Samsung has recently released the details of its upcoming Exynos 5 Dual SoC, and it's impressive to say the least. But first this:
[NOTE]It's stated multiple times that this is intended for tablets, with specific features pointing toward Windows 8 tablets.[/NOTE]
I wouldn't expect this to show up in Android phones first, but eventually we'll see it powering Android phones and tablets.
This is a fully realized Cortex A15 design, which brings with it all of the improvements that ARM has made to its architecture. We've seen the difference this can make with the Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 (Krait) architecture, but this is more along the lines of the reference ARM design, without any of the tweaks and changes that Qualcomm did.
It's built on the existing 32nm HKMG (for more information on what that does see THIS POST) process that the current Exynos 4 Dual/Quad is, so the power savings from that process will carry over to this SoC as well.
Another dramatic improvement is RAM, more specifically, Samsung moved to a dual socket 800mhz LPDDR3 interface. This is significant, because as Samsung points out when during serious multi-tasking (streaming 1080p while taking pictures, videos, etc) definitely taxes the memory subsystem, and the increased bandwidth available should help with that. Also, the ability of this SoC to drive WQXGA (2560x1600) resolution displays will require this much bandwidth.
WQXGA is a pretty high-resolution, so what else is needed to drive that? A beefy GPU. Samsung has paired the Exynos 5 Dual with the newly announced Mali-T604 quad-core GPU. Currently the most powerful GPU Mali offers, this thing is a beast. Pure computational computing power is matched only by the highest end PowerVR GPU's (think what's inside the new iPad). If real world performance matches what the manufacturer states, then this should be far more capable than what nVidia, TI, or Qualcomm have coming (more on this later).
Other things that matter (but no so much to Android) is USB 3.0 support as well as DirectX 11 support. Like I said, this is intended first and foremost as a Windows 8 tablet SoC IMO.
So, this has the horsepower and capability to do pretty much anything you would ever want it to do. But will it? Well, that all depends. You can have all the hardware in the world, but at the end of the day you need the software to take advantage of it. If anything, this is where things will kinda sorta fall apart. Samsung can make great hardware, but they don't seem to take full advantage of it through software. This is where another manufacturer like nVidia has an advantage. They know all about hardware/software optimization, and take full advantage of it. There's a reason everybody wants Tegra 3 in a tablet, and the games is why. If Samsung can learn this they will be a force to be reckoned with. They have always had one of the best (if not the best) SoC's available, but performance has always been hindered by software.
Performance-wise I expect this to be at the top of the heap as far as raw numbers go. The benchmarks will say it's the fastest. But benchmarks only tell part of the story. Those represent raw horsepower, which is fine, but it isn't necessarily representative of what you'll experience in the real world. Without the software optimization to take full advantage of the hardware I wouldn't expect to be blown away by a device running this hardware. I wouldn't expect it to be night and day. In other words, I wouldn't wait to purchase a device just because you want this specific SoC running it. All the awesome features that it has built-in probably won't be utilized by whatever software it's running.
[NOTE]It's stated multiple times that this is intended for tablets, with specific features pointing toward Windows 8 tablets.[/NOTE]
I wouldn't expect this to show up in Android phones first, but eventually we'll see it powering Android phones and tablets.
This is a fully realized Cortex A15 design, which brings with it all of the improvements that ARM has made to its architecture. We've seen the difference this can make with the Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 (Krait) architecture, but this is more along the lines of the reference ARM design, without any of the tweaks and changes that Qualcomm did.
It's built on the existing 32nm HKMG (for more information on what that does see THIS POST) process that the current Exynos 4 Dual/Quad is, so the power savings from that process will carry over to this SoC as well.
Another dramatic improvement is RAM, more specifically, Samsung moved to a dual socket 800mhz LPDDR3 interface. This is significant, because as Samsung points out when during serious multi-tasking (streaming 1080p while taking pictures, videos, etc) definitely taxes the memory subsystem, and the increased bandwidth available should help with that. Also, the ability of this SoC to drive WQXGA (2560x1600) resolution displays will require this much bandwidth.
WQXGA is a pretty high-resolution, so what else is needed to drive that? A beefy GPU. Samsung has paired the Exynos 5 Dual with the newly announced Mali-T604 quad-core GPU. Currently the most powerful GPU Mali offers, this thing is a beast. Pure computational computing power is matched only by the highest end PowerVR GPU's (think what's inside the new iPad). If real world performance matches what the manufacturer states, then this should be far more capable than what nVidia, TI, or Qualcomm have coming (more on this later).
Other things that matter (but no so much to Android) is USB 3.0 support as well as DirectX 11 support. Like I said, this is intended first and foremost as a Windows 8 tablet SoC IMO.
So, this has the horsepower and capability to do pretty much anything you would ever want it to do. But will it? Well, that all depends. You can have all the hardware in the world, but at the end of the day you need the software to take advantage of it. If anything, this is where things will kinda sorta fall apart. Samsung can make great hardware, but they don't seem to take full advantage of it through software. This is where another manufacturer like nVidia has an advantage. They know all about hardware/software optimization, and take full advantage of it. There's a reason everybody wants Tegra 3 in a tablet, and the games is why. If Samsung can learn this they will be a force to be reckoned with. They have always had one of the best (if not the best) SoC's available, but performance has always been hindered by software.
Performance-wise I expect this to be at the top of the heap as far as raw numbers go. The benchmarks will say it's the fastest. But benchmarks only tell part of the story. Those represent raw horsepower, which is fine, but it isn't necessarily representative of what you'll experience in the real world. Without the software optimization to take full advantage of the hardware I wouldn't expect to be blown away by a device running this hardware. I wouldn't expect it to be night and day. In other words, I wouldn't wait to purchase a device just because you want this specific SoC running it. All the awesome features that it has built-in probably won't be utilized by whatever software it's running.
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