Chinese modder runs Nvidia RTX 4060 on Huawei Arm workstation via modified RTX Spark driver

When Microsoft and Qualcomm launched the first Copilot+ PCs with Snapdragon X Elite processors, CPU performance was beyond reproach. However, due to immature software or underwhelming integrated hardware, GPU horsepower left much to be desired. The obvious solution—connecting a discrete GPU—had not been achieved by anyone—until now.

An enterprising hacker in China has become the first person to publicly get an Nvidia GeForce RTX GPU running on an Arm-based platform using Windows 11, according to WindowsLatest. Notably, the system uses neither a Snapdragon nor an Nvidia CPU.

The Breakthrough

We already knew that Nvidia's RTX Spark processors used an integrated GPU directly derived from Nvidia's Blackwell technology, and that those machines would run Arm-based Windows 11. This meant an Nvidia client graphics driver for Arm Windows 11 existed—it was only a matter of time before someone used it.

That someone is "VoidTech" on BiliBili, who successfully got an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 8GB graphics card working in a Huawei Qingyun W510 workstation.

The Hardware

The Qingyun W510 does not use a Snapdragon processor. Instead, it features Huawei's own Kunpeng 920 CPU, created by Huawei's HiSilicon division. Introduced in 2019, this 7nm server CPU was considered a major milestone, offering up to 80 cores. The specific implementation in the Qingyun W510 has "only" 24 cores.

CPU Performance Limitations

All those cores don't help much in gaming. CPU gaming performance depends primarily on single-threaded performance and system memory latency. The custom TaiShan v110 cores in the Kunpeng 920 offer only about one-sixth the single-core performance of something like a Ryzen 9 9700X (based on Passmark benchmarks, with the usual caveats). Combined with relatively small caches and a DDR4 memory interface tuned for throughput rather than latency, the result is middling gaming performance—before even considering x86 emulation penalties.

Benchmark Comparison

| Benchmark | Qingyun W510 + GeForce RTX 4060 8GB | Ryzen 7 5800X + GeForce RTX 4060 8GB | |-----------|--------------------------------------|--------------------------------------| | Passmark ST / MT | 733 / 9,496 | 3,448 / 27,671 | | Genshin Impact 1080p High | ~25 FPS | 60 FPS (cap) | | Black Myth Wukong 1080p Medium | 21 FPS | 83 FPS | | 3DMark Speed Way | 2,252 | 2,682 | | 3DMark Time Spy Graphics | 6,369 | 10,939 | | 3DMark Time Spy CPU | 3,402 | 10,775 | | 3DMark Night Raid GPU | 43,530 | 61,080 | | 3DMark Solar Bay | 32,373 | 49,435 |

What Worked and What Didn't

Successes

The GeForce RTX 4060 performed about half its job flawlessly. It ran:

• Black Myth Wukong (Unreal Engine 5) at 21 FPS
• Genshin Impact at ~25 FPS (with frequent stuttering)
• Various 3DMark tests

Most software worked without issues, aside from overall weak performance due to the slow Kunpeng 920 CPU.

Failures

• Arknights: Endfield refused to launch, likely due to incompatibility between its restrictive "Anti-Cheat Expert" package and the Prism translation layer required to run x86 Windows games on Arm Windows.
• No video output: VoidTech could not get a video signal from the graphics card. The card and monitor were recognized, but the system couldn't push pixels to the display. This likely stems from the Nvidia Arm driver being built specifically for RTX Spark, missing necessary code to support HDMI and DisplayPort encoders on desktop graphics cards.

Workaround

To bypass the video output issue, VoidTech used the Sunshine game streaming server and the Moonlight game streaming client (on another system) to run the Huawei machine headlessly. A janky solution, but it worked.

Additional Challenges

Because the workstation was designed for Linux, there are no Windows drivers for the network controller or other integrated devices, including audio. VoidTech also struggled to get Windows 11 to boot due to broken ACPI tables and encountered frustration with missing Windows 11 drivers for the HiSilicon Network Subsystem (HNS).

Notable Demos

The video also shows VoidTech running:

• A Blender Cycles render on the GeForce RTX 4060
• Several Nvidia RTX demos, including the Star Wars "Reflections" demo