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Comment by sirmike_ | Hacker News Reader

Just an observation but at this pace which will happen quicker to market -- mouse integration on iOS or Windows 10 ARM?

And of those two which has a bigger impact?

Mouse integration on the iPad would be a disastrous blunder. It just wouldn't fit with any aspect of the interaction model and would represent a dire loss of the plot on Apple's part. So I think that would have the greater impact.

I don't know why it would be a blunder. On a jailbroken iPad it's a god send to be able to have a tablet with a mouse and keyboard with a battery that lasts forever. Touching the screen gets "gorilla arm" fast and also makes it dirty. Could also lead to tablet cases with built in track pads. But I can see the "this doesn't apply to me so it's dumb" narrative that seems to circle around Apple opinions so much.

I'd argue that the iPad Keyboard Cover already represents a loss of the plot. Gorilla arm fatigue is real. Either Apple go whole hog and provide a trackpad in that keyboard cover (not necessarily enabling a mouse cursor mind you [1]) or Apple should sufficiently innovate their software keyboard so we don't need a keyboard cover to begin with.

[1] https://twitter.com/DaveChap/status/869192781960499200

> quicker to market

I'd say Windows 10 on ARM. [0]

[0] https://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Build/2017/P4171

Win10 on ARM devices are already announced for Q4 this year, assuming Intel doesn't sue Microsoft and get a stay on the Win10 x86 translation layer.

Pretty easy to conceive of scenarios where these devices would have real impact, if the translation is fast enough. Imagine a $300 10" windows laptop with a 10 hour battery life and roughly ivy bridge i3 level performance.

In comparison, Apple hasn't even hinted they'd allow mouse input on iOS. If you need that level of precision, they want you to use their stylus.

For what it's worth: you can get a $100-200 10" Windows 10 laptop (well, 2-in-1 tablet) with an Atom. (Battery life as a laptop is closer to 3 than 10, at least for me.)

MS has already hit that price point/form factor, and is working on making it more efficient/performant.

Windows 10 ARM would certainly happen quicker, not sure that mouse on iOS will ever happen. As far as impact - x86 emulation on ARM, if good enough, can significantly undercut Intel, which may end x86 dominance on the desktop eventually.

Intel is already going to be facing tough competition from AMD's Zen architecture too. AMD actually also make powerful ARM chips for servers, so I wonder if they might seize the chance for another angle of attack if it makes sense for them.

Not necessarily. Intel could easily walk away from some of its margin. Even the latest Qualcomm SoCs aren't particularly fast compared to modern intel CPUs, so intel would still maintain its high-end.

That doesn't mean ARM is inherently slow. Apple's SoCs are much faster on single threaded tasks than Qualcomm and Samsung's, easily approaching modern intel CPUs.

Wasn't it possible to use USB mice with the iPad 1?

Not without jailbreak tweaks. iOS has never natively supported a mouse cursor.

By units sold or overall revenue? Apple tends to make up a lot of ground with high prices :)

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