Longtime iPhone user goes Android for 4 months. Result? Back to iPhone

[poofyhairguy]

every time i think about buying the SGS2 i think about samsung's crappy history of updates and the rumors of them using Bada going forward.

For most consumers I don't think this matters. If you are tech savvy enough to care what Android version you are running (or even know that there are different versions) you are tech savvy enough to slap a third-party ROM on there.

 

[MrX8503]

... And it's still not in a phone! While Android phones have had 4"+ screens for a year and a half, and dual cores for a year, Apple is still stuck at 3.5" and single core.

The iPhone is on a longer update cycle than Android, but every time the iPhone has been updated, its specs are on par, or better than what's available currently.

 

[zinfamous]

Funny you should put it that way.

It's actually the other way around from what I have seen, but please feel free to point out where Tegra is faster than Apple's A5.

well, this isn't about Tegra, but it appears that the Exynos is identical, clock-for-clock to A5

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4686/samsung-galaxy-s-2-international-review-the-best-redefined/14

they didn't bench it against the iPad 2, of course, but it destroys everything else. at 1,2ghz in SGS2, the Exynos is clocked higher than what is happening in the Ipad2.

Of course, as far as GPU, Ipad2 has boatloads of horsepower. I expect iPhone 5 to have roughly the same processing power as SGS2, but again--they may not even need it due to iOS efficiency...which is all that matters in the end. As it stands, there really isn't anything out there to truly push the SGS2's capability. (well, I have yet to hook it up to my plasma to play back some 1080p 17mb/s video that I captured...we'll see how that goes.)


And it seems that in the article a few days ago, detailing the upcoming Kal-El, where at even 4-5? core advantage, Mali in the SGS2 might still outperform that next-gen CPU, 1 year later? I think that would be unbelievable, but it's what the comments suggest, anyway.

 

[Fire&Blood]

every time i think about buying the SGS2 i think about samsung's crappy history of updates and the rumors of them using Bada going forward.

Experimenting with a homegrown OS doesn't equate to abandoning Android, all OEM's look for back up options all the time. I'll save a b!tch slap for anyone who spread that rumor with the intent of creating panic that Android is abandoned.

Samsung, or any other brand, would commit a suicide by shifting weight to new OS's without support ecosystems.

Even the giant Nokia had to basically drop their own stuff and pick between Android or WP7, why would anyone move in the opposite direction?

Apple is the only one that pulled it off, and as great as iOS is, it still would have died much like Meego but it was the ecosystem where Apple really nailed it and secured a future for all of it's mobile products.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Funny you should put it that way.

It's actually the other way around from what I have seen, but please feel free to point out where Tegra is faster than Apple's A5.

 

[TheStu]

Just curious, what is 'Performance Speedup', and where does that graph come from?

 

[zinfamous]

Just curious, what is 'Performance Speedup', and where does that graph come from?

yeah, reference would be nice...

 

[Puddle Jumper]

Where in Apple's past smartphone history have they shown that they consistently use under-performing parts? There are only two situations that I can think of... the PowerVR SGX535 being in the A4 and the iPhone 3G being nothing more than an iPhone with a 3G modem. The 535 wouldn't have been much of an issue if the "Retina display" didn't have 4x the pixels. Although, even with that... the games look just as good as they do on their Android counterparts.

I would say that Apple's decisions are probably based partly on money/supplier reasoning. If they determined that the 535 was "good enough", and they already used it in the 3GS, they would save a bundle by simply increasing their existing order versus going for the newer SGX540. Do note though... Android phones only just started featuring the SGX540. So can you really blame Apple for not putting it in their device nearly 15 months ago?

The reason people believe the A5 will be in the iPhone is because the iPhone 4 was released with the A4 and then Apple used it in the iPad 1. Wouldn't it be logical for Apple to simply order more and use the A5 in the next iPhone?

Android phones haven't just started using the SGX540, the Galaxy S used it and it launched shortly after the iPhone 4 in the United States.

Unlike the A4 A5 is a massive and expensive chip to manufacture, it's die is nearly as large as a Sandy Bridge dual cores. I think it is very reasonable to expect it to be cut down in some way or another for use in phones.

 

[Aikouka]

Android phones haven't just started using the SGX540, the Galaxy S used it and it launched shortly after the iPhone 4 in the United States.

I must have forgotten about that, my apologies! I was recalling reading a review for a recent phone that had the 540, and I didn't remember anything else with one. Looking up the Samsung Hummingbird SoC confirmed it.

... And it's still not in a phone!

You don't have to tell me that... I'd like to replace my phone sometime soon. Of course, that's without having to repurchase all of the applications that I've already spent money on.

However, from what I've read the PowerVR SGX 543MP2 from the iPad 2 won't be used in the next iPhone; the single core version (PowerVR SGX 543 I believe) will be used due to heat and battery life.

Hmm that would be a bit of a bummer but understandable. The 543 (single core) has 2x the geometric processing of a 540, which makes it formidable. The GL Benchmark 2.3 tests that I saw on Anandtech (I forget which review it was) showed the MP2 in the lead using off-screen rendering, but I doubt it will keep that lead without the dual-core variant.

Although, you bringing that up makes me wonder... if they can't handle a dual-core variant... how will Sony manage the quad-core in the PS Vita? The Vita is a little bit bigger overall than most phones, and the battery life information from the Tokyo Game Show certainly came as a huge bombshell (~3 hours of gaming). Although, I'd be surprised if I got 3 hours of gaming out of my cell phone. I don't think I could even play Kenken for 3 hours straight without pretty much killing my phone, and that's a 2D Sudoku-like game!

It has the fastest GPU. Its CPU is actually below the current dual-core average (Tegra) in tests I have seen.

Yeah. I could have sworn that I put "GPU" into that post, but I must have intended to and forgotten. Given the very small differences among the A9-based CPUs, the performance mostly comes down to raw speed, and 1Ghz isn't going to win any contests there.

Comparing SoCs is a hard thing to do in this case as well. Usually GPUs on review sites are compared using as similar of a test bench as possible, but given how some GPUs are only found on some SoCs which are only used in conjunction with some mobile operating systems... you get a pretty big mess. A good example is the 543MP2 in the A5. The only product that it can be compared to is TI's OMAP 4470, which I don't think is even in anything yet. It's technically the 544MP2 in the 4470, but they're pretty similar.

But anyway... maybe with that, we can finally get some Apples to Apples (or rather... Android to Android ) testing.

 

[Mopetar]

Unlike the A4 A5 is a massive and expensive chip to manufacture, it's die is nearly as large as a Sandy Bridge dual cores. I think it is very reasonable to expect it to be cut down in some way or another for use in phones.

Not really. iSuppli estimates that the A5 in the iPad 2 costs Apple $14. The Tegra 2 in the Xoom was listed as nearly $21. The Qualcomm chip in the Touchpad was estimated at $20.

Of course the cost of Apple's part doesn't consider that they design the chip themselves, so of course it will be cheaper. On the other hand, Apple sells so many devices using these chips that it probably saves them money in the long run.

 

[poofyhairguy]

yeah, reference would be nice...

Sorry. Here is the source:

http://www.thinq.co.uk/2011/9/22/nvidia-releases-kal-el-benchmark-results/

 

[runawayprisoner]

Sorry. Here is the source:

http://www.thinq.co.uk/2011/9/22/nvidia-releases-kal-el-benchmark-results/

Last time nVidia did that comparison to Core 2 Duo, they heavily skewered the results and made it look like Kal-El was actually faster than the Core 2 Duo T7200.

I wouldn't count on those graphs much if anything. Looks like they are trying to skewer results again. For one, what kind of metric is "performance speedup"?

And if it's a speedup for real, then what is the base?

 

[Fire&Blood]

My favorite pastime is hunting down SoC articles and A5 has been described multiple times as a good CPU/great GPU.

quoting Anand:

As always Apple does its best to hide the limitations of the platform but I must point out that even the iPad 2 with a pair of ARM Cortex A9s has lower CPU performance than a netbook with a single core Atom. The fact that you can't really tell most of the time is a testament to Apple's software engineering, but it doesn't change reality.

 

[alkemyst]

Benchmarks are one thing...usability and reliability more important IMHO in an everyday device.

 

[runawayprisoner]

My favorite pastime is hunting down SoC articles and A5 has been described multiple times as a good CPU/great GPU.

quoting Anand:

Yes, but Anand was comparing it to an Intel Atom combo, which is in fact a lot faster.

That still doesn't say anything about A5 performance compared to other ARM SoCs.

 

[compcons]

I got an HTC Incredible for my previous job and made it my personal phone when I quit. I now have an iPhone for my current job and I am not a fan. My incredible is very easy to use and get setup whereas the iPhone requires too much fiddling to get things working the way I expected to if it can even windbag I want. Not a terrible device, but I absolutely prefer my incredible (recent gingerbread update made the UI better but I need more time to get a comparison to my iphone). The iphone is just not as great compared to good competition. I have not had to root my phone or perform any trickery to make it an enjoyable device.

key areas of concern for work:
1 I need an itunes account just to turn the damn thing on! Seriously? I needed a credit card and itunes account to make a phone work? Apple needs to get a clue on hat one.

2 the email for exchange is barely acceptable. The functions for mail are crippled on the iPhone.

3 the calendar is an absolute joke. Can't update a single person on an invite. Cannot forward invites. Cannot propose new times. Horrible!

 

[alent1234]

the exchange mail on iphone kills android. i tried it on my HTC Inspire and it didn't do push to sub folders. did some research and turns out it's a big bug. it does it on my Moto droid pro but switching between push accounts is almost impossible.

 

[alent1234]

Yes, but Anand was comparing it to an Intel Atom combo, which is in fact a lot faster.

That still doesn't say anything about A5 performance compared to other ARM SoCs.

it killed the Xoom when anand benchmarked it. even accounting for the slightly higher resolution

is A5 better than most ARM CPU's? yes

is it better than Intel? No. ARM is a gimped CPU by design. it doesn't have the cache or circuitry that Intel CPU's have

 

[jpeyton]

The Motorola Atrix is the best Android handset that AT&T currently has available, followed by the Samsung Infuse.

Android is available on a multitude of phones by many different manufacturers on all major carriers worldwide. Thus, a single phone cannot speak for the entire platform (a different situation than Apple, which has 1-2 models and tightly controls their platform experience).

In that regard, I think the OP is being disingenuous. The title of this thread should have been more along the lines of "iPhone user bought an HTC Inspire...going back to iPhone", which I think even Android die-hards could agree with. The Inspire has a CPU that's over a year old and has an anemic 1230mAh battery (the Atrix battery has 33% more capacity in addition to the notably faster CPU/GPU, a qHD screen, fingerprint scanner, etc).

I'm one of those Android die-hards, but I'll admit that Android wasn't as smooth/polished an experience as iOS in the single-core era. Android feels smooth, polished, and extremely responsive on the newest crop of dual-core handsets (Bionic, GS2), and I think going forward most people who shop for a smartphone and try Android will be pleasantly surprised.

 

[Fire&Blood]

It's the best SoC in a tablet right now, but how much of it's performance can it retain now that it's been repackaged for the smartphone? What other changes, if any, has the SoC undergone? We should see some Tegra 3 tablet benchmarks before November, I want to see that clash.

 

[jiffylube1024]

Although, you bringing that up makes me wonder... if they can't handle a dual-core variant... how will Sony manage the quad-core in the PS Vita? The Vita is a little bit bigger overall than most phones, and the battery life information from the Tokyo Game Show certainly came as a huge bombshell (~3 hours of gaming). Although, I'd be surprised if I got 3 hours of gaming out of my cell phone. I don't think I could even play Kenken for 3 hours straight without pretty much killing my phone, and that's a 2D Sudoku-like game!.

The Vita has a ~33% bigger battery than top phones at 2200mAh and it uses OLED for the display. That's how it can get any life at all with all that horsepower.

 

[zinfamous]

Benchmarks are one thing...usability and reliability more important IMHO in an everyday device.

indeed.

and please don't judge me if I ignore benchmarks released by the manufacturer.

 

[Mopetar]

That still doesn't say anything about A5 performance compared to other ARM SoCs.

The thing about SoCs is that most use the standard ARM cores, or slightly tweaked versions of them. For the most part, performance will be similar and the easiest way to differentiate from a competitors SoC is to adjust the clock speed.

In addition to this, most use graphics from a handful of different companies. For example, both Apple and TI use graphics from PowerVR. Once again this can lead to a large amount of similarity between chips. The reason the A5 is so powerful graphically is because it has a lot of die dedicated to the GPU compared to most other chips.

The rest of the SoC is dedicated hardware parts for different tasks such as audio and video decoding. This is where things can really start to differentiate based on what kind of dedicated hardware is being added. Adding, for instance, an MP3 hardware decoder will drastically improve battery life when playing MP3 music files as the dedicated hardware is much more efficient at this task than the ARM cores would be.

For the most part, performance across all SoCs is going to be fairly similar as most of the underlying hardware is similar. Conceivably, the companies like Qualcomm, Apple, or Nvidia can tinker with the ARM cores to make them more efficient, more powerful, or more inline with the rest of the SoC, but it's unlikely that any one of them will ever significantly outperform the others.

Benchmarks are one thing...usability and reliability more important IMHO in an everyday device.

While this is true, you could also say that a device with a better chip will run better than that same device with a slower chip. Assuming that Apple hasn't done some insane optimization for the A5, swapping in a more powerful chip would just make the iPad faster.

I would say that SoC differences are much more applicable to Android devices where more powerful hardware actually will translate into a better user experience.

 

[MrX8503]

From everything that I've read the past year, the A5's CPU was comparable to other dual cores out there. The GPU however, was in a league of it's own, nothing came close when the iPad 2 was released. It's even twice as fast as Mali.

 

[Mopetar]

From everything that I've read the past year, the A5's CPU was comparable to other dual cores out there. The GPU however, was in a league of it's own, nothing came close when the iPad 2 was released. It's even twice as fast as Mali.

Yes, but the GPU isn't anything special. It's just a PowerVR SGX543MP2. The only difference was that Apple is using the two core version of the GPU whereas other manufacturers are using the single core variant or something similar. There's nothing stopping other SoC makers from using more cores and seeing a similar level of performance. The PlayStation Vita, for example, is going to be using the 4-core version of the SGX543.