Motorola Releases An Intel Powered Phone

[Sasqui]

The 32nm Atom apparently is beating the SOC ARM A15 28nm Based Snapdragon, and even has a lower power envelope. It's the beginning of the roadmap for Intel

http://seekingalpha.com/article/875...at-now?source=email_rt_article_readmore&ifp=0

Keeping true to its word, Intel (INTC) has just found its way into the Motorola Mobility "Droid Razr i", the overseas counterpart to the recently released flagship "Droid Razr M" phone. While this design win will likely not have a material impact on Intel's top and bottom lines, it is worth analyzing the significance of this in context of the company's long term mobile bet.

However, as the Snapdragon S4 is out, and other phones built on Cortex A15-class hardware roll out, it's important to see if Intel's hardware can hold its own. Sure enough, it seems that it can. In terms of pure CPU performance, the single core "Medfield" built on the 32nm low-power process at 2GHz in the new Motorola phone actually holds its own against the 1.5GHz dual core Snapdragon S4 built on Taiwan Semiconductor's (TSM) 28nm process.

BENCHMARKING Intel Atom based vs. ARM A15 based phones: http://www.engadget.com/2012/09/18/motorolas-razr-i-benchmarks-intel-2ghz-medfield/

Impressive

Intel future Atom roadmap:

 

[brandonwh64]

Hmmm I am eligible for upgrade!

 

[Sasqui]

Hmmm I am eligible for upgrade!

Interesting that the rolled it out in Europe. I'm eligable for an upgrade too, have a 2 yr old DroidX

 

[Benetanegia]

Snapdragon S4 is NOT Cortex A15. It's based on the custom designed Krait. It's an evolution of A9, with some traits taken from A15.

Still from what I've read A15 is expected to be >20% faster than Krait clock for clock and be able to reach 2 Ghz+ no problem at the same or lower power envelope so that's a significant difference. Medfield catching up to Krait is not the same as catching up with ARM, not at all.

 

[Sasqui]

Snapdragon S4 is NOT Cortex A15. It's based on the custom designed Krait. It's an evolution of A9, with some traits taken from A15.

Still from what I've read A15 is expected to be >20% faster than Krait clock for clock and be able to reach 2 Ghz+ no problem at the same or lower power envelope so that's a significant difference. Medfield catching up to Krait is not the same as catching up with ARM, not at all.

Indeed, not quite the same, but close:

The successor to Scorpion, found in S4 Snapdragon SoCs is named Krait and has many similarities with the ARM Cortex-A15 CPU and is also based on the ARMv7 instruction set.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snapdragon_(system_on_chip)

 

[Benetanegia]

Indeed, not quite the same, but close:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snapdragon_(system_on_chip)

As close as Bulldozer is to Ivy Bridge or even if I want to be generous, as close as Ivy Bridge is with first gen Core2 architecture. No, it's not "close" to being the same, unless you look at them from 20 km high and oversimplify everything.

 

[Sasqui]

As close as Bulldozer is to Ivy Bridge or even if I want to be generous, as close as Ivy Bridge is with first gen Core2 architecture. No, it's not "close" to being the same, unless you look at them from 20 km high and oversimplify everything.

So then, the question becomes how will the next fab of Atom (Z2580) faire against the A15?

The ARM Cortex-A15 MPCore is a multicore ARM architecture processor providing an out-of-order superscalar pipeline ARM v7 instruction set running at up to 2.5 GHz.[6] ARM has confirmed that the Cortex A15 core is 40 percent faster than the Cortex-A9 core, all things being equal.[7] The first A15 designs taped out in the fall of 2011, but products based on the chip did not reach the market until 2012.[1]