It was just a matter of time; in the past few days there are those who tried to install Windows 10 for ARM on new Macs with M1 CPUs; Various tutorials have appeared on the internet to explain how to proceed using the macOS hypervisor and an ad hoc version of the free QEMU software.
Normally the various steps require Xcode, compiling the modified version of QEMU, and typing several command lines from the Terminal. Too complicated? Developer Khaos Tian simplifies everything with ACVM, GUI app (actually a wrapper for QEMU) to download from his GitHub profile which makes everything easier.
After opening ACVM, you can indicate the number of cores and the amount of RAM to be assigned to the virtual machine, drag the Windows disk image for ARM into the “Main Image” box and click “Start” to proceed with the classic Windows installation. But wait, where to find the file with the Windows disk image for ARM, since Microsoft does not sell this version (it is reserved for OEMs)? It is obviously on the Microsoft website, in the section dedicated to Windows Insider, the program that allows you to receive the latest Windows 10 builds as soon as they are available and allow users and developers to experiment with new ideas and concepts that will arrive later in the final builds.
Editors of the French site Macg report that they managed to install Windows 10 for ARM smoothly but had problems getting the internet to work from the virtual machine.
As we reported, a developer installed Geekbench 5 on the virtual machine scoring 1,288 points in single-core tests and 5,449 points for multi-cores (with 8 allocated cores and 4 GB of RAM), compared to 1,730 and 7,500. points with Geekbench running natively on macOS. In other words, there is a loss of speed within the virtual machine, as it goes without saying, but the performance remains great, even better than what can be achieved on a Surface Pro X, the Microsoft device on which it runs. Windows natively for ARM.
