIMD instructions that ARM processors understand. However, this translation introduces some overhead, so a native ARM app should perform better.

> The bigger issue is when downloading the boinc manager, the green download button still defaults to the x86 version, which means you have to click "all versions", and then download the ARM64 manager.

Project maintainers like those behind Asteroids don’t maintain those websites.
Please report it to
https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/issues instead

I know, just thought I'd memtion it here as well :)

> The bigger issue is when downloading the boinc manager, the green download button still defaults to the x86 version, which means you have to click "all versions", and then download the ARM64 manager.

Project maintainers like those behind Asteroids don’t maintain those websites.
Please report it to
https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/issues instead

This has now been fixed, with 2 download options now available.

For the Admin's, since the native CPU tasks were successful, when will these be added by default to Asteroids@Home, for ARM64 users?

I’m aiming to release this version together with the Blackwell app and other improvements, but the admins need to handle it, and they haven’t been easy to reach recently. So, this could take quite a while.

Ok, thanks for the effort :)