Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Samsung Galaxy S3- Quad-Core vs. Dual-Core

The following post was actually an email I sent to my team here at U.S. Cellular regarding the changes to the North American version of the Galaxy S3 getting the dual-core processor instead of the quad-core. I got some positive feedback on how it was explained and figured I'd stick it out here on the interwebs for future phone buyers in case anyone is doing research on it. With that being said, I present to you Quad-Core vs. Dual-Core in the Galaxy S3:

Team:

Being the nerd that I am, I've been doing some research into our new Super phone, and noticed that there is some big differences between the version that will be sold in North America and the version that will is being sold overseas. So I whipped up a little something to explain the changes. I promise it won't be boring for the whole thing, only part of it, so stick with me.

Quad core vs. Dual-core

If you've been following the launch of the Galaxy S3 for the past few months, one of the big features is that it has a Quad-core processor, which is among the first to have such a powerful processor (Along with the HTC One X). Well if you've been looking into the recent announcements of the version that we and the other North American carriers will get, you'll notice that it is listed as having a dual-core processor instead. This is not a typo. The North American version will have the Snapdragon S4 dual-core processor. (The HTC One X will also have a dual-core processor in North America) "What?! They're taking the most important feature out of the phone?! Say it isn't so, Ryan." Well hang on just a second. Let's talk about what it means to have a dual-core vs. a quad-core.

Quad-core is basically like having 4 processors in one, which to most people that means that it has to be way faster than a single or dual core processor, right? Well hang on to your polo shirt, because I'm about to drop a knowledge bomb on you. Most app developers, (In fact it's about 99% of them at the moment) have not optimized their apps to run with a quad-core processor, and really have no intention of doing so anytime soon, as it's not really necessary in most cases. The current dual-core processors are more than powerful enough to run any app that's thrown at it.

"But Ryan, why would they create a quad-core then?" Well the reasoning behind a quad-core currently is battery life. It's much more efficient to have 4 processors running at 250MHz than to have one processor running at 1GHz (1000MHz) when it's running a bunch of applications. Both processors are capable of doing it, but the battery drains much faster when powering a processor at faster speeds. Yes, eventually, just like all computers, the apps will get very resource intensive, and quad-core will be necessary, but that time is not now.

The reason that Samsung is not putting the quad-core processor in their North American version of the S3 is LTE. Quad-cores are not designed to run with North American LTE networks. Europe does not currently run LTE, so the processor runs fine for them over there.

"Thanks for bursting our bubble, Ryan, what other bad news do you have for us?" Well hang on just a minute. In my personal nerd opinion (I'm a certified Nerd. Received my masters at Nerder Dame), I think we actually got the better version of the two phones. The phone we will be receiving has a huge positive, and the advantage is:

2GB of RAM!!!! I'll pause for a moment to let the cheering die down...(cricket chirps)

Ok are we ready?

"Ryan, I got things to do and I'm having a hard time staying awake. What's in this for me and my customers?" Well dear Email reader, I'll tell you.

RAM (Random Access Memory, not important, but just an FYI) is what gives you the ability to multi-task on your phone. The more RAM you have, the more apps you can run at the same time without your phone, tablet, computer slowing down. So if you have a lot of RAM, you can be Facebooking, Youtubing, Tweeting, Emailing, Texting, and web browsing all at the same time without slowing down. In fact on the S3, you'll be able to be in your email inbox reading the new email you got while your Youtube video of Rebecca Black is still playing at the bottom of the screen. I know! Awesome, right?

You see, the European version is only going to have 1GB of RAM in their phone, while we get double that. That's a huge deal! I will take 2GB of RAM over the quad-core processor any day. And benchmark tests have shown that the Snapdragon S4 (the processor that will be in our phones) actually performs better in speed tests than the quad-core processor. Like I said, the quad-core is currently only for battery life, and the S3 actually comes with a pretty big battery, much bigger than current phones that we carry, so battery life should not be an issue for our customers.

So for a quick recap: North America gets a Dual-Core w/ 2GB of RAM super phone and Europe gets a Quad-Core with 1GB. So we win.

Thank you for staying awake and making it to the bottom.


Legal Junk: I would like to point out that any opinions in this post are my own not that of U.S. Cellular.

1 comment:

  1. Its like you know you're tech stuff or something, nicely done

    ReplyDelete