iPhone 4S Preliminary Benchmarks: ~800MHz A5, Slightly Slower GPU than iPad 2, Still Very Fast
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Brian Klug on October 11, 2011 3:22 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Apple
- Mobile
- iPhone 4S
- SoCs
Apple's ability to control the entire information chain, down to the point of limiting leaks, appears to be gradually slipping as it grows as a company. Case in point are the numerous hardware and performance leaks surrounding the newly launched iPhone 4S. Little did we know that several weeks ago we were staring at photos of the 4S' PCB, and more recently we've seen the first performance results from Apple's first A5 based smartphone thanks to a few eager users around the web. We've compiled these results here from various sources (all linked below) and compared them to our existing database of tests.
The results are pretty much as expected. Javascript performance finally catches up to Tegra 2 based Honeycomb devices, while general CPU performance is significantly higher than the iPhone 4. I suspect Ice Cream Sandwich will bridge the Android smartphone gap (the Honeycomb equipped Gtab 8.9 is here to give you an idea of where a more modern Android browser ends up).
Keep in mind that all of these tests measure performance of the software stack in addition to the hardware. In particular the web browser tests depend largely on browser optimizations, which is why we see differences between similar hardware running different browser versions. Also note that all results were run at stock, with the stock browser. Finally, although these browser tests were captured on video we'll still be running our official tests once our 4Ses arrive and will update accordingly.
Using some of the integer and fp tests of published Geekbench scores we can already conclude that Apple is shipping a lower clocked A5 in the iPhone 4S than it does in the iPad 2. This naturally makes sense as the iPhone 4S has a much smaller 5.25 Whr battery. Based on the Geekbench results it looks like the iPad 2 is clocked around 25% higher than the iPhone 4S, pegging the latter's clock speed at 800MHz.
A lower clock not only means higher yields from the factory, but likely a lower operating voltage as well. Dropping a CPU's core voltage, yields a greater-than-linear decrease in power consumption, making the marginal loss in clock speed a good choice. At a lower operating frequency than its Android competitors, Apple does have to exploit its strengths in software to avoid any tangible performance penalties. Apple has traditionally done this very well in the past, so I don't expect the loss of frequency to be a huge deal to the few who do cross-shop iOS and Android.
Unsurprisingly, memory bandwidth doesn't appear to have gone up either compared to the iPad 2's A5 (taking into account scaling due to CPU clock increases). The Samsung part number on the iPad 2's A5 indicates two LPDDR2-800 die on package, it's safe to assume that whatever Apple clocked the memory interface at in the iPad 2 remains unchanged in the iPhone 4S.
The GPU results tell a similar story courtesy of some early GLBenchmark 2.1 results. The 960 x 640 results are useless as they are bound by vsync at ~60 fps. Luckly GLBenchmark 2.1 added an off-screen render mode at 1280 x 720 where we can really see the differences between the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S A5 implementations:
Here the iPad 2 holds a ~21% performance advantage, which once again I assume to be all related to clock speed. Also note the huge advantage over the existing iPhone 4. The GPU power in the 4S should be more than enough to run any well written, current generation title at well north of 30 fps on its display.
We'll be reviewing the iPhone 4S in the coming weeks, stay tuned!
Source: GLBenchmark Database, Geekbench Database, Macrumors
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adrien - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
You're right that they can use V8 which makes sharing code and improvements everything but obvious.But, independently of that, I'm sceptical because of the 2x boost. It's "too good to be true". I'll be waiting for the full reviews. ;-)
mojojojom - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
Why have you left out the iPad 2 from the first benchmark? I find this very irritating.In any case, this particular screenshot is doing its round all around the web including Engadget and I think you should put the iPad 2 numbers there just as you did for Samsung Galaxy tab. The Android enthusiasts are pointing out how Android beat iOS.
jwcalla - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
Yeah I've noticed teh interwebz are aflurry with the big news that the 4S destroys everything on the planet, linking back to this article. But I don't know that there is much we can really conclude from the benchmarks provided here. The first two are just browser benchmarks I guess?My Samsung Fascinate scored just under 7.5s on the SunSpider test, and the only difference between mine and the one in the chart is that I have the 2.2.2 OTA update. So how can any conclusions about the hardware be deduced from these charts when identical hardware can be off by a full magnitude?
Aren't there better benchmarks out there that actually measure processor performance?
doobydoo - Sunday, October 16, 2011 - link
The CPU/GPU results are pretty conclusive.vision33r - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
Android is just a platform to attract the wannabee geeks with big hardware numbers like GHZ and GB but across the board OEM use hardware that does not dramatically improve performance.1.5GHZ phone that gets outperformed by a phone with almost 1/2 the mhz.
Almost all Android phones out uses inferior GPU.
Oh yea, Android need 1GB of memory because all your widgets are memory sucking.
Google is just a bunch of advertising geeks not real software gurus. Android is still beta.
Sind - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
What a totally clueless comment. If you had any iota what you were talking about you would understand the bias involved in these benchmarks, especially versus real world use. Responding to any further of your drivel is pointless.WaltFrench - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
It's been a while since I've been to a real-world website that got bogged down because the idiot designer filled it with robots chasing eggplants or whatever, so I *kinda* get your point.Perhaps you'll respond to my non-drivel: what performance benchmarks indicate how smooth and even speedy a phone is?
I dunno how you'd test smoothness of scrolling, pinching, etc., but I'm gonna guess that if that was OK on any phone since Froyo, it doesn't matter much today on the high-end phones.
I think the graphics benchmarks are more relevant: gaming is moving to iOS big time; the iPodTouch may be the most common handheld gaming device today.
Anyway, go ahead & suggest some benchmarks that AT ought to use, or that you prefer. I don't think you'd be 3 pages down in a discussion about benchmarking if you didn't have some thoughts.
deV14nt - Wednesday, October 12, 2011 - link
Personally I'd go to YouTube and watch side by side videos of browser performance while pinch-zooming. Galaxy S II with Exynos is much smoother than any other Android phone on the market. The old phones you're talking about definitely are not smooth when playing Flash. iOS doesn't play Flash at all so I don't really know how to compare it in the "real world." It's...disqualified. That's all I can say.doobydoo - Sunday, October 16, 2011 - link
Broken... Record... Flash.Cling to flash support which can be achieved through apps, we'll continue to enjoy our faster phone with better battery life.
You can have flash support, we'll have flash support and a better phone.
morphon - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - link
Interesting results, considering they are testing the entire hardware and software stack.Just for comparison, I ran the sunspider benchmark on my Gingerbread-equipped Optimus 2X (G2X on Tmobile). I use the Opera browser - and it delivered a clean 2200ms. The DolphinHD browser, which uses the standard web rendering system, only delivered 4010. Now, I realize that the Tegra2 has a 200mhz advantage against the 4S's A5, but in basically stock configuration, the Tegra2 will deliver similar browsing performance to the A5, provided you use a browser that can take advantage of both cores.
The bigger difference will be in 3D performance. The GPU on the A5 looks pretty beefy.