Overall, these early benchmarks show the iPhone 4S is less powerful than the iPad 2. But it’s superior to every other smartphone — the Samsung Galaxy S II and the Motorola Droid Bionic being the best of the bunch — and equal to Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 8.9.
In terms of hardware, AnandTech has determined that Apple is underclocking the A5 chipset to approximately 800MHz and running a slower GPU than the iPad 2. And in case you’re wondering why Apple likes to underclock their chips here’s why:
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.
Even with the rumoured 512MB of RAM, the iPhone 4S is shaping up to be a beast. [AnandTech]
Curtis
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 8:52 AMEven capped at 800mhz this phone is going to be another android killer. Comon android fanboys you keep bagging the iPhone4S but as you can see you can say nothing. Your SGS2 is just plain slow compared to the new 4S
Peter
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:20 AMI’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Just wait til you try to leave iPhone and you’ll see its just not worth it.
HTS
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:45 AMBeen there and done that. I’ve come back to Apple and will not leave for a long time!
Richard
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 7:28 PMDitto. Skipped the iPhone 4 and went a Desire HD. Back for the 4S. Androids nothing special in my eyes.
SHL
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 7:50 PMMe 4 to that. I bought a Samsung Nexus S early this year and sure it does everything but it does nothing well. Buggy, inconsistent, would overheat and generally a pain in the ass. I gave the platform a shot and I didn’t like it so I’m switching back.
What I really dislike is how Android fanboys feel the need to make snide comments every single time an Apple product is launched as if they’re trying to re-enforce their own superiority.
I like fiddling with gadget as much as the next tech geek, but I want my phone to work.
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:26 PM“Does everything, but nothing well” sums up my experience with a HTC Hero back in the day.
andronicus
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:06 PMI have a Galaxy for work and Iphone 4 for personal use….love my iphone.
Thanioti
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:58 PMWhat? Could newer tech actually surpass slightly older tech? Thanks for stating the obvious. The real figure you should reflect on is the migration away from Crapple to Android. Killer my arse bozo.
Jaymz
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:20 PMWell look at that, a brand new phone beats one released 6 months ago. Someone stop the presses! The people must be told!
It’s interesting that for years iPhone specs have been behind the curve, but Apple fans always maintained that “specs don’t matter, something will always be faster, average consumers don’t care about clock speed.” Now that for ONCE, the iPhone is actually competitive, specs and benchmarks suddenly matter. Does that mean that they will now admit that since every Android handset released has trumped them in the past, that the Android phones were better?
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:45 PMSpecs still don’t matter: It’s software + hardware working together. These benchmarks show that.
moloko
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:08 AMOH noes the fictitious benchmarks are out.
typedmillepede
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:19 PMloving that a soon as a benchmark that makes an iphone look (legitimately) good comes out, it’s fake, but when you bash apple its because android smashes the iphone in performance in all the benchmarks. spare me
Franz
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:42 PMLol @ people who post/create benchmark tests.
EckyThump
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:16 AMGiven that the bloody thing is just an upgrade, you would want it to be faster for the price they’re gauging out of it’s devoted flock! #]
Sam D
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:02 AMDual core, so while the raw clock speed is the same, anything multi-threaded will see an increase.
I think iOS5 is a lot more optimised too, as everything seems a lot faster on my iPad 2 (been running iOS5 for a week – love being a developer)
John
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:20 AMtakes me back to my first iBook when I went from a 3.2GHz Sony to a 1.3Ghz iBook and got a faster computer. Apple are the masters of fast with ‘slow’ processors. This is why Apple control everything, so that they make it all work. I believe the term is SYNERGY when 1+1=3
Thanioti
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:01 PMThis is why your weak mind buckles to Apple marketing. Your logic = stupid.
Scott
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:27 PMAnd your inability to acknowledge performance factors outside pure CPU speed = deeeerp.
Joel
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:38 AMThe 4S absolutely eats every Android phone. So much for catch up lulz
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:35 AMBUT BUT BUT THE GIGAHERTZ!
Thanioti
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:03 PMAnother giddy Crapple fan boy. Give me your address and I’ll send you a turtle neck sweater for Xmas to add to your collection.
Joel
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:26 PMSERIOUSLY? Omg thanks so much I’ll email my address to you straight away :D
BEST. CHRISTMAS. EVER!
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:45 PMSweet! Free sweater!
Switchflo
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 9:04 AMYou realise, the iPhone was released WITH a new iOS. Once Android (particularly SGS2) gets a software upgrade it will shit over apple.
Johnny P
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:36 AMI like how the the Iphone 3GS + iOS 5 outperforms and iPhone 4 with iOS 4.3. Maybe Apple have removed the underclocking in iOS 5 for the 3GS.
Just goes to show that software sells and by having a closed system Apple get the most out of their average processors
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:46 AMI’m wondering if the WP7 approach will give similar results, since they seem to have their hardware specs fairly locked down as well.
jarry
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 2:22 PMthe only reason apple released the 4S is to be the ‘best phone on the market’ again for a while because there is so much stuff better than the iphone 4.
wait a month or 2 and itll be smashed out of the water.
Joel
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 2:52 PMDude it’s not even a new chip, it came out when the iPad 2 came out months ago. Face it the 800Mhz A5 is already smashing a 1.2Ghz Samsung (commonly referred to as the best Android phone).
The iPhone owns it.
Alex
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:16 PMlooking at fanboys going fo shizzle makes my day :) yes its fast it also comes in same shape and size as every other phone from Apple thats the way you were told it suppose to be coz its what Apple said
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:23 PMNice, so since you can’t brag on specs you’re now bragging on case designs?
Alex
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:37 PMim just stating the obvious…
Turd
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:22 PMHow does apple do it it???
Barry
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:25 PMWho cares really. It’s the same thing over and over. (sorry for the word) Fanboys come out and throw whatever at each other. Mobile phones are a personal thing now, almost an extension of that person.
If you are simple, you want simple and iPhone is simple. If you want more technical and you have to use your brain, you go for an Android where you can change almost everything and is a pain at times where you have to work out how to get the update on it or change something on it like the way it looks. I picked WP7 because I liked it over the other two. Fast, does what i need, is different and I’m a software developer and network admin person so simple isn’t really me, nor am I M$, Apple or Google fanboy like some out there.
In the end, who cares. It’s your money, go spend it and waste it on whatever (iPhone, WP7 or Android). They all do what they say but the best thing is to TRY each one before throwing whatever at each other. I have and I picked one over the other two.
Again, who cares. Sorry, just over the whole agrument of who is what and when and why and who cares. I had to vent
Barry
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:27 PMYes WP7 is simple to, this I know but in the end I liked it over the other two.
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:31 PMWell said. I plan on going WP7 after my contract is up, having tried all three platforms.
Ozoneocean
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:27 PMThe gloating from the iphone chauvinists is embarrassing.
This is fairly a timeline issue: Look at the performance stats of these devices and then factor in the original release dates.
It’s simple- Consumer tech like this is only as good as the date on which it was developed. The latest is usually the greatest, till the next latest comes along.
Welcome to the consumer product release cycle. Keep spending and making these companies rich just to have the “latest” and best thing for your 2 month window.
Joel
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:47 PMDerp because a 1.2Ghz processor in the Galaxy is super old. Face it, Android won’t catch up anytime soon in terms of speed.
Cral42
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 12:11 AMDepends on how long the 1.8 dual core SG3 takes to come out I expect
James
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:41 PMLOL, look at the droids get all flustered. hahaha!
Erik Hallander
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:49 PMApple fanboys are funny :P
Of course the latest ‘something’ will always be better than the competition in terms of hardware.
Just like in 6 month or watever, something better will come along with android OS, then iphone 5 will come out, then some other phone and etc etc etc.
Sheesh.
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:14 PMLOL, now everyone’s trying to save face. Love it.
Before bench: “Weak, the SGII walks all over this thing. Apple sucks”
After Bench: “Oh well of course the new iPhone would be faster. I mean that’s just logical, right?”
Nick
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:10 PMGrumpy fandroids incoming.
Ben
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:21 PMFunny thing… the Galaxy Tab 8.9 is only a Tegra 2 but seems to bench as fast as the ip4s/ipad2.
I think there is probably a lot of optimisation still to come for the android units. However pretty sure ip4s/ipad2 wipes the floor in terms of gfx power thou.
End of the day, I think we’ve really come to a point where more power really isn’t so necessary, and battery life is more important. Hence the ip4s is underclocked compared to the ipad2. Afterall there is really no point having console level gfx on a 3.5″ screen of which your thumbs cover half of, when gaming.
Seth Grimshaw
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:31 PMI love these pages, everyone gets into an uproar over stats.
iPhone and Android lovers, you’re embarrassing yourselves, just take a time out.
ThePengwin
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:43 PMIts even better when the stats are giving you numbers that you shouldnt really compare.
Using Sunspider to benchmark phones is pretty stupid. Javascript is a terrible language and its performance is subject to the engine, browser, underlying system, and configuration of the device.
GLBenchmark is probably a bit better as it would be handling specific GL calls, but it also depends on the implementation at the kernel level for systems.
It is prety much comparing apples to oranges here, The real results you can take away from these stats is that iOS5 will have notable speed improvements in previous generation devices.
Raymond
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 5:36 PMCan’t wait to give up a bit of battery life (charge every night anyway) and eventually overclock it! :)
Rick
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 6:11 PMThe thing to remember is that all of the devices in the benchmark are still going to be available to buy brand new. Any app developer with half a brain is going to cater to as many users as possible to ensure maximum purchases, so they’ve got to consider how their app will run on a 3GS, a first gen iPad, iPod Touch, etc. I doubt a lot of developers will be building apps that’ll only run well on a 4S, thus cutting off what, 70+% of potential buyers?
So it’s all well and good to have a faster iPhone, but what are you going to do with that power? Sure it’ll be noticeable in overall OS operation but I don’t think it’s anything to get excited about.
Raymond
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 6:32 PM“Aww yeah, they just released an upgraded phone… What of it…” is basically the gist of your ending. Every single app developer won’t play to the OLD models mate, that’s just stupid, especially since over 1,000,000 per orders have already been placed… Anything that runs ok on older models will run blissfully fast on the newer model, so anyone with lots to do or lives a fast pace and enjoys things that happen quickly, and just everyone in general will enjoy the extra power. No need to cut down the tall poppy on this one mate…
bugwan
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:11 PMI REALLY don’t understand fanaticalism when it comes to technology.
Sounds like a bunch of first-world problems to me.
BenDTU
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:26 PMTech companies are the new football teams.
Azza
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:31 PMIn about a months time the Nexus Prime should be coming out and if what we’ve heard is true, it will kill the iPad 2. Where will all you Apple fanboys be then?
Joel
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:34 PMEnjoying our Apple products.
Moo
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:42 PMHa! Funny!
Garygum
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:48 PMNothing will kill anything. People who want iPads will buy iPads. People who want other products will buy those products. Your average consumer doesn’t care how fast the Nexus is, only that their friends have iPads and that they tell them that they’re easy to use and fast. That’s all there is to it, so lose the fanboyism. Arguing about Android and Apple is beyond retarded; it’s like arguing about Cadbury and Nestle. They both make chocolate, and some people like one and some people like the other. Everyone else thinks both sides are brain dead.
kyron
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:47 PMIn about 23 years time the Honda Infinite Googleplex phone will be out and smash all of your phonez!
But seriously, they’re all just phones bleeding $600-$1000 out of us every 24 months. No one phone is the best for long, but us chumps keep buying them and raging the good rage about their delightful inadequacies and glorious abilities over each other. Gotta have a hobby right?
CrazyCS
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 7:03 AMThe benchmarks are based on stock browser…. Who uses a stock browser on Android. I don’t?
If you run browser mark and sun spider on say opera mobile you will get better figures than any iOs device.