An $899 mini PC that turns the Snapdragon X Elite into a tiny desktop for developers

Microsoft and Qualcomm are making a concerted effort to revive Windows on Arm after years of slow progress and false starts. To engage software developers, companies offer, among other things, mini-PC development kits that plug into a software developer’s regular multi-monitor setup and don’t require the same expense as a Surface tablet or laptop with equivalent specifications.

Qualcomm has announced Snapdragon Dev Kit for Windows, a black plastic mini PC with the same internals as the new wave of Copilot+ PCs with Snapdragon X Plus and Snapdragon X Elite processors. The package is fairly generously equipped and includes a slightly faster version of the Snapdragon X Elite that can accelerate up to 4.3GHz, 32GB of RAM and a 512GB NVMe SSD.

Unlike the Windows Dev Kit 2023, which looks like a repurposed Surface Pro 9 motherboard in a black plastic box, the Snapdragon Dev Kit looks purpose-built. It has a USB-C port on the front, two USB-C ports, an HDMI port, two USB-A ports, a headphone/speaker jack and an Ethernet port on the back. It’s not a huge selection of ports, but it’s in line with what Apple offers on the Mac Mini.

Perhaps most important for developers looking to play with Microsoft’s new wave of accelerated AI features and development tools is that the Snapdragon dev kit includes the same NPU as all of the Copilot+ devices announced yesterday. According to Qualcomm, the NPU is capable of 45 trillion operations per second (tops), which is slightly more than the 40 operations per second that Microsoft has set as the minimum for Copilot+ PCs; This requirement means that no current generation Intel and AMD laptops and desktops are eligible for the label. x86 processors with more powerful NPUs should arrive this fall.

The bad news is that the kit will cost $899, which is $300 more than the Windows Dev Kit 2023 (which was released in 2022). That’s $680 more than the older Snapdragon 7c-based ECS LIVA QC710, the first ARM developer box offered by Microsoft. Although this model was significantly undervalued, there seems to be room to offer a cheaper case (perhaps with a Snapdragon one). You don’t want to spend anywhere near $1,000 on your desktop.

As a Surface Laptop with a Snapdragon you can Register now to pre-order the boxShipping begins June 18.