Mobile processors have been taken to a different level altogether recently. Smartphone giants like Samsung are boasting the Exynos 5 octa core, while Apple came up with its A7 processor with a 64-bit architecture. Of course, Samsung isn’t far behind. The global leader of the smartphone market is expected to launch its own 64-bit processor with the Galaxy S5 flagship device. Add to all this the Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 quad core processor, which I’m sure you have all heard about.
There really is one big question. Does a better processor guarantee better performance? If yes, then why does HTC, Taiwanese smartphone maker repeatedly chose a processor that is below others in the segment. Or, why did Apple not have a quad core processor in the new iPhone 5S. Moreover, why did Anandtech’s analysis of the processors show the iPhone 5S to be stronger than the Samsung Galaxy S4 and others? It’s as that old song goes, the answer my friend, is blowing in the wind.
Whether it is Qualcomm, Nvidia or Cortex, a high performance dual core processor can often provide better performance than a low end quad core processor. This is the concept that is going behind Apple’s seemingly high performing A7 dual core processor. Further, the RAM also plays a part in the performance. As was pointed out by many after the release of the iPhone 5S, with low RAM, your device will not be able to multi task anyway. So, you may have a 2.3 GHz processor, but without adequate RAM, you’re not going to be able to use it anyway.
In smartphones, the biggest hindrance to the processor is the attached storage. Here we have three avenues, the internal storage, external micro-SD card and the RAM. You may have a high end processor in your smartphone, but if your hardware is not good enough to respond to such speeds, it again becomes useless. This is in fact what many relatively unknown mobile makers do. When you’re buying a micro-SD card, be sure to purchase a good quality card, belonging to the class 10 SD cards.
There is another aspect to the processor performance as well. Many people use apps like Facebook, Twitter etc. on their high end mobile phones and comment on how they don’t see a difference in the performance. The reason is simple- these apps aren’t developed to perform better on multi-core systems. You may have a Snapdragon 800 processor, but you will feel the difference when you’re using other apps. In most cases, gaming and multimedia apps are the ones that show the difference. Try playing The Dark Knight Rises on the Snapdragon 800 processor. You will see.
Another aspect of mobile processors that many don’t know about is how much battery they are draining. A high end processor often needs a high powered battery as well. Consider the Nvidia Tegra 3 processor for example. This one can shut down it cores depending on when they are being used, as a result, your battery is not drained quite as easily. Your battery is drained the most when all the cores of the processor are running simultaneously.
To the average smartphone customer, selling a phone based on the mobile processor is quite easy. Why? Because we look only at the clock speed (2.3 GHz, 1.6 GHz etc.) and the number of cores in the processor. In reality, mobile processors are very similar to a PC processor, which means that a good processor needs a lot more for it to perform at its best. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not very tough to understand either. Reading up on processors is always beneficial when you’re buying a smartphone, especially the good ones.
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Posted at Sunday, January 19, 2014 | by
Rajat Khandelwal
