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iPhone 5 GeekBench Results

EGSonikku writes "The iPhone 5 has been benchmarked using the GeekBench tool. According to the results, Apple's claim of 2x higher performance over the iPhone 4S seems accurate. The results show the iPhone 5's A6 CPU is dual core and clocked at 1.2GHz, and is paired with 1GB of RAM. Despite the fact that the Samsung Galaxy S3 has a quad core CPU at 1.4GHz, and twice as much RAM, it seems the iPhone 5 is faster than the S3, or any other Android handset." Meanwhile, Samsung has launched a marketing campaign that compares some of the hardware specs and features between the new iPhone 5 and the GS3.

55 of 470 comments (clear)

  1. Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by magarity · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'd rather it were the same thickness as the old model if the battery would last longer. Who exactly is it that thinks so they're so horribly thick?

    1. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by _Shorty-dammit · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I've said the same thing for years about both phones and laptops. Sooner or later they're of a size that is small enough, and continually making components smaller should simply give us more room for more battery capacity. Even if this iPhone 5 gives us similar, or one can hope for slightly better, battery performance compared to the previous model. But one can only imagine how much better it would be if it were still the same size, and all the shrunken components would give us a battery capacity twice that of the previous model.

    2. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by js3 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'd rather it were the same thickness as the old model if the battery would last longer. Who exactly is it that thinks so they're so horribly thick?

      Everyone I've seen with an iPhone has a ridicilously huge rubber case protecting the fragile thing. You should see the one my girlfriends mom has. You would think she was using a phone from early 2000. Why is thin such a big deal when everyone has a case that makes it NOT thin?

      --
      did you forget to take your meds?
    3. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by CastrTroy · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Well, despite the Macbook Air being extemely small. They have dedicated a fair amount of size to the battery. Check out this picture to see just how much space the battery takes up in the Macbook Air. I only wish my HP thickbook used the same percentage of the volume for the batteries. I'd be able to work an entire day without charging. I'd gladly go without the optical drive if they could replace the entire thing with a battery.

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    4. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by beltsbear · · Score: 5, Informative

      I have dropped my caseless iphone 4 and 4s at least 5 times each (yes I am clumsy) without breakage. It is not fragile even with glass on both sides. The main way gorilla glass is broken is a drop on to concrete, even asphalt seems not to do it at hand height. Almost half the people I work with have the iPhone 4 or 4s, out of maybe 10 phones I have seen one broken from a drop. I have had Samsung phones that break on the first drop and Erikson that took only a few drops. None of my Moto's ever broke from droppage.

    5. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by Zuriel · · Score: 5, Funny

      And, of course, there's the indestructible Nokia.

    6. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by hawguy · · Score: 4, Informative

      Well, despite the Macbook Air being extemely small. They have dedicated a fair amount of size to the battery. Check out this picture to see just how much space the battery takes up in the Macbook Air. I only wish my HP thickbook used the same percentage of the volume for the batteries. I'd be able to work an entire day without charging. I'd gladly go without the optical drive if they could replace the entire thing with a battery.

      I thought all the laptop vendors had something similar to Lenovo's "Ultrabay" battery that lets you swap out the CD-ROM drive for a battery? I know I've seen a Dell that has the same thing. HP doesn't?

    7. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by djdanlib · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I have a friend who dropped her iPhone off the kitchen counter and that impact shattered the glass. She's done this twice, once with an iPhone 4 and once with an iPhone 4S. I think I'll take my chances with a better-constructed device.

    8. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by beltsbear · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The video below takes 4 drops on concrete before it breaks. There is an element of luck. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7-OBoDFeDY

    9. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by peragrin · · Score: 3, Informative

      I dropped my iphone 3G 4 times twice onto concrete without any ill effects.

      One of the times the phone was in my jacket pocket literally while I was on a ladder I must have bounced or moved just right as I felt it slide out and heard the thunk.

      One of the times that wasn't on concrete I was carrying a heavy load up a flight of stairs I had to adjust my grip and as I did the phone slipped out of a different pocket. it sort of cartwheeled down the stairs too.

      I don't use rubbers on my phones. That phone worked just fine for 3 years before I finally upgraded.

      --
      i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
    10. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by PNutts · · Score: 3, Informative

      Why is everybody dropping their phones? How does this happen? After years of smartphone use, and over a decade of cell phone use, I've only ever dropped one phone (an old Nokia, circa 2000; ended up with a loose battery connection that would occasionally cause dropped calls if it shifted mid-call).

      Maybe rather than a case people should get the Nokia Lumia 920 and wear grippy gloves, since the 920's screen can be used with gloves on.

      Looking at your ID I assume you are an old guy like me. :) The difference is 10 years ago we used our cell phones for phone calls. Aside from an outlier realtor or on-the-go professional that usage didn't add up to a lot of minutes during the day, and often for me there were many days between calls. Fast forward to today where "our" noses are buried in the phone most of the day. It's constantly in and out of our hands for social networking, music, news, texting, reading, pictures, whatever. And folks aren't stopping what they're doing to do all that. I see phones in use driving, walking, jogging, bike riding besides the normal multitasking during a meal or other more mundane activities (including the "dropped it in a toilet" horror stories). I'll also add the the current form factor (thin and wide) is more prone to an accidental ejection from a hand than the thicker candy-bar or slider styles. My lawn? Get off it.

    11. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by exomondo · · Score: 4, Funny

      I have dropped my caseless iphone 4 and 4s at least 5 times each (yes I am clumsy) without breakage. It is not fragile even with glass on both sides. The main way gorilla glass is broken is a drop on to concrete, even asphalt seems not to do it at hand height. Almost half the people I work with have the iPhone 4 or 4s, out of maybe 10 phones I have seen one broken from a drop. I have had Samsung phones that break on the first drop and Erikson that took only a few drops. None of my Moto's ever broke from droppage.

      My iphone4 fell out of an ultralight onto a construction site where it was run over by a steamroller and it was fine, but a cotton-wool ball touched up against my samsung and the screen shattered.

    12. Re:Faster is fine - do we need thinner? by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 3, Funny

      And the thinner/lighter formula has been just that.

      Except 'the new ipad' where it was thicker and heavier.

      IOW, Apple is bad for making their devices thinner - unless they make them thicker, then that's evil.

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
  2. Check your countries. by markdavis · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Please note the summary is obviously about the "International" version of the Galaxy SIII.

    The USA version of the Galaxy SIII, and the Evo LTE, and the One X all use the faster Qualcomm S4 chip, not the Tegra 3 they are trying to compare against. And "twice the RAM" should generally have nothing to do with performance.

    What does this all mean? Generally, that the high-end [USA] Android phones perform easily as well as the new iphone 5.

    1. Re:Check your countries. by BorgDrone · · Score: 5, Insightful

      True, but they do this with twice the cores and a highernclock frequency. That makes the A6 pretty impressive.

      Imagine if they put a higher clocked, quad-core version of this in an iPad.

    2. Re:Check your countries. by KiloByte · · Score: 5, Informative

      From the blurb: "it seems the iPhone 5 is faster than the S3", from the linked article: S3 has a higher score than iPhone5 by roughly the relative clock ratio. Most tests are single-threaded so the number of cores doesn't matter, but in the few multi-threaded tests, S3 gets far better edge (duh!). The only part where iPhone5 wins is memory bandwidth.

      Whoever misquoted the results this badly must be some incorrigible Apple fanboy.

      --
      The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
    3. Re:Check your countries. by Nursie · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually it's exynos, Samsung's ARM, not tegra.

      Not sure I'd call the USA phones high end, necessarily. They have less cores because samsung have to compromise and use third party chips in order to get LTE. I know the Qualcomm stuff is good, but I'm not sure I'd wager on it being *that* good.

      Geekbench also seems to have recorded multiple scores for the S III that are above the 1601 reported for the iPhone 5.

      All in all I'd say that there's actually no useful information here at all,

    4. Re:Check your countries. by jones_supa · · Score: 4, Informative

      And "twice the RAM" should generally have nothing to do with performance.

      o_O

      He's right. The programs either fit in the RAM or they don't. On a PC you might get performance improvement by installing extra RAM, but that's only because you get more filesystem cache and get less swapping.

    5. Re:Check your countries. by Smurf · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Sorry, I can't find the text you mention as "from the linked article". Can you please point out where one of the linked articles says that?

      The only thing I could find is this page saying that the A6 running at 1.02 GHz scored 1601, while this chart says that the average Galaxy S3 running at 1400 MHz gets a score of 1560, i.e., the S3 scores slightly lower even though the clock runs 37% faster.

      What am I missing?

    6. Re:Check your countries. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      That chart is not an average.
      See here a list of all Galaxy S III scores.

  3. Android logo? by mr_zorg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The android logo on an iPhone story? Really?!?!

    1. Re:Android logo? by blackest_k · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Thats just to pour fuel on the flames Slashdot seems to be degenerating to flamebait, remember when stories were generally interesting and not just to annoy various factions. Hearing the same comments repeated gets boring after a while.

      Any way good on apple at bringing a more powerful iPhone to market. So how good are the next generation android phones going to have to be, to compete against this latest generation iPhone.

      See this is where the battle for market share should be fought not in the court room.
         

  4. With that much power under the hood by __aaqvdr516 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Since it is faster than all the other phones I can get all my phone calls done faster. That's the way it works.

    Plus, all the video encoding gets done that much faster while I text and drive.

  5. Going for the S3 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've decided that my next phone (soon, I hope) is going to be the S3. I'd been holding out with my iPhone 4 for a while, waiting (like many others, I suspect) to see what Apple would wow us with for the iPhone 5. Needless to say, I wasn't that impressed, though to be honest, part of me really didn't expect to be, given that there are only so many innovations they could have come up with. What could they have done? An even bigger screen? NFC? A phone you could roll up? The first two would hardly have been groundbreaking and the latter is tech that doesn't really exist yet.

    Still, at the end of the day, I'm sure I could be happy with the 5, but I'm ready to play with a new toy. I've never had an Android device before, but got a chance to play with a tablet and some phones over my vacation, and I liked what I saw.

    Captcha: revenues

    1. Re:Going for the S3 by foniksonik · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Uh. You do realize that you just completely contradicted yourself. If Samsung is making chips for Apple in Texas, then it's really Apple and iPhone buyers supporting that manufacturing, not Samsung phones. That article you linked to About A6 chips in fact is very complementary to Apple.

      --
      A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
  6. Oh samsung... by kiriath · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That ad makes me giggle. Samsung is so deathly afraid of Apple that they are flaunting all of their silly useless(to me... I guess... maybe someone can use them) gadgets in hopes that people will think the I5 is inferior. The numbers will speak for themselves, and Samsung is wasting their advertising dollars... they should save up to pay their patent debts.

    Seriously though, I never liked the Mac Vs PC ads, I feel like if you can't sell your product on its own merit, you shouldn't release ads trashing the other guys. When you have an awesome product, people will buy it... when you stoop to trash talk, you're showing your weakness. Apple showed their weakness with the MacVPC ads. Samsung is showing theirs with this.

    Also, if Android didn't almost require 2GB of memory to run I'd feel like that is a lot. My 1GB android devices slug up so fast it is silly. If Android had the memory management of iOS, 2GB would scream.

    Silly large companies...

    1. Re:Oh samsung... by jbeaupre · · Score: 3, Informative

      Hmmm, my wife now has an android phone running Jelly Bean on only 384 meg. Runs pretty nice too, despite using an old processor.

      The difference doesn't seem to be Android itself, but all the other bloatware that gets stuffed on some phones.

      --
      The world is made by those who show up for the job.
  7. So many errors! by lowlymarine · · Score: 5, Informative

    There are a ludicrous number of errors here. The summary says that the CPU is clocked at 1.2 GHz, which the screenshot clearly shows is not the case - it's 1 GHz. The quad-core Galaxy S III only has 1GB of RAM, and the LTE variant with 2GB of RAM doesn't have a quad-core CPU. And both the HSPA+ and LTE Galaxy S III's score well above 1600 on Geekbench when actually running on all cores - the test results that are below 1600 and are no-doubt included in this "average" are custom tests run on fewer cores, which is clearly shown if you actually browse the results.

  8. Does the processor matter that much? by Overzeetop · · Score: 4, Insightful

    At least in the US, the carriers seem determined to ensure that you upgrade every two years anyway, so it's not like you're going to be stuck with a phone which is all that old. It seems more like "fast enough" is simply a responsive GUI and a generally imperceptible execution time for the kinds of activities you do on a phone. I'm not running CFD models, transcoding movies, or running a popular web service on the thing - I'm tweaking photos, or asking it to make simple calculations my HP48 might do, streaming media or rendering a web page (without flash; thanks Steve).

    Now that a couple of generations have past for Android and iOS, the options for switching are getting far more expensive and time consuming. Switch all my media to a new program for syncing - major PITA. Re-buy all my apps (not an insignificant endeavor) for the other platform - $$$. Learn where the fuck the Android/iOS developers decide to put some obscure setting I want to change? Heck, even just setting up my icons and replicating a useful look & feel means dropping at least a couple, if not several, hours.

    Megapixels, streaming video chat, resolution, memory amount, memory speed - the numbers mean almost nothing. They mean even less when you can't even run the opposing OS on the hardware. But I suppose everybody has to have a ruler handy at some point.

    --
    Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
  9. I made a mistake in the story write up... by EGSonikku · · Score: 5, Informative

    Just wanted to fess up to a typo in the story. I accidentally typed that the iPhone 5 runs at 1.2GHz, meant to type 1.02GHz.

    --
    - "Scientia non habet inimicum nisp ignorantem"
    1. Re:I made a mistake in the story write up... by mactard · · Score: 4, Funny

      Isn't that what the Slashdot editors are for?

  10. Thinner is thinner by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Everyone I've seen with an iPhone has a ridicilously huge rubber case protecting the fragile thing.

    Well the cases are not all that large that I have seen, but let's proceed as if they were.

    Why is thin such a big deal when everyone has a case that makes it NOT thin?

    Because the combination of a thinner device + a case is still thinner than the thicker device + a case. If the case, as you claim, is a constant - then thinner really does mean thinner to the user.

    However one thing of note with the iPhone 5 is that it has a metal back again. I'm going to drop using a case with the iPhone5 since it should hold up better to drops (I never used a case with the original iPhone and never had an issue). Other people may also choose to stop using cases.

    One other factor you forgot about is weight, the new phone is lighter - that does matter to people, I jog for instance and the iPhone 4 really produces a lot of pull in the pocket.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  11. Odd conclusion... by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Needless to say, I wasn't that impressed

    Why? It is in fact very impressive hardware; it's simply the case that most of the details about it were leaked beforehand.

    I do not know what aspect of the phone would fail to impress compared to current top-end Android phones unless you were into huge screens. The main thing I wanted was a great camera upgrade from the iPhone4; the iPhone 5 has an excellent camera. It runs iOS apps quite quickly, and has a somewhat larger screen without being physically huge.

    I just don't understand the pure spec-based comparison that takes place without consideration of what software you might want to run...

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Odd conclusion... by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Insightful

      But its *not* impressive. Its totally *meh*. It looks so similar to a 4S that it barely deserves the '5' monkier.

      Who cares how it looks? A good design is a good design. And I thought people claimed iOS users were just buying for the looks...

      And even then, it actually looks pretty different with the metal back. In person it will not look that much like a 4s between the different back and taller form factor. I actually preferred the older size but the other aspects of the device are compelling enough for an upgrade.

      The camera is almost exactly the same as the 4S

      Incorrect. Google sample photos, you can see clear improvement in detail. Also, it's improved over the 4s in many other ways - up to two stops better low light performance for one thing (that is not at all nearly the same), and 40% faster to operate which is important in a mobile camera. The camera is actually what I am most interested in, along with greater processing power and more memory to handle some interesting photo manipulations or faster panoramic assembly.

      We all were expecting better than what we got.

      We were? I was expecting exactly what we got since it's now impossible for Apple to release a week after an announcement and have any secrets left to reveal, too many leaks along the assembly chain. Even then some aspects are better than I thought they might be, like the front camera for example.

      Im more impressed with the S3.

      And again you ignore the real core consideration that shoudl be present in the selection of any smartphone - what can you run on it? The iOS marketplace is still ahead of the Android marketplace, more in quality than quantity at this point - and that will continue as long as most Android phones are stuck at 2.x, while iOS apps are built atop more and more advanced libraries. You'll get some apps that take advantage of Android 4.0 but a tiny fraction of how many will be coding even against iOS6 at launch much less iOS5...

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    2. Re:Odd conclusion... by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I'll take the bait, what app do you have on iphone that there is no equivalent functionality within the android market?

      iPhoto for one. I use it for review of DSLR images since I can quickly zoom to 100% on a 15MP JPG file to make sure focus was correct in specific locations.

      It's also very lame but twitter clients are better. It annoys me that it matters at all to me but it does.

      There are also some specialized weather apps like Dark Sky that I like. (though it looks like you will be getting that particular one eventually).

      There are a LOT of interesting photo apps. There are some on Android but I don't think at the same level of functionality.

      I have a MINI Coper and the MINI Connected smartphone integration is IOS only at the moment and has been for years (that one I think is silly on their part).

      Possibly Android has astronomy apps as good as Hidden Sky and Star Walk, but I'm not sure...

      Also a ton of interesting drawing apps, like Paper to pick a recent example. I know Android has some drawing apps but I'm not sure they are at the same level.

      There are others I'm sure, those are just what I use most often...

      Just in general if any mobile application comes out you know there will be an iOS version at least, and maybe or maybe not an Android version.

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  12. OS change doesn't bother you? by Overzeetop · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I know I have a lot of money tied up in software for my phone. Whether it be remote control software, or specialty apps which are only available for a premium, or just games I paid for - there's a $100-150+ in software I would have to re-buy. I don't want to have to think about switching my media management over. Not that iTunes isn't a steaming pile of shit on Windows, but I've finally gotten it to work acceptably (most of the time) with my 80+GB of music, 400+GB of movies, audio and ebooks, podcasts, etc. I'm sure there are better managers, but the number of hours required to switch that stuff into another management app just makes my insides curl. I'm doubly tied as I have an iOS tablet.

    At this point, the "competitor" from Android would have to be pretty fucking amazingly better to make it worth while to switch, and while the S3 is very nice and there are things about it I like better, it's hard to find a reason for the extra expense and time to switch.

    --
    Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
  13. The numbers are liars by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    One should note that the score given for the SGS3 is an average score from thousands of benchmarks which they range everywhere form 1271 to 2211.
    The Iphone 5 however only has a single result, and that's on a phone that is probably not burdened by a bunch of crap which seemingly tends to give really varying results..
    I won't trust this before they have at least 250 benchmarks done after the release.

  14. Not everyone. by mosb1000 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I don't have a case for my 4S, I didn't have one for my 3GS, and I didn't have one for my original iPhone, which I got from my brother when he upgraded to a 3G. My brother also is on his third phone and doesn't use a case. In all that time only one's ever fallen on the ground. My friend asked to hold it, and immediately dropped it onto a concrete floor when I handed it to him. It was the original iPhone. It put a small dent in the corner of the case, but it didn't really damage it. I'd hardly call the device fragile.

    The population of iPhone owners seems pretty evenly split between people with cases and people without. I certainly appreciate a device that looks good and feels good in my hand. I'm not really concerned with breaking it since I look after my things. A lot of other iPhone users are the same.

  15. You cannot compare specs directly by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's really wrong to compare specs between Android and iOS devices directly without considering how the underlying systems are actually used.

    For instance, an Android phone needs more memory than an iOS device as it tends to have more background processes. iOS has a tighter control over memory so it simply does not need as much to accomplish most things (unless you start getting into talking about image processing applications).

    Also, what about the performance difference between Android apps and iOS apps? Android apps have to rely on a garbage collector to reclaim memory, iOS uses ARC which means memory is reclaimed without that overhead. Not to mention the VM in Android.

    Also how many Android apps are written in such a way as to take advantage of all those cores? With so many Android devices still being on 2.x, lots of developers target that spec. iOS developers at worst are targeting about two versions back, currently switching from iOS4 to iOS5 as the lowest level supported - that means use of a LOT of libraries that actually make use of multiple cores for many tasks.

    I can see comparing specs from on Android device to another or one iOS device to another, but comparing specs between an iOS device and an Android device seems kind of pointless unless you are giving very specific parameters for a task either might accomplish. Running GeekBench is not really a task a user would do every day...

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  16. Re:Oh Noes! by atlasdropperofworlds · · Score: 5, Informative

    There seem to be plenty of S3's in their database that still beat the iP5. There are dual and quad core variants of the S3. Though it doesn't matter because it seems the S3 is actually still faster according to the current, real data on their site.

  17. Re:WGAF? by CapuchinSeven · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yes let's just ignore the fact that all we've heard for years from Android users is how fast the CPU is in their phones and how important it is to them, like it actually matters. Now the shoe is on the other foot it suddenly isn't a reason to buy or upgrade a phone.

  18. Re:WGAF? by cheesybagel · · Score: 5, Informative

    The summary is bollocks. The iPhone 5 is faster than the dual-core Galaxy S III. The quad-core Galaxy SIII is faster than the iPhone 5.

  19. Re:WGAF? by miltonw · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Actually, you weren't listening. We buy Android phones because we want to buy Android phones. Got it?

  20. Re:WGAF? by tsa · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's like with PCs. Smartphones are so fast nowadays that whatever you buy is good enough to do 90% of the things people want a smartphone to do. So even a 100% speed increase is no compelling reason to upgrade for most people.

    --

    -- Cheers!

  21. Re:WGAF? by Sir_Sri · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Smartphones are so fast nowadays that whatever you buy is good enough to do 90% of the things people want a smartphone to do.

    That's because smart phones are basically 5 year old PC's with small screens.

    But for some people the new network (LTE) will be radically different, especially if the 3G in your area has serious congestion issues.

  22. Re:WGAF? by Sir_Sri · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This might be because samsung is marketing a dual core and quad core phone under the same brand, despite the obvious difference in capability. That is, without a doubt, my biggest gripe with Samsung in the industry. A Galaxy S III should be the same everywhere, or failing that a Galaxy S III DC, or QC should be clearly the same everywhere. Having different versions of the same product is unnecessarily confusing.

  23. Re:WGAF? by anethema · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Odd considering the dual core snapdragon S4 is faster than the quad core one in almost every single benchmark. Only the really parallel ones (Which face it, never happens on a smartphone) pull ahead, and even then, just.

    --


    It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
  24. Interesting bandwidth results by Namarrgon · · Score: 4, Informative

    As you say, while the S3 has a consistent edge elsewhere, the iPhone destroys the S3 in the memory bandwidth tests. But those tests are strangely inconsistent, for both devices.

    The S3 is a lot slower for sequential read bandwidth (578MB/s vs 1.73GB/s), but actually faster for sequential writes (1.53GB/s vs 1.35/GB/s). It's interesting that write speed is so much faster than reading; usually read speeds are faster than writes (as with the iPhone). This appears common to many Android devices though.

    OTOH, the iPhone 5 is ridiculously fast in the stdlib write test - over 6GB/s. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the tests, but I don't see how this result can be three times higher than sequential writes; I'd expect a little slower. Perhaps the iPhone has a large enough cache that the test fits within it?

    --
    Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
  25. Better camera, not the same by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Informative

    The camera is almost exactly the same as in 4S?

    No it is not.

    Up to two stops better performance is a good upgrade. And also there happen to be sample pics on DPReview from an iPhone 4s that match one of the shots the iPhone 5 was demoed with - the iPhone 5 captures detail better. Also I cannot find details on how the 4s camera was constructed but I believe the iPhone 5 is a step up in terms of the lens used.

    I have a DSLR and profesional compact cameras too. What I want out of a cell phone camera is an image that does not make me wish I also had a compact camera, and the iPhone 5 meets that goal (really the 4s did as well, but the 5 has a nice boost beyond even that).

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  26. Re:Comparing apples and oranges by smash · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I know some software for Android is written against the NDK but lots of it is not, is it fair to compare that against all the iPhone apps that are native?

    As far as the end user is concerned, whether it is native code or not is irrelevant. The available apps should be compared. If they run fast, that's all the user cares about. Some theoretical e-peen contest about "oh my smartphone has a quad core CPU that is way faster" doesn't matter if the software available consumes far more resources and doesn't run as fast.

    --
    I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
  27. And who cares? by Torp · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Meanwhile, no matter the hardware specs, iOS will keep being more responsive and iOS phones will keep getting software updates for years after launch. Clock speed and number of cores has stopped being relevant even in phones (it's not really relevant on the desktop any more as well) already.
    Note: i've owned two Android phones before switching to iOS.

    --
    I apologize for the lack of a signature.
  28. You continue to claim you understand? by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Informative

    Reference counting (ARC) is EXACTLY a form of garbage collection, not particularly better or worse than any other.

    It's not the same as garbage collection, it's exactly what the name says - AUTOMATED reference counting. The moment your code no longer needs an object code is inserted to release it for you. It has no cost over the code you would have written manually.

    It is superior to traditional GC because there is no processor time taken in deciding what to collect, no examination of the object tree to find what is still in scope. That means no overhead, and no "pauses" in application flow as a GC fires up to collect things.

    You DO realise that ARC imposes a runtime cost which some other garbage collectors do not?

    Compile time feature, moron. Even the weak reference zeroing is just code inserted around properties.

    You DO realise that ARC is sensitive to some forms of data structure that it cannot collect? (circular references)

    It's not "sensitive" to anything, that is simply an artifact of reference counting. By the way, in almost a year of developing multiple applications using ARC you know how many circular references I have seen in real life? Zero. Over-retention is still possible, but cycles are quite rare.

    And no, iOS cannot just run multiple apps at the same time to use multiple cores, as iOS only supports specifically
    written background tasks

    Which then run in the background doing whatever they were designed to do in the background. For instance what do you think Pandora does, genius? What happens when I have Pandora running AND have backgrounded a navigation application? Why in fact they ARE both running.

    Of course the system tasks all do run in the background so you really come off as quite ignorant claiming iOS cannot do this arbitrarily when it's a limitation specifically imposed on a subset of applications on the system. A jailbroken iPhone can run any user application in the background simply by a tweak to Launchpad, not the OS or app.

    it cannot just continue normal execution of a non-foreground task.

    Actually it can for about ten seconds for any app even without jailbreaking. You just have to let the OS know.

    You also, I bet, dont know what a process scheduler is,

    I've written several thanks. That was a while ago as I moved on from such trivial things.

    I do also know what an apostrophe is. Zing!

    that addresses your idiocy about primary apps being slower.

    Might want to watch the word idiocy when you are so prone to misunderstanding what is being said - I am talking about an foreground application that is not taking full advantage of the system resources. Pretty obviously an application that runs on one core when it could make use of two would be slower than it could be. Duh.

    I kind of feel sorry for the corporate IR development teams you worked with

    Imagine the concern I feel for whatever company must put up with your constant misunderstandings of technology! I sure hope you are not in charge of any iOS work for sometime to come.

    Really, your UID is low enough that you should know better..

    My UID is low enough you should have known to do more research rather than spout off on technologies you have not used.

    I will allow you the last response, you may either choose the path of wisdom and grovel for forgiveness at your iOS 101 level of understanding, or you may continue down the path of proving beyond all doubt you enjoy staying ignorant. Your choice, but I'll respond no more as I have already spent too much time on your education.

    If I were you though I would go watch all of the Stanford introductory iOS course and read some of the iOS documentation to understand how the system works. Oh and find a good white paper on what ARC does, because Damn.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  29. Re:WGAF? by Sir_Sri · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Right, but the south koreans get quad core, some countries get different amounts of RAM etc.

    If all you heard was the launch announcement of 'quad core*' and ignored the asterix of different countries getting different products you'd be confused by the whole thing.

    As a developer by the way, this is a fucking nightmare. I work at a university, so we have, every year and every christmas people with phones from all over the world trying to use our mobile app. We need to test on the indian version, the korean version the chinese versions, the hong kong version, the taiwanese version, etc. etc. etc. And we need someone to keep track of what all the different versions are. I know the guys at big blue bubble in town who make mobile games have a big lab but I think they only care about europe and north america rather than everywhere else too.

  30. Re:WGAF? by gnasher719 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Try 10 year old PCs. I have a Core 2 Quad here that's pretty much 5 years old and is still 5x faster than any phone in the geekbench data. Linpack is 1000x slower on any ARM than it is on a current x86 too.

    Jack Dongarra published a paper how he got about 800 MFlops out of an iPad 2, using only one core, and estimates that about 1.5 GFlops should be possible. The iPhone 5 chip should run a lot faster. And no current x86 does 1500 GFlops.

  31. Re:WGAF? by atlasdropperofworlds · · Score: 3, Informative

    I've seen that claim. There is a youtube video where linpack on iOS gets 800 MFLOPS. Linpack for android gets 70 Mflops for a comparably clocked ARM. My desktop gets 40 GFLOPS (hence the 1000x - or three orders of magnitude at least). My video cards are rated at over 1 TFLOP dpfp each. My laptop can do about 25 GFLOPS. Perhaps linpack for iOS is more representative of what the hardware can do, but it still doesn't hold a candle to a desktop/laptop.