State of mobile chip (Qualcomm Kryo, ARM Cortex A72, Intel Goldmont)

[FORTHEWIND]

This year is gonna be good for mobile SoC with 3 new CPU Cores competing with each other. But which one is good? (No flame wars please )

 

[el etro]

I like Kryo and A72, they both have different targets. Goldmont may have its attention because the Intel 14nm process manufacturing.

 

[CHADBOGA]

Hard to have any faith in Intel for a phone/tablet chip.

More heads should have rolled.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Kryo looks like a flop and I dont believe in Intel. So A72 it is.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Hard to have any faith in Intel for a phone/tablet chip.

More heads should have rolled.

Truth.

 

[mrmt]

Both Intel and Qualcomm are reducing investments in mobile chip development, so I think A72 will get a lot of share this year.

 

[NTMBK]

I'm more interested in the 64-bit follow up to the A17. A53 seems like the limit for an in-order core, but A72 seems like overkill for most phones.

 

[Sweepr]

Hard to have any faith in Intel for a phone/tablet chip.

True but at least Goldmont should improve the performance of entry-level PCs. And if Intel is smart enough they could score some interesting mobile design wins. A phone that turns into a x86 PC when docked (Continuum) would be pretty cool.

 

[nismotigerwvu]

Wow, you guys seem awfully willing to dismiss chips that are still months away from release. I'll make up my mind once we actually have some chips in some products.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Kryo looks like a flop

If by flop you mean "It will get more Android flagship design wins than any other SoC, including being the SoC for the North American Galaxy S7" then yeah it will be a flop.

Other companies would kill for a flop like that.

 

[coercitiv]

Wow, you guys seem awfully willing to dismiss chips that are still months away from release. I'll make up my mind once we actually have some chips in some products.

If we were more optimistic about upcoming chips would you be willing to make up your mind about them now?

 

[Andrei.]

If by flop you mean "It will get more Android flagship design wins than any other SoC, including being the SoC for the North American Galaxy S7" then yeah it will be a flop.

Other companies would kill for a flop like that.

Kyro is performance-wise quite disappointing.

Furthermore, just because there's a lack of SoC options for smartphone vendors to use doesn't mean that the one that they do end up using is a success. By that same definition the S810/808 were a great chips.

After measuring the Kirin 950's power efficiency I'm pretty certain that Kyro will have a very hard time competing against A72, and Mongoose is supposedly even better than that.

I'm more interested in the 64-bit follow up to the A17. A53 seems like the limit for an in-order core, but A72 seems like overkill for most phones.

A35 already has stuff that outperform A53's architecture - there's improvements to be made in the core but it just takes longer development cycles to squeeze out those improvements.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Kyro is performance-wise quite disappointing.

I don't disagree that it's not as fast as people like, but at least it's not a design disaster like the 810 was.

Furthermore, just because there's a lack of SoC options for smartphone vendors to use doesn't mean that the one that they do end up using is a success. By that same definition the S810/808 were a great chips.

Hence why I mentioned the Galaxy S7. If Samsung thought it was a useless SoC we would see Exynos in North America again like when the 810 bombed.

After measuring the Kirin 950's power efficiency I'm pretty certain that Kyro will have a very hard time competing against A72, and Mongoose is supposedly even better than that.

The Kirin 950 might be awesome on paper, but until it is in a product us enthusiasts will buy (a Nexus, a Galaxy, a HTC phone, a LG phone, a Moto, etc.) it basically doesn't exist. Seeing as how Huawei didn't put their SoC in the 6P (which would have been the perfect time to do it as the 810 was terrible) I just don't see them breaking into the North American market with their chips. Plus isn't the Kirin 950 GPU pretty weak?

Honestly I have more hope that Intel will get some decent design wins (the Zenphone was close, but its OS has an awful skin combined with no update policy) than a Kirin 950 ends up in a phone worth buying. Maybe Lenovo will push the Moto side to take Intel for a spin.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Do you think Kryo will turn Qualcomms SoC division around? I dont. A72 will rule the game.

 

[Andrei.]

Hence why I mentioned the Galaxy S7. If Samsung thought it was a useless SoC we would see Exynos in North America again like when the 810 bombed.

We still don't know if the S820 variant is going through, this time last year the S810 S6 was still on the table. It could also just mean that it's "good enough" to no warrant going with 8890 + QC modem which would be a huge BOM overhead. (CDMA is really damaging the SoC industry right now)

The Kirin 950 might be awesome on paper, but until it is in a product us enthusiasts will buy (a Nexus, a Galaxy, a HTC phone, a LG phone) it basically doesn't exist. Seeing as how Huawei didn't put their SoC in the 6P (which would have been the perfect time to do it as the 810 was terrible)

The 6P was 4 months too early to be using the 950 plus it's Google that decides what hardware gets used in Nexus phones, and they're pretty much in love with Qualcomm so I doubt we'll ever see other SoCs used.

Plus isn't the Kirin 950 GPU pretty weak?

No it's not. Assumptions like these is why we get SoCs that throttle to half their peak performance because they use vastly oversized GPUs not suited for smartphones.

 

[poofyhairguy]

We still don't know if the S820 variant is going through, this time last year the S810 S6 was still on the table. It could also just mean that it's "good enough" to no warrant going with 8890 + QC modem which would be a huge BOM overhead.

Fair enough. We will see I guess. If the Galaxy S7 is Exynos-based (or has a 4K screen) that will be my next phone.

The 6P was 4 months too early to be using the 950 plus it's Google that decides what hardware gets used in Nexus phones, and they're pretty much in love with Qualcomm so I doubt we'll ever see other SoCs used.

If the 2016 Nexus has an 820 and the Galaxy S7/Note 6 has an 820 then most of the phones ethustists will consider (and most mobile journalists will write about) will by Kyro-based.

I would love for it to be different, as I will be in the market for a phone this year after limping by to skip the 810 generation. But I have given up hope though that anything non-Qualcomm based will be in a phone that will actually run the newest version of Android and will get fast updates. At this point thanks to how broken the Android update process is it makes more sense to decide based on the software than the hardware, or you end up with some phone locked to Lollipop with a launcher skinned like iOS that you can't replace.

The Android OS update model hurts the industry even more than CDMA if we are talking about SoC (or phone vendor) competition.

No it's not. Assumptions like these is why we get SoCs that throttle to half their peak performance because they use vastly oversized GPUs not suited for smartphones.

That is why I was asking, the previous Kirins were a generation behind. Personally I don't care how big the GPU is as most Android games won't push past what the Galaxy S4 could do in 2016. Unlike in iOS it doesn't make economic sense to develop games for the bleeding edge.

 

[Andrei.]

If the 2016 Nexus has an 820 and the Galaxy S7/Note 6 has an 820 then most of the phones ethustists will consider (and most mobile journalists will write about) will by Kyro-based.

If you're US based then that's pretty much a given because of the lack of other options and it will continue to be like that until CDMA dies out.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Do you think Kryo will turn Qualcomms SoC division around? I dont. A72 will rule the game.

No, just like every other generation Qualcomm's radio division will keep its SoC's relevant. Unless Samsung goes Exynos with the Galaxy series the 820 will "rule the game." Vendors like LG or Moto really don't have another option.

Heck, there is a reason that the Nexus 6P with a garbage SoC got more positive press than all the phones will non-Qualcomm SoCs combined last year. It doesn't matter how awesome Intel is doing or what Huawei or Mediatek is doing if we can only count on Nexuses to give us fast stock updates of the OS. This isn't like x86 Windows were the hardware is separate from the software so you can talk about them in abstract, they are always a package with mobile. The winner is the one with the best package.

Qualcomm will probably get the design wins to make everything else irrelevant in the North American markets. That is the reality of the situation.

 

[poofyhairguy]

If you're US based then that's pretty much a given because of the lack of other options and it will continue to be like that until CDMA dies out.

Is there some non-US phone that has stock Android and gets updates as fast as Nexues/GPes? Because I would import that phone in a second, I am on AT&T so I don't need CDMA.

I bet there isn't because what the North America mobile enthusiast values (aka fast updates) isn't what the world at large values (something as close as possible to the iPhone so they too can pretend they have a status symbol). No one really values having a top-notch SoC or the Zenphone 2 would have killed it last year.

The closest thing we have is what OnePlus is doing, but the OnePlus Two doesn't have Android 6.0 yet even though my GPe M8 does. Eventually hopefully one of these Chinese companies will "get it" that all you have to do is make one phone that is a Nexus ripoff (and actually put in the resources to make the updates come fast) and you get all the positive press you can handle. Until one of them figures it out the options are limited to what Qualcomm makes.

 

[beginner99]

Eventually hopefully one of these Chinese companies will "get it" that all you have to do is make one phone that is a Nexus ripoff (and actually put in the resources to make the updates come fast) and you get all the positive press you can handle.

Exactly. Cheap phone with acceptable hardware and fast updates. That's what I would want. Cheap can still mean mid-range prices but lower than flagships. Also put some effort into the design (small bezel so no space wasted).

But I doubt they will every get it due to mentality. A sell is a sell, "I managed to cheat you with my cheap crap that doesn't' work, your problem". They for sure don't have a service-oriented culture.

 

[Andrei.]

I bet there isn't because what the North America mobile enthusiast values (aka fast updates) isn't what the world at large values (something as close as possible to the iPhone so they too can pretend they have a status symbol).

Wow what a biggoted statement.

The rest of the world doesn't suffer from US carrier bloat and firmware delays. I currently don't care that I currently don't run 6.0 on my S6 because other than Doze there is little to no other benefit for my usage. HTC/LG already have it and most everybody else already have 6.0 a few months after Nexus devices. For me personally vanilla/AOSP can be a detriment because Google still lacks usability features that OEMs have implemented years ago.

No one really values having a top-notch SoC or the Zenphone 2 would have killed it last year.

Did I miss something? I wouldn't quality the ZF2 as having a top-notch SoC.

 

[poofyhairguy]

But I doubt they will every get it due to mentality. A sell is a sell, "I managed to cheat you with my cheap crap that doesn't' work, your problem". They for sure don't have a service-oriented culture.

I doubt they will get it too, but it isn't due to the mentality. It is due to the fact that the margins on these devices are very small and there isn't really some sort of incremental future revenue from sold devices that make it worth keeping them updated.

What they are missing is that it would be worth losing money on a single halo device that is a Nexus copy just for all the positive press it would bring for their other devices.

 

[ChronoReverse]

The rest of the world doesn't suffer from US carrier bloat and firmware delays. I currently don't care that I currently don't run 6.0 on my S6 because other than Doze there is little to no other benefit for my usage. HTC/LG already have it and most everybody else already have 6.0 a few months after Nexus devices. For me personally vanilla/AOSP can be a detriment because Google still lacks usability features that OEMs have implemented years ago.

That's a short-sighted statement because you don't really get guaranteed security fixes which is something you have to worry about whether or not you're in the US. Even with Samsung's pledge to do monthly security fixes (so far synced with Google's) you're still limited to the newest phones (for instance, only the GS6-class phones got the December update).

Since one of the biggest points people like to stick it to Android is the security updates, it follows that it's a real big concern which can't be dismissed as "bigotry".

 

[poofyhairguy]

Wow what a biggoted statement.

I never said the North American enthusiasts were "right," just that they have different priorities than most of the world.

If someone having an Android phone that apes an iPhone makes them feel better about their purchase or themselves more power to them. I personally want fast updates, as do most people who cover Android for a living.

The rest of the world doesn't suffer from US carrier bloat and firmware delays.

And yet NOTHING on the planet can compare to a Nexus or Google Play Edition update schedule right now. Heck the Verizon 2014 Moto X got KitKat before many Nexus devices did, and the Sprint LG G4 got 6.0 before many International users did. The carriers get too much of the blame for slow updates, the real issue is it isn't a priority for OEMs.

I currently don't care that I currently don't run 6.0 on my S6 because other than Doze there is little to no other benefit for my usage.

Even if you personally don't care about updates, a lot of people do. I personally love the new permission setup in 6.0, the fixed volume controls, and the better copy and paste.

HTC/LG already have it and most everybody else already have 6.0 a few months after Nexus devices. For me personally vanilla/AOSP can be a detriment because Google still lacks usability features that OEMs have implemented years ago.

YOU might see it as a detriment, and I would argue many normal users who hate change don't like the idea of OS updates and their learning curves. Hence why I kept using the word "enthusiast."

With that said, the Android Journalist Community obviously (over)values stock Android and therefore gives devices like the Nexuses WAY more coverage than they deserve based on units sold. Your phone simply isn't going to get a good review in North America if you are running an old OS and it has some sort of OEM skin even if that isn't fair. Galaxies get the most coverage, than Nexes, than everything else.

Did I miss something? I wouldn't quality the ZF2 as having a top-notch SoC.

For the price it had a monster SoC, and had 4GB of RAM when even Google only put 2GB in the 5x. The CPU performance of the ZF2 is not lacking compared to anything at that price point.

 

[dark zero]

I dont believe in Intel.

Wait.... what? That was unexpected... you say that Intel was flawless and now this? Core M was supposed to end in phones...