The Apple iPad - Anand's Analysis
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 27, 2010 5:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Mobile
The Hardware
Leading up to today’s announcement I desperately tried to figure out what hardware Apple would use for the iPad. I’ve been on a bit of an SoC kick as of late, so you can understand my fascination.
Apple acquired PA Semi back in 2008. Everyone assumed that it’s because Apple wants to start making its own SoCs for the iPhone. Well, the first results of that acquisition are in the iPad.
Apple didn’t devote much time to the SoC in the iPad other than to tell the world that it’s Apple’s own silicon and it runs at 1GHz. The SoC is called the A4. I’ve asked Apple for more details on it, but I’m not holding my breath for a response.
Given the fact that it runs the iPhone OS and nearly all iPhone apps, I’m guessing the A4 is ARMv7 based. It’s possible that Apple engineered its own architecture for the A4, but more likely that it simply took an existing ARM design and modified it to suit its needs.
If Apple wanted to save cost it would’ve gone with a Cortex A8 based processor, or if it wanted more performance it would be something more A9 like. I’m not ruling out a dual-core implementation, but given the entry level cost point I’m assuming that it’s not anything quite as fantastic.
The 1GHz operating frequency implies a 45nm manufacturing process if it’s indeed an A8 or A9-like core. If we look at Apple’s public video, it appears to render a page at Spin.com in roughly 2.7 seconds. My iPhone 3GS does the same in about 7 - 9 seconds, but it also appears to be loading a lot more content on the current Spin.com site. Even if we assume that the 600MHz Cortex A8 in the iPhone 3GS can render the same page in 5 seconds, the speedup is too big to be from a clock speed increase alone.
Based on this data alone (and the responsiveness of the UI from the videos) I’m going to say that there’s a good chance that the A4 is much closer to the A9 in terms of performance. If it’s not an A9 itself, it may be Apple’s own out-of-order design.
Then there’s battery life. Apple is claiming 10 hours of web browsing battery life, which is reasonable given the 25WHr battery, but over a month of standby power. I suspect that the ridiculous standby power is due to the fact that the 3G radio is completely shut off when the device is asleep, but even then that’s very good power consumption. If anything, Apple’s own engineering here was probably spent on making sure that the SoC’s power consumption was as low as possible. By comparison, even the best SoCs in a smartphone today can usually only offer 300 hours of standby power (12.5 days).
Apple’s battery life claims have been unusually reliable as of late, so I would say that we should expect 10 hours of useful battery life out of one of these things.
I’ve spent a lot of time talking about the CPU, but what about the GPU in the A4? Given that Apple is a shareholder in Imagination Technologies (9.5%), I’d say that it’s a pretty safe bet to assume there’s some sort of a PowerVR SGX core in here. Which core? There’s definitely the physical space to include something ridiculous, but I’m guessing it’s something relatively controlled - perhaps an SGX 535 or SGX 540 at the most.
A4 in the next iPhone?
I've been racking my brain over the past several months trying to figure out what Apple will use in the next iPhone. I figured it could be as simple as a 45nm Cortex A8 shrink, or as ridiculously sweet as a pair of Cortex A9s. With the iPad being based on Apple's own A4 SoC design, I'm guessing we'll see it (or a derivative) making an appearance in the 4th generation iPhone.
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Zebo - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
Has multi taskingAlready has 10 hrs battery life
Has Anything a PC does like Flash
Light 3 lbs.
Tough, can drop it
Can play old games on it like warlords battle cry 3 currently..
Can dock it like ipad.
Roland00 - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
Don't get me wrong I like thinkpads (though have no personal experience with there tablet models)...BUTthe thinkpad x200
cost over 3x the cost of the ipad
is double the weight.
Lonyo - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
[quote] The one thing Apple prides itself on is doing just that. As one of very few one-stop hardware/software makers, it has the ability to tightly couple UI with physical design. We saw it manifest in its greatest way with the iPhone, and now Apple (or perhaps the media covering Apple) is attempting to recreate the magic with the iPad. [/quote]You say that, but the iphone wasn't a breakaway hit.
The iPhone eventually became a breakaway hit once it was fixed up and released a second and third time as a much improved product, but initially it didn't do all that well. Wouldn't surprise me to see if anything a very similar pattern with the iPad, only this time it will have better competition because it will be fighting both x86 based tablets with Windows or Linux, but also probably ARM based products.
pugster - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
I agree, I think that Apple will probably release an ipad in the next coming years with an integrated camera and maybe an SD slot. They could've easily made an application called ichat and revolutionize im's. Some people probably thinks an ipad is too big and I would not be surprised that they will release an ipad mini or something like that with an 5"-7" screen.I doubted apple before with the ipod and iphone products but they were able to sell. I don't own both and I am not planning to buy them. I am seriously thinking of buying an ipad even though I'm not a apple fan.
Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
From a technology and a reception standpoint, I think the iPhone did quite well on its first iteration. It sold ridiculously well given the price point. Obviously it didn't come into its own until the 3G and associated price drops, but I don't believe it was a mediocre first start.I agree on the competition angle. Apple had a ~2 year head start with the original iPhone. We've only recently started to see real competition from Android based devices. The iPad will not enjoy such luxury, unless Apple has done something unusually revolutionary in its A4 silicon.
Take care,
Anand
vol7ron - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
I don't know if it fails, but it definitely isn't reaching it's potential.A device like this should be running it's own OS, or maybe not a new OS, but definitely a new framework. How long did it take to develop this? They act like there was a breakthrough. Is the fact that it plays the same stuff as an iPhone/iPod Touch supposed to make me happy? I mean it should be able to do that... it's the same thing with a larger form factor.
The keyboard - most notably the worst part about the "iPx" (as I call it) brand - is the same thing! I was hoping for something that I could use to program iPhone apps on - the iPad is not for that. Microsoft had a better idea back when it split the keyboard in half and put it at both sides of the screen (a nice thumb keyboard).
And did anyone else find the keynote boring as hell?
A repetition of old applications and slow speech - really slow speech. As if talking slower will impress us more when demonstrating dated technology. And don't let me start on the "App Store" plugs that Jobs inserted every time he had a chance - as if we couldn't tell they just want us to spend more money. Jobs and staff act like the new "Calendar" and photo viewing is a revolution. I don't know, it looks similar to Microsoft Outlook's calendar, only there's no VBA behind it that I can script to customize and automate things.
The best thing about the presentation was probably the accessories. The keyboard dock was nice, perhaps bluetooth would have been better. Why? There's no side port, so forget about those landscape papers - think PowerPoint.
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They talk about it being "redesigned", but the thing that needs to be redesigned is the framework. The iPad is not really customizable, so customers will have to hope for someone to JailBreak it. This is a necessity to really have applications that do something useful.
If I haven't lost you yet, let me tell you the two things I found worst about the presentation:
When Jobs loaded pages, it took forever - longer than my iPhone loads pages. It shouldn't matter that it's a bigger screen, the webpage data is the same. The problem is probably in Apple's A4 Processor, which probably is where they saved the money to drop the price down from $999 (that and no camera as you noted - probably not microphone either?). Notice that it is an 802.11n wifi, but it took forever to load the page. The connection should have been super fast. The pages should have loaded instantly.
But, the biggest problem with the iPad, which I'm sure many of you saw, is it's lack of a Flash player. It's just funny, "let's go to New York Times", "let's go to Time's website", "let me show you how some of the page doesn't load, because you'll only get an icon where that Flash content should be." They used a page that has Flash as an example - hahaha. And did you see how fast he scrolled past it? It's sad; truely a demonstration of nothing new here.
If I were Apple, I would have focused more on how I could integrate this as a remote control for my home media center (eg. TV, Lights, Stereo). Instead, this news announcement just showed us much of the same. This demonstration just doesn't cut it. I'm curious to see what the new Cortex A9 processors would have done for the iPx products. A dual-core ARM processor might really change the game. Not to mention I think it could put the "10 hour" battery life to shame. Apple should have waited for the better technology, or maybe they are planning on it and just trying to squeeze more out of their customers to the tune of 3G -> 3GS.
dtm4trix - Friday, January 29, 2010 - link
I agree with every point you made but would like to make another point. With a device like this I would like to have access to movies on my network. There is no reason why I should not be able to access this through a device like this, yet there is no network sharing tools or anything to browse a shared network. Also a device this large running with a screen like that should support FLASH!! I noticed how fast he scrolled over the empty spot where the flash content should have been. I chuckled!!!Final words to Apple; GET A GRIP. OVER 50% OF WEBSITES USE FLASH OF SOME SORT YOU MORONS. YOU MUST SUPPORT FLASH ON A DEVICE LIKE THIS.
dotroy - Monday, February 1, 2010 - link
Where did you get this information that over 50% site uses FLASH ?Adobe flash will die because Ajax is better than FLASH and HTML5 is also better than FLASH. A lot of people hate FLASH. Macromedia SOLD to Adobe because they did not see much future in FLASH which they through would bring revolution. SO stop being a MORON !
- Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
I see a problem here; firstly the internet requires input, our experience with touch screen inputs finds interaction is just not fast enough, and texting? And in respect to size, the bigger a device is the more the consumer expects. What exactly do we get that’s different from an iPod? ebooks? What exactly can I do with it, that’s not of the smaller iPod? Apps2 ?UNCjigga - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
I think the problem with the iPad is a little different than just lack of features. First, we need to look at the iPhone. When it first launched, the killer app was the Internet in your pocket. You could now walk around carrying a full HTML browser in the palm of your hand, with connectivity anywhere. This was pretty revolutionary at the time--Opera on WinMo or S60 didn't even come close in performance or ease of use. So what's the killer app for the iPad? IMHO, the iPad is trying to bring new media (web, blogs, streaming video, digital magazines and newsfeeds etc.) into a familiar old media format.But the problem is that Apple isn't doing anything revolutionary with the content itself. It's the same content I can browse on my PC for the most part. So why will users settle for a locked down platform with silly limitations (no multitasking, no Flash support?)
Here are the biggest threats to the iPad:
- HTML5: Even though Safari will be HTML5 compliant, this standard poses a serious threat to Apple's closed, self-managed content storefronts. Browsers will continue to evolve and the scripting engines will get better and better. As more websites get comfortable with HTML5, the "app" experience will move to the open web and become more accessible to multiple devices. As a developer, would I rather code with multiple SDKs for each device, or write my app once in HTML5 and do the bare minimum of porting possible?
- Android: You know its a matter of months before Android tablets emerge. They will bring full Flash support, multitasking, and probably a camera or 2. The software won't be as polished as the iPad's initially, but those new releases keep coming.
- Snapdragon2/Tegra2/Cortex A9/Moorestown: As advanced as Apple's silicon may be, it isn't the only game in town. With all of this powerful mobile silicon and OSes to take advantage (Android, Moblin, WinMo 7 etc.) don't expect the iPad to stay at the forefront of tablet tech for very long.