x86 software runs fine on Windows for ARM nowadays. I've been using it on Parallels for the last year and it has been working great (I don't do any high performance stuff on Windows though).
The virtualization features are at the hardware level, macOS and Parallels just configure that to run. Really it's just "I'm running a Windows VM and it's translating x86 apps to run on the ARM CPU".
Works great, particularly for 32 bit x86 apps it's a lot faster than running Crossover.
Exactly. ARM Windows has a feature like Rosetta which allows you to run x86 binaries on ARM (32 Bit and 64 Bit). This is mandatory because almost no one makes software for ARM Windows.
Nowadays it‘s pretty good. I was surprised how good it is, because I remembered it from the early Windows 10 days when the performance was atrocious.
That’s exactly what some people do. And it’s even possible to run older games that way. The x86-on-ARM Windows thingy is no Rosetta, but it’s pretty usable.
Could that also work for to old-ish software, like a decade old or so, or does this require applications to be optimized or compiled for it? And is this something Parallels is required for or could one test that without buying Parallels?
The Windows x86 -> Windows ARM works with any 32 or 64 bit apps unmodified and is a part of Windows itself. It's basically the Windows version of Rosetta 2. I use it to run an ancient Windows app on my work M1 MacBook.
Parallels comes into play if you want your Windows VM to have GPU acceleration. If you don't care about that you can just use UTM for free to run the Windows ARM VM on your M1/M2 MacBook.
