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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DaveGirard - Saturday, June 12, 2010 - link
sweet Jesus, that Nokia phone is huge. Does it double as an ice cream sandwich cover?metafor - Sunday, June 13, 2010 - link
Cortex is the CPU designed by ARM. This is available as a hard-macro (layout already done) or soft-macro (just the functional RTL). Some companies license this in either version. For those who license the soft-version, such as TI, nVidia and Broadcom, they can do a customized place-and-route along with clock-tree optimizations and voltage partitioning to try to make the design run faster.However, the micro-architecture is the same.
A few companies have ARM architectural licenses (Apple, Qualcomm, Marvell) and instead of licensing the Cortex line of processors, they design their own. The micro-architecture is developed independent of what ARM did in their Cortex series albeit there will often be similarities.
Scorpion inside Snapdragon was developed in the course of years and while it has many similarities to the A8 from a power-point standpoint, the micro-architecture underneath was designed from the ground up. Everything from the branch predictors, the cache controller, exception handling, execution units and most notably, a partially OoOE scheduler and retirement buffer.
There's also the 128-bit, fully pipelined, partially OoOE SIMD/FP unit.
medi01 - Sunday, June 13, 2010 - link
Well, I find it very strange, that "incidentally" iPhone is never shown in bad light. Could you please update your side to side comparison?Impulses - Wednesday, June 16, 2010 - link
Personally I think there's better things for you guys to do or test with your time... Who cares if a phone's screen colors are more or less accurate, as long as they aren't outright flawed or ugly to look at it shouldn't be a big deal, not like anyone's gonna be doing any pro content editing work on their phones! (I don't even own an AMOLED screen so I'm not particularly biased one way or the other, I own an EVO atm)mojtabaalemi - Saturday, June 19, 2010 - link
I hate the design of nokia mobile phones . in my idea an iphone is far far better !paihuaizhe - Sunday, June 20, 2010 - link
(nike-alliance).(com)=>is a leading worldwide wholesaler company (or u can sayorganization)
arnavvdesai - Saturday, June 26, 2010 - link
I was just wondering if the author had installed AdBlock+ and then run the browser speed numbers or without it being on. If it was not installed which is what I am guessing from the photos, did you notice an improvement in the render times when it was installed. I actually bought the phone recently after seeing it on sale for 380$ and wanted to know the details. Also, I have heard that the current build of the OS allows potrait mode even for the browser(although it has to be activate through some setting) and not just the phone.drwiremore - Sunday, July 4, 2010 - link
Amanda, delighted to have found you. Given the issues in the title, affecting 20~50% of MOTO Droid users, was surprised to see no mention of it. The MOTO boards are alive with disdain and some feel an in you face attitude by Motorola Droid 2 and X announcements. Would you do an iPhone like analysis of voice, antenna and signal issues across Verizons Droids: HTC incredible and MOTO Droid. Your scientific analysis would be welcomed.