Talking About Snapping Dragons and Co-Pilot+PCs

Last year, I was genuinely excited to hear that Qualcomm was developing its own ARM-based CPU for PCs, especially as I was debating whether to buy a laptop last year, shortly before Qualcomm’s announcement. The announcement of the Snapdragon x Elite promised to shake things up and provide a serious alternative to the Apple’s offerings. Qualcomm’s acquisition of Nuvia, a startup with engineers from the team that developed Apple Silicon and the CPUs that power iPhones, added to my excitement, suggesting that we might see high-performance ARM processors that could really compete in the laptop space with Apple, finally.

At the time of the announcement I wasn’t too familiar with Qualcomm’s product lineup - I know that they developed CPUs for some Android devices and that they were deeply involved with 5G modems, their stranglehold of that particular market is why Apple purchased Intel’s modem a few years ago to reduce reliance on Qualcomm as a supplier.

As the launch approached, I eagerly awaited the release in June, hoping these new laptops would offer solid features and upgrade paths. When the pricing was revealed, I was taken aback. I expected these devices to be priced competitively with the MacBook Air, but instead, they were positioned more like the MacBook Pro, which felt disheartening. Although I eventually came to terms with the pricing, it was disappointing to see that the M2¹ and M3 MacBook Airs outperformed the Snapdragon x Elite in terms of battery life and performance.

Adding to my concerns was the controversial CoPilot+ Recall feature. Initially pitched as a helpful tool to take screenshots of everything done on the computer, it turned out to be a significant security risk, storing passwords in plain text without encryption. The decision to delay this feature for a later release was welcome, but it raised questions about the long term plan with that feature as there are reports that it will be a part of a future Windows 11 update, and there may be no option to disable it.

Considering the pricing of the various CoPilot+PC devices (the name given to the laptops running the SnapDragon Elite and Plus CPUs), I strongly considered purchasing a laptop that was powered by the lower-end Snapdragon x Plus, thinking it could be a decent compromise since it still boasted a 10-core CPU and 16 GB of RAM, which is an upgade on the M2 MacBook Air’s 8-core, 8 GB of RAM. The lack of Linux support at launch was a deal-breaker for me. I had hoped to use Linux on these devices, but I understand that are more signficiant challenges associated with getting it running on ARM, like needing a Device Tree and specific drivers. Unlike the more standardized x86_64 architecture, ARM’s diverse hardware requires a lot of extra configuration, and I wasn’t interested in with using Windows 11 on ARM.

I did see a screenshot of someone successfully installing Arch Linux on a Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 with the Snapdragon x Plus, but that was just one instance and hasn’t led to any broader developments with the exception of Alex Ziskind who seemed to at least get Linux working in a command-line interface only. The anticipation of getting Linux up and running felt dashed when I learned that it wouldn’t be available right out of the box.

The naming of these processors could have been clearer. Qualcomm should have taken a cue from Apple’s M-series naming convention, which effectively communicates the hierarchy: M3 for the base model, M3 Pro for mid-tier, and M3 Pro Max for the top-of-the-line option. Instead, we have Snapdragon x Elite and Snapdragon x Plus, which can be confusing and doesn’t convey which model is the primary choice or how the Elite is a better option than the Plus. A simpler approach—like just calling them Snapdragon Elite or Pro and Snapdragon would have made it easier for consumers to navigate their options.

In the end, if the Snapdragon x Plus had been priced more competitively with the MacBook Air, I might have purchased one of them, especially the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x which has an appealing look (it has a reasonably sized keyboard in comparison to Asus’ offering which squeezes in a full keyboard) and offer upgrade options. But with reviews indicating that the Snapdragon x Elite’s performance isn’t quite on par with Apple’s M2 or even M3 chips, my initial enthusiasm has really taken a hit. It feels like a missed opportunity for Qualcomm to carve out a meaningful space in the laptop market.