[olga421]

What's the difference between dual core,and quad core pertaining to smartphones,I'm hearing so many different pros and cons,can someone please enlightened me thanx

[EauRouge]

Personally, I dont know.

All I know my laptop is a dual core, I cant imagine my cell phone needing 4 cores.

[GTiLeo]

read up about multicores then make your desision, right now i don't see a quadcore needed in mobile but it is where the market is heading because its the only way Android devices can have that edge over other Androids. in high volume high task process mroe cores makes doign multiple things faster, but when it comes down to having less processes goign on that you will not be using more cores for higher CPU speeds is actually better. most smartphones are usually 1.5GHz and blah blah cores with blah RAM, for a smartphone the way i see it is a dual core can perfom the same as a Quad core and it really comes down to the speed/RAM/ OS efficiency. i'f youve seen some demos of the Nexus4 vs the Z10 you will see when loading and playign angry birds the game runs just as fast and loads faster on the Z10 then it does on the Nexus 4. at that point having the extra cores is just an extra cost and further demandign on the battery

[JR A]

The difference is that quad-core processors have twice as much marketability than dual-core. As apps become more and more cpu intensive, more cores are needed to power the massive number crunching necessary to launch those tiny birds across a small screen. Most of all, quad cores have twice as much gimmick as dual cores; just look at any recent benchmarks, the data is there.

/endsarcasm

[joe.miller]

To explain it simply, the number of cores that a processor has determines the number of things that can be done simultaneously. For example, say you're surfing with the browser, while listening to MP3s using the music player in the background at the same time. One core might be decoding and playing your music, while another core does all the computations necessary to scroll around the web page you're viewing.

If you only had a single core, the processor would have to make a decision about which computations to do first. With multiple cores, there wouldn't have to be any waiting--each core can do it's work in parallel.

For most general use, quad core is complete overkill. However, complex apps like games might be able to take advantage of multiple cores at once--say for example using one core to do the work of enemy AI, while another core does the work necessary to calculate different objects moving around the screen. It depends on how the application is written whether or not it can take advantage of multiple cores or not.

[dangerousfen]

It depends on how the application is written whether or not it can take advantage of multiple cores or not.

Exactly. It's all down to how the software is designed. In most cases additional cores are a complete waste of time in terms of speed.

[playbookster]

depends on the software its running.

[Tre Lawrence]

I know it is "proper" to say multiple cores are not needed, but if I can get more cores and an increase in associated performance without sacrificing reasonableness of price and other things (like battery life and size), bring on the extra cores.

[billsterjito]

Thanks to all
good info!

[anon(4018671)]

I know it is "proper" to say multiple cores are not needed, but if I can get more cores and an increase in associated performance without sacrificing reasonableness of price and other things (like battery life and size), bring on the extra cores.

if only...

[jimpilot]

I know it is "proper" to say multiple cores are not needed, but if I can get more cores and an increase in associated performance without sacrificing reasonableness of price and other things (like battery life and size), bring on the extra cores.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I understand very few programs use more than 2 cores. So it's kind of like having a 4 lane road with two lanes blocked to traffic.. The extra cores are there but not doing anything

[Rickroller]

If you really want to watch a good demonstration of CPU useage of multiple cores, check out this video from about the 3:40 mark.



Basically, with 5 flash videos playing simultaneously, the 4 cores are running at about 75% smoothly. However, with a 6 Flash video, the 4 cores are then almost at 90% maxed out, and things begin to get a bit choppy.While everyday use of a phone for texting, email, browsing, and phone calls would never need 4 cores, if you really want to break into the "mobile computing" platform, then you need more power. Plain and simple.

[kfh227]

FWIW:

I'f rather have 8 GB of memory in next gen devices with dual core 2 GHz processors than 4 GB of memory and quad core 1.5 GHz processors.

[Rickroller]

FWIW:

I'f rather have 8 GB of memory in next gen devices with dual core 2 GHz processors than 4 GB of memory and quad core 1.5 GHz processors.

I'm guessing you mean RAM instead of Memory..
Either way, neither of those figures will be happening anytime soon lol

[BBThemes]

FWIW:

I'f rather have 8 GB of memory in next gen devices with dual core 2 GHz processors than 4 GB of memory and quad core 1.5 GHz processors.

on that tangent, id far rather see DDR3 RAM than extra cores and power. bettery power effeciency and far far better speed are just two major attractions of DDR3 over DDR2

[tte404]

it comes down too is - You're only as fast as your Mobile OS... Jelly Bean was written for dual core, re-written for quad-core. The QNX Neutrino RTOS can handle multiple cores, 64+ natively...
Right now, BlackBerry 10 can run 4 videos smoothly with 1.5GHz Dual Core, 2GB RAM, where the Note2 1.6GHz Quad Core, 2GB RAM (in the video above) starts to over take the native cores..
When it comes to app management; QNX handles app calls and threads far better than it's competitors. We don't want smart phones anymore... BlackBerry has opened our eyes to true mobile computing.

[Rickroller]

it comes down too is - You're only as fast as your Mobile OS... Jelly Bean was written for dual core, re-written for quad-core. The QNX Neutrino RTOS can handle multiple cores, 64+ natively...
Right now, BlackBerry 10 can run 4 videos smoothly with 1.5GHz Dual Core, 2GB RAM, where the Note2 1.6GHz Quad Core, 2GB RAM (in the video above) starts to over take the native cores..
When it comes to app management; QNX handles app calls and threads far better than it's competitors. We don't want smart phones anymore... BlackBerry has opened our eyes to true mobile computing.

In the above video, the Note 2 was handling 6 flash videos before any hiccup was detected. As for "opening your eyes" to true mobile computing, please do explain how HDMI mirroring which has been around since 2010 is mobile computing? Especially considering there is no USB OTG support. IMO, BB has a long way to go before it's being considered a "mobile computer".

[SpiralBorg]

Dual Core is good, but Quad Core is enough. I don't mind Quad Core, sometimes it has an good speed boost, and is excellent for multitasking, but things like Tegra 4 and Samsung Exynos 5 Octa, which is 8 cores, is just plain unnecessary.
If any knows about the RAZR I, it ran an 2hz Intel Atom chip, it was single core, but it excellent performance, speed, battery life and graphical grunt. It even out performs my XOOM, which is Dual-Core, and the XOOM has constant lag, which is also due to its 1GB RAM. We just need a good processor, like the atom chip, for exceptional results overall. Eight cores is good for computing, for a mobile OS, such as android, I highly doubt it actually takes full advantage of it.

[Emu the Foo]

There's always the aristo

[JR A]

There will be a day when there is practical need for multiple cores and optimized software that takes advantage of it will be the norm. That day isn't today. At least not for smartphones.

[Skeevecr]

Dual Core is good, but Quad Core is enough. I don't mind Quad Core, sometimes it has an good speed boost, and is excellent for multitasking, but things like Tegra 4 and Samsung Exynos 5 Octa, which is 8 cores, is just plain unnecessary.

Actually those additional cores are actually useful if you are going to use a15-based chips since using the additional lower power cores is the only way to reign in the power demands by reducing the amount of time the faster ones are actually active. Obviously another option would be to choose chips that were better suited to mobile-sized batteries, but the android market is allergic to such ideas.

[gxgs]

There will be a day when there is practical need for multiple cores and optimized software that takes advantage of it will be the norm. That day isn't today. At least not for smartphones.

In my eyes, mobile operating systems are not optimized, thus you need to put up with monster cpus that will bruteforcefully accelerate things. Why do i say this? because no mobile operating system is up to par with what even windows xp/linux can do, yet windows xp or any desktop linux distro can run smooth with much lower specs and memory requirements than current mobile OSes. Then again, you need more arm cores than intel/amd cores to match performance.

Its interesting seeing phones needing 2GB of ram + 8cores to do simple tasks, leads me to think mobile industry is developing faster than it can optimize, or the excessive ram is there to counter act the lack of processing power offered by arm processors.

[jimpilot]

There will be a day when there is practical need for multiple cores and optimized software that takes advantage of it will be the norm. That day isn't today. At least not for smartphones.

So if I understand it correctly the extra cores are battery using hardware that because the software doesn't address them adds nothing to most programs

[Cesare21]

One point missing is multi-threaded processors. A dual core multi threaded processor is enough processing power to handle everyday needs for current mobile needs.

[barbarianthemadserb]

Here is my real world experience with quad core vs single core. I have the quad core Nexus 4 vs my plain old Nexus S (single core) vs my Blackberry 99x0 (single core 1.2Ghz speed). In a nutshell I notice very little speed difference with all of the above. Sure I get 20Mbit download speeds with my Nexus 4 and only 7Mbit download speeds with my Nexus S and Blackberry 99x0. But once the data/program is on the phone, there is very little difference on speed-based upon my usage that is. I am NOT impressed with the Nexus 4 period! I do not do games or heavy texting or lots of phone calls. In fact, the native apps on my Blackberries meet all my needs!. The Nexus 4 with its big screen only shines when I want to do a lot of web cruising due to both the screen size as well as the download speeds. But if I do not need to do a lot of web cruising, then my Nexus S and my Blackberries excel quite well for the single cores they are. These are my opinions based upon my needs only. Your results may vary quite a bit I assume from mine.