- Mar 29, 2010
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Hey guys.
I'm far from an expert on this subject, but I've been wondering about this for quite some time now. I know there are some really smart people here at Tom's who might be able to offer their thoughts, opinions, and knowledge about this subject.
The basic premise of this discussion is the speed at which CPU's in our mobile devices are progressing in comparison to our beloved desktop counter-parts.
I'm not sure if I'm using the proper term here, but by "mobile CPU's" I'm referring more so towards SoC's (Snapdragon, Tegra 2, OMAP, etc.) used in phones and other small devices, rather than mobile CPU's you see in a notebook. Should I refer to it as ARM CPU's instead? Please forgive my lack of knowledge in this subject. I just don't want this discussion to become ARM vs. Intel vs. AMD. I'll stick with SoC's.
Enough with the nonsense. What do you guys think about the progression of CPU's in our smartphones over the last few years?
From what I've gathered, the smartphone arena was pretty stagnant from introduction of blackberry's in 2002 up until late 2008, when we started seeing the first android devices and the iPhone was in its second generation. I believe the first android phone(HTC Dream) was clocked in around 500mhz(192MB RAM) while the first couple iPhones were clocked in around 400mhz(128MB RAM). By late 2009-early 2010, only a year later, we started seeing phones hit 1GHz that had 512MB RAM.
Here we are in early 2011, and we are already starting to see dual-core mobile phones with a full 1GB of RAM. This is only the beginning, as we are expected to see 1.5GHz QUAD-CORE smartphones(2GB RAM?) by the end of 2011.
To put things in perspective, we were seeing Athlon T-birds hit 1GHz in 2000, almost 10 years before the first smartphone hit 1GHz. It wasn't until 2005 that we saw our first dual-core on the desktop market, but it was still almost 6 years before the first dual-core smartphone. Intel managed to squeeze out the first quad-core just before 2007, while we expecting quad-cores to hit phones just before 2012, a 5 year difference. Early 2010 showed us Hex-core CPU's from both Intel and AMD, which smartphones aren't even close to using(or are they?) I should also mention for the sake of mentioning that both Intel and AMD are expected to release Octo-Core CPU's by the end of 2011.
Obviously Desktop CPU's are still much more powerful then their handheld counter-parts. A top of the line SoC gets stomped even by even the weakest of desktop CPU's(non-Atom). However, what I find very interesting is the rate at which these mobile CPU's are progressing. Within a matter of 2 years they progressed from 500mhz to 1Ghz to dual-cores, something that took the desktop side around 6 years.
Of course, the mobile industry has a couple advantages that the desktop side didn't. For one, Intel and AMD were the first to do it, making those innovations in the CPU industry, that is. Since these advancements had already been made, it's easier for current SoC manufacturers to implement them into their current chips. Secondly, they have a HUGE headstart with the ability to use a much smaller fabrication process then older chips. Current dual-core SoC's are using a 45nm(Snapdragon) or 40nm(Tegra) fabrication process. The athlon 64 x2's were manufactured at double that, using a 90nm fab. process. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the first athlons to hit 1GHz were using a whopping 180nm fab. process. Yikes.
But these mobile CPU's do happen to have a few disadvantages over our power-house desktop CPU's. The first is simply because an SoC isn't just a CPU, it's EVERYTHING(hence System-on-a-Chip). Take the Nvidia Tegra 2 for example, the dual-core CPU(ARM Cortex-A9), GPU, North/Southbridge, and memory controller are all integrated onto a single package. Forgive my lack of knowledge, but I believe this is more of a comparison to earlier dual-cores, such as Core 2 duo or Athlon 64 x2. Compared to recent generations of desktop CPU's its quite similar, as Intel's Clarkdale contained most of the northbridge, the memory controller, and the GPU on single package, and Sandy bridge even put the GPU on the same die as the CPU. That being said, the desktop side can add dedicated graphics, which offer huge performance increases, something SoC's lack.
I believe the real disadvantages lie within the small form factor and power usage - to be honest, its pretty amazing. These devices are incredibly small, especially when you set it on top of your gaming rig and see the real size difference. The Samsung Galaxy S II for example, it may feature Tegra 2 and have a 1GHz Dual-core ARM Cortex A9, an 8-core Geforce GPU, 1GB RAM, 32GB Flash Memory, and is only 8.49mm thick! Oh, and there isn't a giant CPU fan or case fans to cool it either. Also, a Tegra 2 SoC has a ridiculous power envelope of like 1 watt, where as a current gen desktop dual-core has a 65W TDP or higher. Seriously, a power envelope of 1 watt? I'm just going to throw it out there that we have people stuffing 1000W power supplies into their desktops(Yes, I know why). Kal-El, the successor to Tegra 2, which is expected in android phones by the end of 2011, will feature a 1.5GHz Quad-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU, and a 12-core Geforce GPU, and expects to to be 3-5 times faster than Tegra 2, all while consuming LESS POWER than the Tegra 2.
The reality is that right now smartphones are nowhere near the performance of even a half-decent desktop. It also seems like nonsense to even think that they might "catch up" to the same level of performance of desktops. Heck, you can go on newegg right now and buy a DIY combo for $198 that includes a 2.9GHz Athlon II x2, 2GB RAM, 500GB HDD, along with a case, mobo, and PSU. That $198 system would absolutely destroy any smartphone on the market today.
That being said, the speed at which our mobile devices are progressing is scary, yet amazing at the same time. If we really see 1.5GHz quad-cores in our smart phones by the end of 2011, who knows what we should expect in another 3 years. I'm certainly not complaining when Android phones are going from a 500mhz single-core CPU in December of '08 to a 1.5GHz Quad-core CPU in December of '11. I'll add for the sake of causing a flame-war that the original iPhone launched '07 with a 412mhz single-core CPU, while 4 years later the iPhone 4 only has a 800mhz single-core CPU(talk about progression
). Anyhow, if this progression continues(for android devices), I will be very excited to see what will be coming in the future. Hell, our phones may be powerful enough to run current-gen video games to a 1080p display, they might even be able to run [strike]Crysis 2[/strike](not a challenge 
) the original Crysis!
So what do you guys think? Is it possible for smartphones and their ever-progressing SoC's to reach the levels of performance that desktop CPU's have to offer? Or will it be never-ending game of catch-up?
Please feel free to share your thoughts and opinions on this subject, as well as offer any advice!
Also, please correct me if I said anything that was completely moronic. As I stated earlier, I'm no expert on this subject, although It does fascinate me. Sorry for making this post so long! For more info on Kal-El - http://blogs.nvidia.com/2011/02/tegra-roadmap-revealed-next-chip-worlds-first-quadcore-mobile-processor/
I'm far from an expert on this subject, but I've been wondering about this for quite some time now. I know there are some really smart people here at Tom's who might be able to offer their thoughts, opinions, and knowledge about this subject.
The basic premise of this discussion is the speed at which CPU's in our mobile devices are progressing in comparison to our beloved desktop counter-parts.
I'm not sure if I'm using the proper term here, but by "mobile CPU's" I'm referring more so towards SoC's (Snapdragon, Tegra 2, OMAP, etc.) used in phones and other small devices, rather than mobile CPU's you see in a notebook. Should I refer to it as ARM CPU's instead? Please forgive my lack of knowledge in this subject. I just don't want this discussion to become ARM vs. Intel vs. AMD. I'll stick with SoC's.
Enough with the nonsense. What do you guys think about the progression of CPU's in our smartphones over the last few years?
From what I've gathered, the smartphone arena was pretty stagnant from introduction of blackberry's in 2002 up until late 2008, when we started seeing the first android devices and the iPhone was in its second generation. I believe the first android phone(HTC Dream) was clocked in around 500mhz(192MB RAM) while the first couple iPhones were clocked in around 400mhz(128MB RAM). By late 2009-early 2010, only a year later, we started seeing phones hit 1GHz that had 512MB RAM.
Here we are in early 2011, and we are already starting to see dual-core mobile phones with a full 1GB of RAM. This is only the beginning, as we are expected to see 1.5GHz QUAD-CORE smartphones(2GB RAM?) by the end of 2011.
To put things in perspective, we were seeing Athlon T-birds hit 1GHz in 2000, almost 10 years before the first smartphone hit 1GHz. It wasn't until 2005 that we saw our first dual-core on the desktop market, but it was still almost 6 years before the first dual-core smartphone. Intel managed to squeeze out the first quad-core just before 2007, while we expecting quad-cores to hit phones just before 2012, a 5 year difference. Early 2010 showed us Hex-core CPU's from both Intel and AMD, which smartphones aren't even close to using(or are they?) I should also mention for the sake of mentioning that both Intel and AMD are expected to release Octo-Core CPU's by the end of 2011.
Obviously Desktop CPU's are still much more powerful then their handheld counter-parts. A top of the line SoC gets stomped even by even the weakest of desktop CPU's(non-Atom). However, what I find very interesting is the rate at which these mobile CPU's are progressing. Within a matter of 2 years they progressed from 500mhz to 1Ghz to dual-cores, something that took the desktop side around 6 years.
Of course, the mobile industry has a couple advantages that the desktop side didn't. For one, Intel and AMD were the first to do it, making those innovations in the CPU industry, that is. Since these advancements had already been made, it's easier for current SoC manufacturers to implement them into their current chips. Secondly, they have a HUGE headstart with the ability to use a much smaller fabrication process then older chips. Current dual-core SoC's are using a 45nm(Snapdragon) or 40nm(Tegra) fabrication process. The athlon 64 x2's were manufactured at double that, using a 90nm fab. process. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the first athlons to hit 1GHz were using a whopping 180nm fab. process. Yikes.
But these mobile CPU's do happen to have a few disadvantages over our power-house desktop CPU's. The first is simply because an SoC isn't just a CPU, it's EVERYTHING(hence System-on-a-Chip). Take the Nvidia Tegra 2 for example, the dual-core CPU(ARM Cortex-A9), GPU, North/Southbridge, and memory controller are all integrated onto a single package. Forgive my lack of knowledge, but I believe this is more of a comparison to earlier dual-cores, such as Core 2 duo or Athlon 64 x2. Compared to recent generations of desktop CPU's its quite similar, as Intel's Clarkdale contained most of the northbridge, the memory controller, and the GPU on single package, and Sandy bridge even put the GPU on the same die as the CPU. That being said, the desktop side can add dedicated graphics, which offer huge performance increases, something SoC's lack.
I believe the real disadvantages lie within the small form factor and power usage - to be honest, its pretty amazing. These devices are incredibly small, especially when you set it on top of your gaming rig and see the real size difference. The Samsung Galaxy S II for example, it may feature Tegra 2 and have a 1GHz Dual-core ARM Cortex A9, an 8-core Geforce GPU, 1GB RAM, 32GB Flash Memory, and is only 8.49mm thick! Oh, and there isn't a giant CPU fan or case fans to cool it either. Also, a Tegra 2 SoC has a ridiculous power envelope of like 1 watt, where as a current gen desktop dual-core has a 65W TDP or higher. Seriously, a power envelope of 1 watt? I'm just going to throw it out there that we have people stuffing 1000W power supplies into their desktops(Yes, I know why). Kal-El, the successor to Tegra 2, which is expected in android phones by the end of 2011, will feature a 1.5GHz Quad-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU, and a 12-core Geforce GPU, and expects to to be 3-5 times faster than Tegra 2, all while consuming LESS POWER than the Tegra 2.
The reality is that right now smartphones are nowhere near the performance of even a half-decent desktop. It also seems like nonsense to even think that they might "catch up" to the same level of performance of desktops. Heck, you can go on newegg right now and buy a DIY combo for $198 that includes a 2.9GHz Athlon II x2, 2GB RAM, 500GB HDD, along with a case, mobo, and PSU. That $198 system would absolutely destroy any smartphone on the market today.
That being said, the speed at which our mobile devices are progressing is scary, yet amazing at the same time. If we really see 1.5GHz quad-cores in our smart phones by the end of 2011, who knows what we should expect in another 3 years. I'm certainly not complaining when Android phones are going from a 500mhz single-core CPU in December of '08 to a 1.5GHz Quad-core CPU in December of '11. I'll add for the sake of causing a flame-war that the original iPhone launched '07 with a 412mhz single-core CPU, while 4 years later the iPhone 4 only has a 800mhz single-core CPU(talk about progression
). Anyhow, if this progression continues(for android devices), I will be very excited to see what will be coming in the future. Hell, our phones may be powerful enough to run current-gen video games to a 1080p display, they might even be able to run [strike]Crysis 2[/strike](not a challenge ) the original Crysis!So what do you guys think? Is it possible for smartphones and their ever-progressing SoC's to reach the levels of performance that desktop CPU's have to offer? Or will it be never-ending game of catch-up?
Please feel free to share your thoughts and opinions on this subject, as well as offer any advice!
Also, please correct me if I said anything that was completely moronic. As I stated earlier, I'm no expert on this subject, although It does fascinate me. Sorry for making this post so long! For more info on Kal-El - http://blogs.nvidia.com/2011/02/tegra-roadmap-revealed-next-chip-worlds-first-quadcore-mobile-processor/
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