Hello everyone! I’m Stephen from Nigeria’s leading phone engineering company, and today, I want to help you understand mobile processors better. Mobile manufacturers have done a great job educating consumers about smartphone components like RAM, storage, and camera types. However, many people still find the mobile phone processor a bit confusing.
You may have heard terms like dual-core, quad-core, or octa-core processors, but is a higher processor count the only reason a phone works faster or lasts longer? If you’re looking to buy your next phone, how do you choose between two devices that both claim to have an octa-core or quad-core processor? Let’s explore this topic together.
Understanding Mobile Processors
To start, let’s compare the components of a smartphone to those of a computer. In a computer, you have a CPU, motherboard, RAM, hard disk, graphics card, keyboard, mouse, and a power source. In a smartphone, the mouse and keyboard are gone, and the hard disk is replaced by memory or storage. The power source is now a battery, and RAM remains the same.
All these components are integrated into a single chip called the SoC, or System on Chip. This means that a smartphone essentially has a full computer on one chip. Manufacturers have made it easy for us to check the RAM, memory, and battery on a phone. Generally, the higher the number, the better it is. For example, a phone with 12 GB of RAM is better than one with 8 GB.
However, the marketing from manufacturers can be misleading. They often highlight the SoC used in a phone, such as Snapdragon from Qualcomm, Exynos from Samsung, or A14 from Apple, leading you to believe that all phones with the same SoC will perform at the same level. This is not true.
What’s Inside a Modern SoC?
Let’s take a closer look at what’s inside a modern SoC, using the Snapdragon 888 as an example. This chip features an octa-core processor, which means it has eight cores: one prime core, three secondary cores, and four efficiency cores. This design helps distribute tasks effectively. For instance, when browsing the web, the efficiency cores are used to save battery, while the prime core kicks in for high-performance tasks like gaming.
The SoC also includes an Image Signal Processor (ISP) that enhances the quality of your photos, a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) for managing display resolution and gaming, and components for artificial intelligence tasks, such as voice assistants and scene identification.
Additionally, the SoC manages various sensors, security features like biometric scanning, mobile network connectivity, Wi-Fi, and cache memory for efficient operation.
Choosing the Right Processor
Now that you have a basic understanding of SoCs, you might think that the best choice for your next phone is simply to pick the one with the best SoC. While that’s partly true, it’s not the whole story. Just because a phone has a powerful SoC like the Snapdragon 888 doesn’t mean the manufacturer will utilize all its features effectively.
For example, RAM performance is not just about the amount of RAM but also the frequency at which it operates. An 8 GB RAM running at 133 MHz performs differently than one running at 2600 MHz. The Snapdragon 888 supports RAM speeds of up to 3200 MHz, but not all manufacturers use this capability.
Think of it like having a high-speed car that can reach 200 kilometers per hour, but the manufacturer only allows it to go up to 180 kilometers per hour due to cost-cutting or other reasons.
Making an Informed Choice
So how can you make an informed choice when buying a phone? Instead of focusing solely on the SoC name or the number of cores, use benchmarking tools like Antutu and Geekbench to see how well the phone performs in real-world tests. These tools provide performance scores based on various tests conducted by users.
For example, both the OnePlus 9 Pro 5G and Samsung S21 Ultra use the Snapdragon 888 SoC, but the OnePlus 9 Pro scores significantly higher in performance metrics.
From now on, I encourage you to check the Antutu scores before making your next mobile phone purchase. This will help you have smarter discussions with retailers who may emphasize octa-core or quad-core processors without understanding the full picture.
If you found this information helpful, please give it a thumbs up and share it with others who might benefit. Thank you for your time, and I look forward to seeing you in the next article!
