Samsung Announces World's First Octa 8-Core Mobile Processor

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]fancarolina[/nom]I agree with you. I'm surprised we haven't seen Intel go this direction. They could list all of their processors using Logical Cores (Physical + Hyper Thread). All of the current generation chips would magically improve from being Dual-Core, Quad-Core, and Hexa-Core. To Quad-Core, Octa-Core, and Dodeca-Core.[/citation]

That'd be outright lying, unlike the mere misleading of counting low-power cores in the core count.

 

[zeratul600]

[citation][nom]grndzro[/nom]This is going to be hillarious when Blackberry's 2 core processor running BB10 smokes Samsung's 8 core in everything.[/citation]
you re trolling? he is trolling right?

 

[saturnus]

[citation][nom]dalethepcman[/nom]What we have here is technically a 10 core system, its ((4+1)+(4+1)) because it uses a companion core along side the traditional quad core design, same concept as in the Tegra3.[/citation]

No!

big.LITTLE is an entirely different concept. It has 2 different cores integrated into a single processor. The ultra low power core is completely different from the high performance core, as it's in-order instead of out-of-order, pipeline depth is different and so forth.

The key here is that each processor switch to the core needed for the application running on it at the time. In reality it's not really 4x4 cores either. It would be more accurate to say it's 4x (1+1) cores.

Simply put. It's a quad core A15 with the ability to switch each core separately to an ultra low power mode (and by ultra low power it actually means it uses less power than an A15 core throttled down completely).

 

[Bloob]

It sounds expensive and stutter-prone, but it will be interesting to see how well it works.

 

[m32]

Samsung is AMD of the mobile world! I love AMD btw.

 

[Guest]

Lot of BS comments.

The big.LITTLE can utilize all the 8 cores at once. http://liliputing.com/2013/01/samsung-introduces-exynos-5-octa-cpu-with-8-cores-kinda.html

 

[Cryio]

Quoting fancarolina, this is a double-quad-core CPU. Sounds a bit gimmick-ish this way, right?

 

[chocostain]

I bet this is going to be OCTA-Expensive as well!

 

[redeye]

OMG, just image the "motion of the ocean" i can give with 8 cores... i rock!... those 2 cores... so lame!... /sarcasm

so much p3n1s Envy...

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]schawi[/nom]Lot of BS comments.The big.LITTLE can utilize all the 8 cores at once. http://liliputing.com/2013/01/sams [...] kinda.html[/citation]

Using all eight doesn't make it analogous to an eight core CPU except in the most basic and misleading way. It's still more of a 4 high power plus 4 low power core CPU rather than what is implied by calling it an eight core CPU.

 

[jimbo007]

So much misinformation going on around here. Even Mr. CEo is vague. This is actually a quad-core (4+4) chip with only 4-cores usable at a time (Either the quad A15s or the quad A7s) not both.

And sorry, no! "Octa-core" does not imply 8 cores of equal power (that would be homogenous cores) but 8-cores that can be utilized simultaneously.

 

[haswell5271]

For those of you complaining that it's not a "true 8-core" although you are technically right need to stop complaining. IT HAS 8 CORES. IN A PHONE. This processor -coupled with a lightweight OS- could be faster than my i5-3570k! I doubt it, but the possibility IS there. So stop complaining and help me ditch my tired iPhone 4 by crossing your fingers for the Galaxy S IV to have this AMAZING processor!

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]jimbo007[/nom]So much misinformation going on around here. Even Mr. CEo is vague. This is actually a quad-core (4+4) chip with only 4-cores usable at a time (Either the quad A15s or the quad A7s) not both.And sorry, no! "Octa-core" does not imply 8 cores of equal power (that would be homogenous cores) but 8-cores that can be utilized simultaneously.[/citation]

Eight cores does imply eight identical cores. It doesn't necessarily mean eight cores, but that is what it implies. Furthermore, Samsung and the others have already stated that there are two modes for the CPU to operate in. One lets the low power cores only be active when the high power cores are not active whereas a second mode lets them all be active at once and the phone has to intelligently schedule things to the proper cores. Please get your facts strait before complaining about the misinformation going around.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]haswell5271[/nom]For those of you complaining that it's not a "true 8-core" although you are technically right need to stop complaining. IT HAS 8 CORES. IN A PHONE. This processor -coupled with a lightweight OS- could be faster than my i5-3570k! I doubt it, but the possibility IS there. So stop complaining and help me ditch my tired iPhone 4 by crossing your fingers for the Galaxy S IV to have this AMAZING processor![/citation]

This processor is four Cortex A15 cores with four Cortex A7 cores. There is no chance of it being as fast as one of the i5-3570K's cores at stock, let alone all four, let alone all four with a significant overclock.

 

[GhosT94]

not much of a futur in phones , but onto a good start with tablets replacing laptops in the future

 

[haswell5271]

I'm not saying it will beat my i5 but it has the potential to be. IF its OS were light enough. Windows 7 is probably a limitation for my speedy chip.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]haswell5271[/nom]I'm not saying it will beat my i5 but it has the potential to be. IF its OS were light enough. Windows 7 is probably a limitation for my speedy chip.[/citation]

No, it doesn't even have the potential to beat your i5. That's like saying that a chicken has the potential to spontaneously evolve/devolve into a tyrannosaurus rex and eat everyone around it. Sure, maybe it's possible, but you're not likely to say that the chicken even has the potential to do that.

Regardless of how light the OS is, the difference in performance is still staggering even if you compare a single core from the i5-3570K at stock to the whole Samsung Exynos5 SoC's CPU performance and any difference in perceived speed is more likely because of the storage being a hard drive than the CPU or OS not being good enough. Windows 7 most certainly isn't such a limitation that an Exynose5 with Android or whatever else will be able to best an i5-3570K at stock, let alone overclocked.

No offense, but it's just not going to best an i5-3570K in CPU performance under any reasonable circumstances.

 

[haswell5271]

If the OS was light enough? I would bet it could. Windows 7 is very heavy compared to Android, and because it's flash architecture is might be faster memory than my 7200 RPM HDD. Also my i5-3570K isn't overclocked. It's actually underclocked to 2.9 GHz to lowers temps (I don't need and more speed). You have to give Samsung some faith mate.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]haswell5271[/nom]If the OS was light enough? I would bet it could. Windows 7 is very heavy compared to Android, and because it's flash architecture is might be faster memory than my 7200 RPM HDD. Also my i5-3570K isn't overclocked. It's actually underclocked to 2.9 GHz to lowers temps (I don't need and more speed). You have to give Samsung some faith mate.[/citation]

It doesn't matter how good Samsung did. The CPU is still just a quad core Cortex A15+quad core Cortex A7 at best. What I think of Samsung doesn't change the fact that a very, very low end CPU will not beat one of the highest end consumer CPUs available.

You are greatly overestimating the influence of Windows 7.

Even with that considerable underclock, a single core of your i5 will beat the Exynos 5 in eight-threaded software by huge margins simply because it's that much faster than ARM. There is a huge difference in power consumption, performance, and price for a reason. I've got nothing against Samsung, I even own several Samsung products, but they can't make an architecture perform better than it is capable of performing.

Also, you seem to not understand how fast the on-board flash of modern devices really is. Sure, it's not junk, but it's no speed demon either. A cheap SSD can be exponentially faster and be much faster even in more real world scenarios the benchmarks and unusually high usage situations.

I repeat: There is no chance, whatsoever, of your i5 being beaten by Samsung's Exynos5 unless Samsung managed to get more than an order of magnitude improvements to meet desktop performance without desktop nor even low end laptop power consumption. Since Samsung did no such thing, the i5 will win without any performance competition, granted it is an apple s to oranges comparison.