Comment Different Specs: quad core a9 vs single core A8... (Score 1) 194
And yet something already exists, and for cheaper.
... and I could continue with differences in the gpu (nvidia Tegra vs unknown gpu)
These things matter for a videoconsole
And yet something already exists, and for cheaper.
... and I could continue with differences in the gpu (nvidia Tegra vs unknown gpu)
These things matter for a videoconsole
I think that what is really awesome is that adding just 23k lines of code gives you support for a new CPU architecture!
It is possible to use the GPU effectively to speed up some scientific simulations. Usually in fluid mechanics problems that could be solved by time marching (or physics that obey hyperbolic governing differential equations). But working with the GPU is a real PITA. There is no standardization. There is no real support for any high level languages. Of course they have bullet points saying "C++ is Supported". But you dig in and find, you have to link with their library, there is no standardization, you need to manage the memory, you need to manage the data pipe line and fetch and cache, the actual amount of code you could fit in their "processing" unit is trivially small. All it could store turns out to be about 10 or so double precision solution variables and about flux vector splitting for Navier Stokes for just one triangle. About 40 lines of C code.
On top of everything, the binary is a mismash of compiled executable chunks sitting in the interpreted code. Essentially the if a competitor or hacker gets the "executable" they can reverse engineer every bit of innovation you had done to cram your code into these tiny processors and reverse engineer your scientific algorithm at a very fine grain.
Then their sales critter create "buzz". Make misleading, almost lying, presentations about GPU programming and how it is going to achieve world domination.
According to wikipedia, there are frameworks (like Open CL http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenCL ) in order to program in high level languages and have compatibility through various platforms
Is it a viable alternative against flash? According to http://gnashdev.org/ last version is 0.8.9 published in march 2011.
You can find an ARM vs x86 power consumption at:
http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2011/5/19/the-coming-war-arm-versus-x86.aspx?pageid=6
"The chart below contrasts power consumption between the Intel Atom N450 and the ARM Cortex-A8 while running miniBench. The power curves were generated from system power usage adjusted downwards so that idle system power was discarded. For the Atom, idle power was 13.7W with the Gateway netbook’s integrated panel disabled while the idle power for the Pegatron system (ARM Cortex-A8) was only 5.4W."
They are 3 different things that server 3 different needs. It's ridiculous to even imagine that you could combine them into one device given the consumer technology right now. Maybe in 20 years, when it's commonplace to sport a holographic projector on a phone, or screens can be unfolded and folded at a whim, then perhaps the tablet and phone can be combined into one (satisfying the needs that a personal computer satisfies would require significant advances in input technology).
A jack of all trades does nothing well at all. That seems to describe the Windows (Mobile and Desktop) strategy right now.
I agree with you. It's ridiculous to even imagine that you could combine them into one device given the consumer technology right now.
However, the phone can be connected to a dock so that:
b) Can be used as a tablet: see the Asus Pad Fone http://event.asus.com/mobile/padfone/
c) Can be used as a computer: Motorola Atrix has a dock with HDMI port and USB port.
d) Can be used as a game console. Let's compare the specs of an iphone s against a xbox 360:
* RAM Memory: xbox360 512MB RAM. iphone 4s 512MB RAM
* Triangles/sec: xbox 360 500 Million. iphone 4s 68 MPolygon/s.
* Filtered Texture Fetch: xbox 360 8.0 Billion Texels/sec. iphone 4s 1000 MTexels/s
iphone A5 cpu is manufactured using a 45nm process. intel is producing its Ivy Bridge processors using a 22nm process right now (see http://www.tomshardware.com/news/ivy-bridge-processor-release-22nm-3d-transistor,13753.html: "CEO Paul Otellini confirmed that Ivy Bridge 22 nm processor volume production has already begun, which is a rather significant achievement as there have been apparently no major hiccups in the implementation of its 3D transistor technology")
Of course, the next xbox will be more powerful than any smartphone, but think about having current xbox 360 games in your smartphone in 2013 or 2014.
sources:
* Xbox 360 http://www.pvcmuseum.com/games/vs/ps3-vs-xbox-360-gpu-specs.htm
* iphone 4s: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_A5
Just imagine: in 2013 having a windows phone that:
a) Can be used as a phone (of course!)
b) Can be used as a tablet (windows 8 with the Metro UI)
c) Can be used as a computer (windows 8 with the Classic UI)
d) Can be used as a game console (it is rumored that the next xbox could run in ARM processors a variant of the windows 8 kernel).
Microsoft is known for improving its products version after version... Everyone thinks that Windows Phone 7.5 is a very goog start: just read the reviews:
- Engadget ( http://www.engadget.com/2011/09/27/windows-phone-7-5-mango-review/ )
"While Windows Phone still needs a glass of water to get rid of a few hiccups -- and let's face it, every mobile OS has plenty of their own -- it ironed out a lot of the wrinkles from earlier versions and made it a much more feature-laden, user-friendly experience. With Mango, WP7 has caught up with Android and iOS in nearly every way, and in some areas it's even surpassed the other two in functionality. Despite a grim first year, the bright future of Windows Phone is forcing Ballmer to wear shades."
- The Verge ( http://www.theverge.com/2011/10/24/2509332/windows-phone-75-mango-review )
"Put simply, regardless of your preconceptions, Windows Phone finally deserves an honest look the next time you’re ready to buy a phone — particularly as we start to see new devices come to market over the next few weeks."
- gsmarena ( http://www.gsmarena.com/windows_phone_7_5-review-655.php )
"WP7 lacked key functionality, which deterred potential consumers. Version 7.5 however brings things that will appeal to businesspeople, social networking buffs and people who like a novel software experience. If you're using Microsoft software (chances are you're using at least Office at work), WP7.5 offers the smoothest, most well-rounded experience. The rich bundle of several social networks and IM clients and emails and texts is beautifully organized too. And let's face it, the Windows Phone interface is the only UI around that's truly different - iOS, Android, even Symbian are becoming harder and harder to tell apart. The only thing that held it back was the lack of multitasking and now that's been sorted out."
"Working on a tablet made it more difficult to constantly monitor everything that happens in a day, but there was a tradeoff: it was significantly easier to be productive when actually writing. In fact, I produced slightly more the day I worked on the iPad than on a normal day, and I didn't miss any significant news—work-related or otherwise. I did feel as if I was somewhat disconnected from the world compared to my usual setup, but I wasn't—I just couldn't see everything at the same time, all the time.
Instead, I had to make conscious decisions to switch over to IM and respond to several people at once, or go to IRC to see what the rest of the staff was up to, or go back to Writing Kit to dedicate another hour to uninterrupted writing. It's a different mental process for a typical computer user, but it worked out a bit better than fine if personal productivity was the metric."
It will be deployed in 2014:
http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4230160/ARM-unveils-64-bit-architecture
"Indeed, the first processors based on ARMv8 will only be announced sometime in 2012, with actual server prototypes running on the new architecture expected in 2014."
An open terminal with great reviews
The Toshiba AC100
You can find a review at http://www.reghardware.com/2010/11/03/review_netbook_toshiba_ac100/
"The beautifully designed and executed hardware is very close to my ideal netbook, and it's hardly an exaggeration to say that I'm heart-broken by Toshiba's cocked-up Android implementation. The best one can hope for is a firmware rescue from the open source community, although I wonder if the product will stay around long enough in these tablet-obsessed times for that to happen."
http://www.silentpcreview.com/
Or a complete solution from Zotac for330 USD:
http://techreport.com/articles.x/21556
... but they can lose them.
Currently, Linux x86-64 offerings are cheaper and faster than Oracle SPARC Servers, and Dell and RedHat will welcome their money to make the migration.
http://vanshardware.com/2010/08/mirror-the-coming-war-arm-versus-x86/
Conclusion
The ARM Cortex-A8 achieves surprisingly competitive performance across many integer-based benchmarks while consuming power at levels far below the most energy miserly x86 CPU, the Intel Atom. In fact, the ARM Cortex-A8 matched or even beat the Intel Atom N450 across a significant number of our integer-based tests, especially when compensating for the Atom’s 25 percent clock speed advantage.
However, the ARM Cortex-A8 sample that we tested in the form of the Freescale i.MX515 lived in an ecosystem that was not competitive with the x86 rivals in this comparison. The video subsystem is very limited. Memory support is a very slow 32-bit, DDR2-200MHz.
Languishing across all of the JavaScript benchmarks, the ARM Cortex-A8 was only one-third to one-half as fast as the x86 competition. However, this might partially be a result of the very slow memory subsystem that burdened the ARM core.
More troubling is the unacceptably poor double-precision floating-point throughput of the ARM Cortex-A8. While floating-point performance isn’t important to all tasks and is certainly not as important as integer performance, it cannot be ignored if ARM wants its products to successfully migrate upwards into traditional x86-dominated market spaces.
However, new ARM-based products like the NVIDIA Tegra 2 address many of the performance deficiencies of the Freescale i.MX515. Incorporating two ARM Cortex-A9 cores (more specifically, two ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore processors), a vastly more powerful GPU and support for DDR2-667 (although still constrained to 32-bit access), the Tegra 2 will doubtlessly prove to be highly performance competitive with the Intel Atom, at least on integer-based tests. Regarding the Cortex-A8’s biggest weakness, ARM representatives told us its successor, the Cortex-A9, “has substantially improved floating-point performance.” NVIDIA’s CUDA will eventually also help boost floating-point processing speed on certain chores.
"Don't drop acid, take it pass-fail!" -- Bryan Michael Wendt
