Do we even want the CPU clocked at 1.5ghz?

ottscay · 10-12-2011, 04:37 PM

Phandroid just said their source has once again confirmed that the Galaxy Nexus will use the OMAP4460 SoC that is clocked at 1.5ghz, rather than the 1.2ghz OMAP4430 (that was used in the Droid 3 and Bionic).

But I'm not sure if that's actually desirable or not (outside of bragging rights). Both use the same GPU (the PowerVR SGX540), so the gains will only be in CPU-limited activities. I want a future-proof phone as much as the next person, but it wouldn't be hard to overclock those cores anyhow.

What I'm getting at is with no other material differences, the 4460 will probably be more power-hungry than the 4430. I don't know by how much, but at this point I think I'm more concerned about battery life than I am about the extra CPU speed, unless ICS has a really good underclocking governor for when those clock cycles aren't needed.

Anyone else? Is there some other benefit to the 4460 that I'm missing?

ManBearPig618 · 10-12-2011, 04:41 PM

So long as that phone/OS are optimized to minimize power consumption, then sure...I'd love a 1.5 ghz chip. Panda is saying he burned through the battery in 6 hours of HEAVY (4 gb data) usage - the Bionic took 3 hours to die during similar usage.

Obviously that doesn't mean the Prime's battery is literally twice that of the Bionic's, but it probably puts it into a level where, at least for me, I would prefer a 1.5 ghz CPU in the phone.

jamesbrown33 · 10-12-2011, 05:10 PM

Well, If the cpu comes factory clocked at 1.5, that means that the frequencies have not been messed with. I believe the omap's powerVR is at a 50% overclock compared to what was in the galaxy/nexus s, if the cpu was underclocked the gpu may be underclocked as well which would limit performance increases

ShiZero · 10-12-2011, 05:11 PM

Whether or not it comes in clocked at 1.5ghz, the Nexus line should be known for the open platform, which means being able to add your own CPU customizations using something like SetCPU, for example. If it seems like the phone is dying out too fast for you, you can always add customized power profiles, underclock the CPU and what-not; and it should be easy to do.

I'm also with high hopes that ICS brings battery life improvements, just like everyone else. My Eris can last me through the weekend easily without a charge (and with almost no use of course), but for the few days I had the Charge, the battery really bothered me. Here's to hoping BMX's test works for everyone else.

sushiglobster · 10-12-2011, 05:40 PM

Honestly, I'm more worried about the GPU. I'd prefer a slower CPU to a faster GPU, example: Exynos

I'll be more than happy though with my 1.5Ghz TI OMAP...and when the community releases improved kernels and ROMs you can bet that battery life will probably get much better. Remember, this is ICS..and the community ROMs and Kernels will be based off of ICS so there are possibilities for vast improvements. ICS mostly likely handles battery life and CPU processes much better.

jamesbrown33 · 05:55 PM

Well the omap has the same gpu as the iphone 4, but it is clocked higher. If the iphone4 can have a butter smooth ui and great looking games, android should be able to achieve better on an overclocked version of that gpu, it just needs the software to support it.

Andrew Ruffolo · 10-12-2011, 06:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jamesbrown33

Well the omap has the same gpu as the iphone 4, but it is clocked higher. If the iphone4 can have a butter smooth ui and great looking games, android should be able to achieve better on an overclocked version of that gpu, it just needs the software to support it.

Games were never the problem. The hardware acceleration from ics will make it buttery smooth... although I can't complain how well my cm7 phone runs (better than my iphone 4 I ditched after 3 weeks)

ottscay · 10-12-2011, 06:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ManBearPig618

So long as that phone/OS are optimized to minimize power consumption, then sure...I'd love a 1.5 ghz chip. Panda is saying he burned through the battery in 6 hours of HEAVY (4 gb data) usage - the Bionic took 3 hours to die during similar usage.

Obviously that doesn't mean the Prime's battery is literally twice that of the Bionic's, but it probably puts it into a level where, at least for me, I would prefer a 1.5 ghz CPU in the phone.

Yeah, I've seen all that, but honestly battery life still has me more concerned than a couple hundred extra mhz at this point. If it weren't for LTE radios being stuck on 32nm processes I would be all for it, but they aren't so at this point I'm just not sure it's worth the extra power draw.

Hbomber110 · 10-12-2011, 06:48 PM

I don't know about this stuff but i heard the ICS will be built on Kernel 3, what kind off improvement can we hope from this ?

ottscay · 10-12-2011, 07:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hbomber110

I don't know about this stuff but i heard the ICS will be built on Kernel 3, what kind off improvement can we hope from this ?

Kernel 3 is Honeycomb - that's where the multi-threading and hardware accelerated GUI comes from (although I imagine there's been a lot of tweaking and rewrites on the way to ICS).

That's why the interface should be buttery-smooth, because it will be offloaded to the GPU and not be impacted by how much memory you have, or the CPU load.