6 ms·

I feel Mobile CPUs are fast enough from last 5-6 years. Its the battery tech which is lagging. On Laptop/Server side Qualcomm need to catch up to AMD/Apple.

usrn 4y ago
After my experiences with Android I will never ever buy another device with a Qualcomm SoC again.
- arifmeticus 4y ago
  Could you explain why?
- akmittal 4y ago
  I had totally different experience, One i bought with Exynos was Battery hog, Mediatek ones generally have bad performance.
- danielEM 4y ago
  I'm also curious what were your experiences with android that were affected by Qualcomm?
  - uni_rule 4y ago
    Maybe they had an 810 crap out on them
- rbanffy 4y ago
  After my experiences with Android, it'll be really difficult to make me buy an Android phone. Compared to iOS, everything is slightly clunkier.
  - karamanolev 4y ago
    I'll take "slightly clunkier" before "extremely locked down and limited in unthinkable ways" any day, and not just for Android, but in general.
frostwarrior 4y ago
IMHO that's because Apple was the first to bother optimizing an ARM CPU for performance instead of battery life. The performance per watt in ARM exceeded x86 since long ago, but most manufacturers used that feat to create mobile CPUs instead of cranking up the power to see if it catches up to high performance x86
- akmittal 4y ago
  I think reason is that Qualcomm need to sell to Phone makers so they can't make their SoC very expensive. On the other hand Apple can make expensive SoC without worrying about sales
  - PaulHoule 4y ago
    Apple has a big advantage over Microsoft in terms of building PCs. Apple can decide that it is switching from Intel to ARM and not looking back so it not only realizes costs from investing in ARM but it ultimately will realize savings from not having to support Intel. There is no real unity behind Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo and all the other vendors, plus the motto of Windows users is "who moved my cheese?" You don't use Windows because Windows is the best operating system, you use Windows because it has the most software, and that software is written for and optimized for the x86 platform. Microsoft is always floating ARM-based systems as a hobby but it cannot make the commitment that it is going "all in" so it has to support Intel as the primary processor for the foreseeable future, so the ARM transition costs Microsoft but never saves them anything. On top of that Microsoft is dependent on vendors like NVIDIA and AMD to supply drivers for graphics cards and all the other parts for their machines and getting them all to supply good drivers for ARM is yet another big ask. Apple can say "here is the supported hardware" and not have to fight with vendors who have the power to torpedo their ambitions.
    - _ph_ 4y ago
      At minimun, Microsoft could try for real. In 2019 Samsung announced the Galaxy Book S with an ARM processor. Looked like a nice compact laptop. I would have been interested in it, but it was basically never available and limited to Windows for ARM. Which isn't even officially sold by Microsoft, you can run it fine on the new Macs in a VM, but only as a part of the beta test access. Even if Microsoft cannot force the whole market to ARM - and might not even desire to do so - at least they could treat Windows 11 for ARM as a full product.
rawoke083600 4y ago
Speaking of battery-tech and mobile. I wish I can get "today phones" but with a "thick option". i.e add 2-3mm in thickness for greater battery capacity ?
- windowsrookie 4y ago
  Apple has made the last few generations of iPhones thicker to do exactly that.
- semi-extrinsic 4y ago
  How much do you want? Motorola has a couple of 6000 mAh battery options, and I think even Samsung has a few 5500 mAh models.
danielEM 4y ago
Yes, they are so fast that I would be happy to use my phone as a computer if the industry didn't make it close to impossible
- 2Gkashmiri 4y ago
  try to use ffmpeg on termux and on a regular laptop. beyond some slight timing difference, my tests on a random file gave me similar results which is amazing
  - imtringued 4y ago
    Running a simple gradle build was 10 to 20 times slower.
    - 2Gkashmiri 4y ago
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygy_JfE0cMA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygy_JfE0cMA check this
    - danielEM 4y ago
      Can you be specific? What was the phone and what was hardware on desktop that you're comparing here?
- MR4D 4y ago
  My gut tells me that if we could, there would be phones catching on fire all over the place. Although a phone has tons of power, and can probably function as a low-end desktop, the lack of a sizeable cooling solution, or even just a plain heatsink, would cause it to throttle pretty quickly. I have to believe this is the reason, or otherwise someone would have done it already (successfully that is) for such an obvious use case.
  - danielEM 4y ago
    > My gut tells me that if we could, there would be phones catching on fire all over the place. If that was an issue you would see it already all around. > Although a phone has tons of power, and can probably function as a low-end desktop, the lack of a sizeable cooling solution, or even just a plain heatsink, would cause it to throttle pretty quickly. I would rather compare it to laptops and processing power of snapdragon 8 is rather in mid-upper segment of average available on the market laptop ARM is also a different platform with way better computing performance per Watt ratio from regular PC, there is throttling, but when it kicks in it doesn't reduce your performance so significantly > I have to believe this is the reason, or otherwise someone would have done it already (successfully that is) for such an obvious use case. Believe, or not - the reasons why it wasn't done so far are far beyond technical reasons and we could have computer like capable phones long time ago already.

usrn 4y ago

After my experiences with Android I will never ever buy another device with a Qualcomm SoC again.

arifmeticus 4y ago
Could you explain why?
akmittal 4y ago
I had totally different experience, One i bought with Exynos was Battery hog, Mediatek ones generally have bad performance.
danielEM 4y ago
I'm also curious what were your experiences with android that were affected by Qualcomm?
- uni_rule 4y ago
  Maybe they had an 810 crap out on them
rbanffy 4y ago
After my experiences with Android, it'll be really difficult to make me buy an Android phone. Compared to iOS, everything is slightly clunkier.
- karamanolev 4y ago
  I'll take "slightly clunkier" before "extremely locked down and limited in unthinkable ways" any day, and not just for Android, but in general.

frostwarrior 4y ago

IMHO that's because Apple was the first to bother optimizing an ARM CPU for performance instead of battery life. The performance per watt in ARM exceeded x86 since long ago, but most manufacturers used that feat to create mobile CPUs instead of cranking up the power to see if it catches up to high performance x86

akmittal 4y ago
I think reason is that Qualcomm need to sell to Phone makers so they can't make their SoC very expensive. On the other hand Apple can make expensive SoC without worrying about sales
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  Apple has a big advantage over Microsoft in terms of building PCs. Apple can decide that it is switching from Intel to ARM and not looking back so it not only realizes costs from investing in ARM but it ultimately will realize savings from not having to support Intel. There is no real unity behind Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo and all the other vendors, plus the motto of Windows users is "who moved my cheese?" You don't use Windows because Windows is the best operating system, you use Windows because it has the most software, and that software is written for and optimized for the x86 platform. Microsoft is always floating ARM-based systems as a hobby but it cannot make the commitment that it is going "all in" so it has to support Intel as the primary processor for the foreseeable future, so the ARM transition costs Microsoft but never saves them anything. On top of that Microsoft is dependent on vendors like NVIDIA and AMD to supply drivers for graphics cards and all the other parts for their machines and getting them all to supply good drivers for ARM is yet another big ask. Apple can say "here is the supported hardware" and not have to fight with vendors who have the power to torpedo their ambitions.
  - _ph_ 4y ago
    At minimun, Microsoft could try for real. In 2019 Samsung announced the Galaxy Book S with an ARM processor. Looked like a nice compact laptop. I would have been interested in it, but it was basically never available and limited to Windows for ARM. Which isn't even officially sold by Microsoft, you can run it fine on the new Macs in a VM, but only as a part of the beta test access. Even if Microsoft cannot force the whole market to ARM - and might not even desire to do so - at least they could treat Windows 11 for ARM as a full product.

rawoke083600 4y ago

Speaking of battery-tech and mobile. I wish I can get "today phones" but with a "thick option". i.e add 2-3mm in thickness for greater battery capacity ?

windowsrookie 4y ago
Apple has made the last few generations of iPhones thicker to do exactly that.
semi-extrinsic 4y ago
How much do you want? Motorola has a couple of 6000 mAh battery options, and I think even Samsung has a few 5500 mAh models.

danielEM 4y ago

Yes, they are so fast that I would be happy to use my phone as a computer if the industry didn't make it close to impossible

2Gkashmiri 4y ago
try to use ffmpeg on termux and on a regular laptop. beyond some slight timing difference, my tests on a random file gave me similar results which is amazing
- imtringued 4y ago
  Running a simple gradle build was 10 to 20 times slower.
  - 2Gkashmiri 4y ago
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygy_JfE0cMA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygy_JfE0cMA check this
  - danielEM 4y ago
    Can you be specific? What was the phone and what was hardware on desktop that you're comparing here?
MR4D 4y ago
My gut tells me that if we could, there would be phones catching on fire all over the place. Although a phone has tons of power, and can probably function as a low-end desktop, the lack of a sizeable cooling solution, or even just a plain heatsink, would cause it to throttle pretty quickly. I have to believe this is the reason, or otherwise someone would have done it already (successfully that is) for such an obvious use case.
- danielEM 4y ago
  > My gut tells me that if we could, there would be phones catching on fire all over the place. If that was an issue you would see it already all around. > Although a phone has tons of power, and can probably function as a low-end desktop, the lack of a sizeable cooling solution, or even just a plain heatsink, would cause it to throttle pretty quickly. I would rather compare it to laptops and processing power of snapdragon 8 is rather in mid-upper segment of average available on the market laptop ARM is also a different platform with way better computing performance per Watt ratio from regular PC, there is throttling, but when it kicks in it doesn't reduce your performance so significantly > I have to believe this is the reason, or otherwise someone would have done it already (successfully that is) for such an obvious use case. Believe, or not - the reasons why it wasn't done so far are far beyond technical reasons and we could have computer like capable phones long time ago already.