Two OMAP 3430 Phones: Nokia N900 and Motorola Droid
by Brian Klug on June 10, 2010 9:29 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- N900
- Maemo
- Motorola Droid
- Droid
- MeeGo
- Android
- Mobile
| Physical Comparison | |||||||
| Motorola Droid | Nokia N900 | HTC Droid Incredible | Apple iPhone 3GS | ||||
| Height | 115.8 mm (4.56") | 110.9 mm (4.36 ") | 117.5 mm (4.63") | 115 mm (4.5") | |||
| Width | 60 mm (2.4") | 59.8 mm (2.35") | 58.5 mm (2.30") | 62.1 mm (2.44") | |||
| Depth | 13.7 mm (0.54") | 19.55 mm (0.78") | 11.9 mm (0.47") | 12.3 mm (0.48") | |||
| Weight | 169 g (6.0 oz) | 181 g (6.38 oz) | 130 g (4.6 oz) | 133 g (4.7 oz) | |||
| CPU | Texas Instruments OMAP 3430 @ 550 MHz | Texas Instruments OMAP 3430 @ 600 MHz | Qualcomm Scorpion @ 1GHz | ARM Cortex A8 @ 600MHz | |||
| GPU | PowerVR SGX 530 | PowerVR SGX 530 | Qualcomm Adreno 200 | PowerVR SGX 535 | |||
| RAM | 256MB LPDDR1 | 256MB LPDDR1 | 512MB LPDDR1 | 256MB LPDDR1 | |||
| NAND | 512 MB + microSD | 32 GB + microSD | 8GB + microSD | 16GB or 32GB | |||
| Camera | 5.0MP with Dual LED Flash | 5.0MP Tessar with Dual LED Flash | 8MP with Dual LED Flash | 3MP | |||
| Battery | Removable 5.18 Whr | Removable 4.88Whr | Removable 4.81 Whr | Integrated 4.51Whr | |||
| Resolution | 3.7" 854 x 489 LCD | 3.5" 800 x 480 LCD | 3.7" 800x480 AMOLED | 3.5" 320 x 480 LCD | |||
| PPI | 266 | 267 | 252 | 165 | |||
| Digitizer | Capacitive Multitouch | Resistive | Capacitive Multitouch | Capacitive Multitouch | |||
As enthusiasts of the N900, Palm Pre, and Motorola Droid alike know, the 600 MHz clock is somewhat conservative, as many have been able to get up to 1 GHz relatively easily with custom ROMs and other kernel patches. In fact, the OMAP 3440 has a recommended clock target of 800 MHz, some 200 MHz higher than the recommended 600 MHz target for the OMAP 3430. Notably, the OMAP36x series running at 45-nm has recommended clocks of 720 MHz for all but the highest end OMAP 3640, which is 1 GHz. It's entirely likely that the difference between the OMAPxx40 and the lower clocked OMAPxx30 for each process target is binning, possibly explaining why some are able to get devices running at even over 1 GHz.
Of course, the primary comparison for this generation is arguably Qualcomm's popular Snapdragon SoC. The primary differences between these two popular SoCs are two things: the Qualcomm SoC includes celluar modems, but more notable is the difference in GPU. We've talked briefly before about how the QSD8250/QSD8650 both include Qualcomm Adreno 200 GPUs which are actually re-branded AMD z340 GPUs brought over with the IP Qualcomm bought when it acquired AMD's handheld graphics and multimedia assets division. Interestingly enough, the AMD z340 is related to the Xenos GPU in the Xbox 360. Standards support wise, however, the Adreno 200 and PowerVR SGX 530 both target OpenGL 2.0 ES, but performance wise we now know the PowerVR SGX 530 is superior performance wise over the z340. Keep in mind the iPhone 3GS has a slightly higher spec'ed version of PowerVR SGX GPU, an SGX 535.
It's difficult to be absolute about how much the performance delta between the Adreno 200/AMD z340 and the PowerVR SGX530 really is, as so much of the difference is the result of driver differences. Add in further complexities surrounding how well implemented features are on different smartphone OSes, and it becomes even more challenging to give you a real objective answer. Point is, without a common software stack, it's difficult to give a solid benchmark. That said, it's hard to argue that Imagination's PowerVR SGX series isn't faster in practice across the board.
Of course, the untold story here is that although the 3430 ships with modest clocks (which the Motorola reduces by 50 MHz), it has seen largely uniform overclocks to 1 GHz. In fact, what's really interesting here is that in principle, a 1 GHz OMAP 3430 should outpace a 1 GHz Snapdragon SoC in a number of use scenarios because of the vastly better GPU onboard the 3430.
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Zebo - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
with 750mhz processor convex keys and ditching the lame D pad making this the best smart phone for my use talking 5-6 hours a day plus on best network instead of T or TM.krazyfrog - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
Dude, you chat like an eight year-old lol.CityBlue - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
The latest Maemo5 PR1.2 does bring a welcome improvement to battery life, in some cases as much as 50% improvement to standby time.The recently released Opera Mobile on the N900 is lightning fast - it would be interesting to see how that performs in your comparison tests, or the latest Fennec (Firefox Mobile 1.1). The stock MicroB browser is beginning to look a little long in the tooth what with all the Javascript run-time improvements in competing browsers, but it does still offer the most complete web experience on pretty much any mobile device.
Overall though, a very good and welcome review of Maemo5 which is much misunderstood by a world obsessed with Android and iPhone.
achipa - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
Two small corrections:Nokia's next MeeGo device is still going to be ARM (MeeGo is a two-platform OS, ARM and Atom), if there is a Moorestown device far along in the pipelines, it's not Nokia's.
PR1.2 is very likely not the last update. Nokia has pledged to deliver QtMobility (the mobile device Qt APIs) in a future update, and there is an active Qt4.7 branch for Maemo5 which also suggests work is being done there.
The Solutor - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
Not all the Droid/Milestone's keyboard are flat.http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/5872/dsc00180.png
http://img412.imageshack.us/img412/6551/dsc00176.p...
This is my milestone (bought in december).
So there's no need to wait droid 2 to get the raised keys.
Brian Klug - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
Interesting... looks like they definitely identified that issue somewhere between finishing the CDMA 'Droid' design and the GSM Milestone. Cool stuff!-Brian
strikeback03 - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
I read that elsewhere as well. Would be nice if the verizon stores got the newer keyboard models out on display to tryBoyBawang - Sunday, June 13, 2010 - link
Sorry to break your heart dude but the ones with raised keyboard were the early builds. Motorola changed it to flat after reported sliding problems with the raised designstrikeback03 - Monday, June 14, 2010 - link
Actually one of my friends got a Moto Droid Thursday and I had a chance to play with it Friday, it did feel like they had improved the key feel slightly. IIRC the Droids on display had concave keys, this one was slightly convex.solipsism - Friday, June 11, 2010 - link
I understand that's because they are in the same package is the reason why you need the BT to be on to get FM, but that can't be too common. After all, most smartphones seem to have WiFi and BT(+EDR) and FM all the same transceiver.For comparison, the iPhone 3GS uses a <a href="http://www.broadcom.com/products/Wireless-LAN/802.... BCM4325</ a>