Where is my ARM?

Continuing with the exploration of Linux on Mx chips, I’m faced with another potential set back, and this time it impacts software availability. And it’s not just affecting people that want to replace MacOS by Ubuntu on their pricey second hand laptop.

Without going into much detail, computer processors (CPUs) have different architectures. But us mortals don’t really care about them since the dominant one, for the past decades, has been the x86 family. So when buying a machine, especially with Windows and Intel inside™, we were in fact running on the x86 architecture. 20 years ago, Appde also made the switch from their PowerPC architecture to x86.

Changing architecture is a big deal. Software that works on one architecture, does not work on another, except if you make some changes. So it takes quite a lot of resources to do these kind of transformations. Again, without going into much detail, there are good reasons to change. One of them could be power consumption of these chips. And that’s why “recently”, we’ve seen a growing adoption of ARM based computers. ARM (or arm64 or aarch64, as you’ll see it written) is a different architecture than x86. And ARM chips tend to be more power effecient than x86 ones. That’s also why Apple switched, again, this time from Intel x86 to its own brand of Apple ARM chips, named M1, M2, M3, etc.

Who would have thought, in a world where everything is mobile, people would care about the battery life of their devices more than anything else? Jokes aside, even Google and Microsoft are adopting ARM chips for their Chromebooks and other Windows Surface laptops, for obviously similar reasons.

ARM processors are becoming more and more widespread. An ARM processor is expected to be installed in 13.9% of all desktop PCs and notebooks sold in the first quarter of 2025.

Mantel M. (2025) ’ARM exceeds 10 percent CPU market share in notebooks and servers’, heise online, 16 May.

Linux works well on ARM chips. Hey, I can recall that it works well on those since the first Raspberry Pi came out. In general, Linux works on pretty much every computer architecture that exists in the world. I’m pretty sure someone somewhere made sure of that. But that does not mean every software, that us mortals need to run on top of our operating system, has been adapted (or compiled) for that particular architecture.

And that’s what I bumped into when trying to use Ubuntu on a MacbookPro M1 for work. There is a key piece of proprietary software that I have to use daily, and the manufacturer hasn’t bothered providing the binaries for the arm64 architecture: Zoom. Zoom works on Linux. But Zoom works on Linux for x86_64, and nothing else.

Zoom isn’t the only issue. And there are workarounds, since Zoom works also in the browser, as a web application, alas with a more limited set of features. No, the issue is that the list of Linux software for ARM architecture is just smaller than for the x86 architecture. And that’s understandable since people will prefer to develop and maintain software for the most popular architecture.

With the growing trend of computers adopting ARM chips and the speed at which these devices tend to appear on the second hand market, we need to make sure using Linux as an alternative operating system on those laptops is a viable option. That means making sure software is available, tested and working correctly. We can imagine that, as the popularity of ARM based computer grows, availability of software for this particular architecture will also grow. But I’ve experienced a few of my preferred software not working properly on ARM to be concerned about that.

So, if you are thinking of buying a second hand Apple machine (or Chromebook or Surface) and put Ubuntu on it and call it a day, make sure you check first that the most important software for you is available on arm64 or aarch64. Make sure it also works as expected. There is probably not a reliable way to figure this out except by trying it yourself. I know, that’s annoying. And as with all these things, even if things are not available today, that does not mean they won’t be available in 6 months or a year. So try again some time.

If the growing trend of devices with ARM chips continue, we’ll need to make sure running Linux on them offers a good experience for everyone. So we can prolong the life of these devices beyond their proprietary planned use. So ask your favorite developer if it will run on arm64 and if they can provide the packages for it.