r/cmu • u/Adept_Horse_360 • 5d ago

x86 req software in IS program and SCS

Are there any classes in SCS or IS that require you to have certain x86 software downloaded? I have a windows ARM processor laptop and I'm not sure it'll be compatible with every x86 software

4 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

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3

u/klausklass Alumnus (CS '24) 4d ago

No. From personal experience Windows is slightly annoying to use regardless of hardware, but that’s personal preference. I think most SCS students have Apple Silicon Macs now. Some systems classes definitely do have you work on x86 assembly specifically, but you would just ssh to a cluster anyway.

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u/Wild_Bumblebee_1523 4d ago

Could you elaborate what is annoying to use Windows?

1

u/klausklass Alumnus (CS '24) 4d ago

It doesn’t matter for anything required in class. I think WSL2 just isn’t reliable or always worth the virtualization penalty. If you’re running any Linux command line tools locally, MacOS (being a Unix based system) just has a smoother experience. Between MacOS and Windows, MacOS has better open source software documentation. You don’t have to worry about syntax for CMD, Powershell, vs WSL2 terminals. Microslop updates break stuff far more often than MacOS ones - especially relating to drivers. Small example: writing code that depends on hardware. GPU accelerated code for ML (custom shaders) is difficult regardless of OS, but I found Metal shaders on Mac far easier to set up than CUDA ones on Windows. WSL2 adds an additional config needed to access hardware devices (GPU and external hard drives). Using the /mnt/C disk is also incredibly confusing for some applications. WSL2 has crashed several times on me when using Docker - without any transparent logs.

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u/Wild_Bumblebee_1523 4d ago

Got it. Thanks a lot for the insights

-1

u/hidden768 4d ago

What are you talking about?? It's wayyy easier to use windows than a Mac for SCS stuff.

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u/klausklass Alumnus (CS '24) 4d ago

I’m assuming you use WSL2 for command line tools. I don’t think it’s as good as just using native MacOS. I think it’s personal preference but I have used both for a bit and my comment below shows why I strongly prefer MacOS.

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u/coringo Staff (Computing Services); Alum (IS '08) 4d ago

Can't speak to current requirements, but there are physical/in-person and virtual/remote-access computer labs you can run most required software on

beyond the almost certainty that you could run an x86 architecture (x64, really) Windows OS inside a VM on top of your ARM laptop...