Cortex-A9 browsing example

[mobcat40]

I guess that's some serious efficiency on the right

[ffenero]

Definitivamente, a Intel perdeu a mão com processadores de baixo consumo de energia.

[MrGoDuck]

I want to see a Kal-El comparison with Atom.

I'm not too sure about power consumption figures but I would assume they're not very different.

[StevensiTX]

@bsoft16384

Oh men

What are you doing here, is nothing but talk about the bush and this brings about the same as if you had not said.

[Guaardado44]

Excelent video

[MeatPoPsiclez]

From a usability standpoint this video made it clear that a 500mhz arm c9 is fast enough to do general web browsing.

However, the comparing it to a first gen atom is really arbitrary. They could easily have compared it to a recent via cpu and seen the same results, since 99% of what they showed was limited by internet transfer speed and response time.

My core2duo laptop running at 600mhz (a valid option enabled with the third party tool rmclock) runs firefox/chrome just fine... just saying.

[ogicabp4u]

the ARM processor has a strong pair of legs!!! V Fast for its MHz and power consumption. x86 is like a fat hungry chicken that drinks gasoline the ARM is like a humming bird on crack powered by a high torque electric rotor strapped to its back.

[ogicabp4u]

I remember having an ARM250 machine way back in the early 90's. My mate just bought a mega P90 system that burned electricity like there were rain forests on pandora. He was showing me what his machine could 'do'. I showed him my ARM250 (at about 25Mhz I think)..it just totally blew him away... several times faster....haha...ARMs are sooo much faster 'MHz for MHz' and suck far less electricity 'tree for tree'. If you wanna save the trees buy an ARM. Best of British engineering YEY!!!

[llothar68]

Question is how much CPU power is required here and if this is not a GPU intensive test. So i'm not sure if this is showing something valueable.

I wait for SPEC Int2006 results. In the past the A8 was so behind Atom for CPU power that there wasn't any reason to run it as a small home server where Integer and IO is everything that counts.

[prankmypants]

ARM have a dual core 3ghz 28nm chip due out soon

[freeculture]

This proves ARM is a viable platform for real life web navigation. Now that TVs are 1920x1080 screens, there is no reason not to have an embedded ultra-light OS in there for quick browsing. They might even add fancier PVR features if desired.

Face it, current x86 machines are way overpowered for web browsing (or even office work), and much less efficient in power consumption.

[walter0bz]

I read they're trying to get into server market due to advantages of power efficiency. we need this as energy gets more expensive.

its amazing how far Intel have stretched the x86 isa but in 2010 the world needs to move on.

[Dilekz]

I want to see a snapdragon 1ghz ( ARM Cortex-A8 ) with neon core GPU VS the Atom... let's see who wins.

[TheOrando]

the intel atom is just really a socket 486 processor with a new name on it as it has to process instructions in order which is slow and cortex -a9 is manufactured using 28nm process meaning a lot less power required and could run at 2ghz and beyond

and still needing less power than the atom

[fithisux]

I like the Arm one. I want one of them.

[snowboard9]

I must be missing something.

I see the NEW and still unavailable Cortex A9 board in a cardboard box (DUAL CORE) as SLOWER than the 2 year old Atom (SINGLE CORE) that you can buy now !

Gee. Where can I get that nice cardboard box design?

[ARMflix]

The point is the clock speeds. 1600MHz for the Atom and 500MHz for the Cortex-A9. Yet browsing performance is very similar and the ARM does it all at a fraction of the power.

[commodore256]

@ARMflix I know, I'm a big RISC Fanboy. Per clock cycle, a RISC CPU are 1.5x-2x faster than CISC.

Too bad my closed binaries don't work with RISC :(

[intgrx]

@snowboard9: I believe you don't want ANY Atom processor in your cell phone if the battery runs out in a day. :)

[snowboard9]

Thanks for the warning although I don't recall any Atom chips in any cell phones.

By the way,the same argument was made against running any applications on cellphones because cellphones were suppose to be for voice, So much for that theory.

[Cybertronic72388]

@snowboard9 you are and idiot. I just want you to know that. Clock Rate isnt the only determining factor. MIPS (Millions of Instructions Per Second) determines the power of a CPU. An A9 CPU performs 5X's more MIPS than the 1.6ghz Atom... so assuming you get an A9 to go to 1GHZ it would then do 10X's more MIPS.

[maroom1]

@Cybertronic72388

You are lying. ARM Cortex A9 (dual core) @ 1GHz is 5,000 MIPS

While Atom N270 (single core) @ 1.6GHz is 3,846 MIPS

So, how it has 5x more MIPS ?

[Cybertronic72388]

@maroom1 Your figures are wrong... and you are comparing a low end A9.. I am talking about the 2Ghz Quad Core A9..... I still dare you to find an Intel Atom that tops that one...

[StevensiTX]

@snowboard9

The ARM Cortex 8 or 9 hav much better performance per watt than this Atom waste

[markie101uk]

where can I get myself one of them monitors!

[RustyBinProductions]

This is dumb. You can't compare direct CPU performance by browsing the internet! You need to perform computation benchmarks.... or show a common software application (running entirely on the client system as opposed to a browser which will always behave unpredictably due to network loads etc.).

[mkostya]

Not so true. ATOM is positioned as web-book processor, which is mostly used for web browsing. So in this niche ARM definetely wins. On the other hand, if you are talking about general purpose applications, Intel processors will beat ARM with ease.

[shaurz]

Actually I prefer to see real-world performance, which is what really matters, not artificial benchmarks. By the looks of things the ARM is a bit slower, but at 1GHz with a GPU it should be competitive and have much better battery life than Atom.

[Dilekz]

@RustyBinProductions but this is real world testing.. wich is also very important. Because some benchmarks can be misleading.

[igorsova]

If ARM smaller and cheaper than Intel, than why wouldn't you fit couple of ARM processors in a single unit, one responsible for OS and security, and another one(s) for power hungry applications like hi-res video playback, office tools,... ?

[Caroliano]

Well, many phones and gamind devices (nintendo DS for example) use multiple dedicated ARM CPUs. But that adds complexity to the hardware design and also software. Also, with an dual or quad-core Cortex A9, you can freely distribute the load among cores.

Hi-res video playback is done in a couple of mW on dedicated logic, and there are also DSP units for less common standards and processing.

So much of what you are talking about is already done. Research more on SoC.

[igorsova]

If it has been done before, than it proves that it can be done again, and this time with personal computers.

If ARM would like to compete with Intel, and to win the competition (it has all necessary potential) than it has to push market into more complex hardware design and new software architecture.

ARM has huge advantage in price and energy consuming, and it would be not smart not to use it to beat Intel in productivity.

I suspect 24-processor laptops are not that far away. Will it be ARM?

[Caroliano]

There are many problems there:

- It is not easy to stack up many cores. Issues like cache coherency make it increasingly dificult.

- Recently, ARM anounced suport for up to octa-cores Cortex A9. But I have not heard about any quad-core Cortex A9 silicon being designed, let alone octa-core.

- The lack of 64bit suport make octa-cores almost meaningless...

- There are limits to multi-threading in many softwares. More cores does not equals to faster web browsing.

[igorsova]

@Caroliano Here you go, 8 independent processors, done by nVidia. I'm officially impressed.

watch?v=8IvErY2lwpw

[Caroliano]

2x Cortex9, 1x Video Decode, 1x Video Encode, 1x Audio, 1x Image Processor, 1x GPU and 1x ARM7 core. Here are your 8 independent processors. Looks a bit different now from how you imagined it right? :) (thanks TravelMug)

You haven't done what I asked you in the first post: Research more on SoC. Even you tv has multiple independent processors.

By the way, the ARM7 core is only for on-chip tasks, like power-management, data-flow, etc. And it and cortex A9 are the only ARM processors there.

[igorsova]

Indeed, it is different, but I suspect, it's only beginning, and in very near future we're likely to see much more different and more complex hardware designs and software architectures, and yes, it does look that probably, it will be ARM. :)

As for me, I'd love to see hardware and software architectures that will allow future applications to run on their own micro-OS, regardless of type of main user OS.

p.s. I did look into SoC, thank you.

[Alecalisk]

nice monitors

[Nabeelco]

Wait for the punch line...

And that's why RISC is better than CISC.

[frvfilms]

r-u running ubuntu ?

[AlbanRampon]

From the icon at the very top left of the screen, I would say so.

[kishan4910]

arm is going to take market share from intell i thinks

btw check out my new tech blog

techrightnow.blogspot. com

looking for writers and tips :-)

[arnolddisco]

nerrr a lyk nVidia ion!

[Mack786]

If I remember correctly this also comes in double core variations right?

Twice the cores with twice the clock speed would be amazing to see.

I think if ARM teamed up with Google and got some ChromeOS or Android tablets/smartbooks/netbooks etc down to around $100 and put them in every Walmart theyd be on fire.

[ilovemaryam08]

man i love ARM ever since i studied up on tegra 4 months ago i fell in love with ARM processors. Definitely better than atom on all fronts.

[kawaiigardiner]

Awesome - hopefully we'll see some real world netbooks at a low cost with arm processors; right now the selection is horrible and the alternatives such as the loongson is only available in China :'(

[AlbanRampon]

I am delighted to see a real and direct comparison.

It gives tangible details to people unaware of ARM true performance/efficiency... or to downsize the pedestal!

Kindly, Alban

[nytrex2001]

Thanks Eric, for a very informative demonstration of a Cortex-A9 in real world situations.

You certainly left the best bit till last. The clock speed vs performance is astounding.

CES 2010 is going to be an amazing show for ARM.