Intel: Android Not Ready for Multi-Core CPUs

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Although I understand what Intel is saying here, it is still strange to hear the company say single core processors are better than multi-core CPUs.

Intel, which is entering the market with its single-core Medfield Atom processors, hits out against ARM and its dual-core and quad-core by claiming that the company needs to do much more to optimize Android to handle multiple cores. In fact, Mike Bell, general manager of Intel’s mobile and communications group, goes as far as to claim that multiple cores may in fact be a disadvantage.
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Well dual cores don't seem too bad, but the quad's seem to be performing the same/worse than the dual cores. Not sure why we don't stick with Single's and Dual's for now. Kinda pointless for quad cores in phones at least, maybe tablets.
 
Aren't there already a bunch of dual-core phones running Android?

:confused:
 
What he is saying is that right now, with the way the programs and OS are designed, it would benefit more from a higher speed single core, then a multicore processor.

I also completely disagree with him.
 
Lol. You could say the same thing about like 90% of applications for Windows then, as well.
 
Intel's stance is why the dual core Snapdragon S4 phones rock so much, and why people bitching about the US version One X or Galaxy S3 don't have a clue what they are talking about...

hell, for once, the US seems to have gotten the superior version of each of HTC and Samsung's new phones...
 
MavericK96 said:
Lol. You could say the same thing about like 90% of applications for Windows then, as well.
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Not exactly. His argument considers a lot of factors and one of them is that there is advantage to multiple cores when they are actually stressed, but in a power constrained environment you really don't want that happening much.
 
brucedeluxe169 said:
Intel's stance is why the dual core Snapdragon S4 phones rock so much, and why people bitching about the US version One X or Galaxy S3 don't have a clue what they are talking about...

hell, for once, the US seems to have gotten the superior version of each of HTC and Samsung's new phones...
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Agreed... Give me similar performance with significantly better battery life anyday.

I fail to see the need for a quad core in a phone, but dual core still makes sense. A dual core that is comparable to a quad core in multithreaded applications will always produce a better experience, since it will be faster for unoptimized, single core applications.
 
Jorona said:
What he is saying is that right now, with the way the programs and OS are designed, it would benefit more from a higher speed single core, then a multicore processor.

I also completely disagree with him.
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Yea this is just PR bullshit. If Intel firmly believed in this then they wouldn't be such HUGE proponents of multi-core CPU's for the desktop. Multiple Core's are the future period.

Ignore Intel and continue on.
 
If Intel can show that IPC really matters on Android than more power to them I say
 
Godmachine said:
Yea this is just PR bullshit. If Intel firmly believed in this then they wouldn't be such HUGE proponents of multi-core CPU's for the desktop. Multiple Core's are the future period.

Ignore Intel and continue on.
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They aren't saying that it's useless, it's that the way the Android OS and developers handle it it makes them useless as almost no one is making changes to properly take advantage. That I do agree with and it's one of the main things that stuck out when I switched over six months ago. If things were optimized properly simple things like playing music and opening another app shouldn't cause stutter or other little things that people just take as just a slow processor. And when you have things like Linaro coming out of nowhere boosting performance 20-100% by code optimizations it should tell you Intel is on to something.
 
So basically it's all up to the developers. I was under the impression the android OS was just fine and dandy with multicore. It when the developers don't take the time to take advantage of it that adds no benefit.
 
wtiger said:
So basically it's all up to the developers. I was under the impression the android OS was just fine and dandy with multicore. It when the developers don't take the time to take advantage of it that adds no benefit.
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The Inquirer link from the ZDnet link explains it better. It's software developers and hardware developers, the biggest issue being how the OS schedules and threads.
 
They're saying that because they don't have a dual core processor ready to compete yet. Clearly since everyone is currently dual/quad-core crazy for phones, they would have to try to argue the single-core stand point.
 
onedestinazn2 said:
They're saying that because they don't have a dual core processor ready to compete yet. Clearly since everyone is currently dual/quad-core crazy for phones, they would have to try to argue the single-core stand point.
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That's probably got a lot to do with it. They have to downplay core count. If they don't, they're making Medfield look like it can't compete. On a side note, Medfield is a pretty decent performing platform in phones according to some of the benchmarks out there. It doesn't run away with the performance crown, but it can hang in there with most current generation dual core smartphones. Then again, Intel will have to catch up quickly since the A9 is quickly heading towards becoming a last generation part.
 
Godmachine said:
Yea this is just PR bullshit. If Intel firmly believed in this then they wouldn't be such HUGE proponents of multi-core CPU's for the desktop. Multiple Core's are the future period.

Ignore Intel and continue on.
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You're completely missing his point. Desktops are not power constrained. What he is saying is that the advantages of having a multicore processor in a power and heat constrained package such as a phone doesn't make sense when the OS cannot effectively leverage those cores the majority of the time.

I somewhat agree. I would have to see the difference in performance, but frankly all I do on my phone is browse the internet, read email and check Facebook. I would prefer a longer battery life over an app opening a couple of seconds faster.
 
Rizen said:
You're completely missing his point. Desktops are not power constrained. What he is saying is that the advantages of having a multicore processor in a power and heat constrained package such as a phone doesn't make sense when the OS cannot effectively leverage those cores the majority of the time.
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Exactly. Though of course he may simply be promoting Intel's interests what he's saying is much more complex than simple PR. I think the PR on this goes both ways. Phone makers no doubt pump up hardware specs to sell hardware that many people probably marginal benefit from.
 
Even the PC with Intel chips, more than one core is hardly used, much of the time. I was just running an video encoder on a 8-thread i7. The encoder claimed to be using 8-threads, but the Windows showed total CPU utilization of only about 20%. Four threads showed practically no activity. Only one thread showed high activity. From other benchmarks, we know that a lot of software simply doesn't scale well.
 
Even the PC with Intel chips, more than one core is hardly used, much of the time. I was just running an video encoder on a 8-thread i7. The encoder claimed to be using 8-threads, but the Windows showed total CPU utilization of only about 20%. Four threads showed practically no activity. Only one thread showed high activity. From other benchmarks, we know that a lot of software simply doesn't scale well.
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use a different program...

On the topic though, I love my Razor and its dual core goodness.
 
Rizen said:
I somewhat agree. I would have to see the difference in performance, but frankly all I do on my phone is browse the internet, read email and check Facebook. I would prefer a longer battery life over an app opening a couple of seconds faster.
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As an Android user I would be considered a power user. The most processor hungry apps are emulators, like N64 or PSX emulation. On my cells 800 Mhz chip, they never slow down. The only thing that I've seen slow down is playing flash games through a web browser, and that's something I'd expect any phone to have trouble. Flash on Android works, but it's pretty crummy sometimes. Only FireFox or the built in browser works, but Chrome won't.

Who here can play this game fine on their phone?
http://armorgames.com/play/13155/fancy-pants-adventures-world-3

How about this flash animation? This was crazy out of sync on my phone.
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/596174
 
Godmachine said:
Yea this is just PR bullshit. If Intel firmly believed in this then they wouldn't be such HUGE proponents of multi-core CPU's for the desktop. Multiple Core's are the future period.

Ignore Intel and continue on.
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There is a grain of truth in it; multiple cores require more transistors typically, and thus, increase leakage power. If it's not really used, it is just excess baggage.

That said, if I could choose between 2x freq or 2x cores, that would be a real easy choice.
 
Stone Cold said:
Even the PC with Intel chips, more than one core is hardly used, much of the time. I was just running an video encoder on a 8-thread i7. The encoder claimed to be using 8-threads, but the Windows showed total CPU utilization of only about 20%. Four threads showed practically no activity. Only one thread showed high activity. From other benchmarks, we know that a lot of software simply doesn't scale well.
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Funny I encode all the time on my i7 and I get 90+ usage until the coding is done
 
All depends on the apps, same as in any other OS. Saying the multicore procs look good on paper is like saying lipstick looks good on pigs. Performance/watt is what counts, and programming techniques have to be there to make it work for these applications.
 
Jorona said:
What he is saying is that right now, with the way the programs and OS are designed, it would benefit more from a higher speed single core, then a multicore processor.

I also completely disagree with him.
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I read Intel's statement as "We can't get the power consumption down low enough with our x86 Smartphone CPUs if they're dualcore, so we're going to poison the well by saying it's not needed."
 
Most multi-core SoCs have the ability shut off unused cores, though. Tegra 3 even goes as far as to have *five* cores. When you're not doing anything demanding on the phone, all four cores are shut down and a fifth, slower, ~400 Mhz or something, low-power core is activated.

However I'd have to somewhat agree that more than dual-core seems a bit pointless on a phone. You're typically only working with one, full-screen app at a time. To save battery, you want as few background tasks as possible. While individual apps can be optimized for multi-core, there are limits in terms of thred dependencies etc. (ie. if C=A+B, and you want to calculate C+D, you first have to figure out A+B). Multi-core is really most useful for doing many, unrelated things at once - such as in multi-user environments or heavy multi-tasking, neither which is applicable on phones.
 
JimmiG said:
Most multi-core SoCs have the ability shut off unused cores, though. Tegra 3 even goes as far as to have *five* cores. When you're not doing anything demanding on the phone, all four cores are shut down and a fifth, slower, ~400 Mhz or something, low-power core is activated.
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I believe you touched on the biggest issue for Intel... IIRC they're not able to power off extra cores, just run them low in idle states.
 
If the power is there to be used, they will use it up as quickly as they can.

Android is still rather immature compared to the other OS's, possibly also due to patents, would be the only reason I could see Intel complaining. If Android was limited to single core CPUs, like the Windows Phone platform, they would work harder on efficiency, but since there's plenty of power for a smartphone readily available they just wanted to do what they can with it and improve efficiency once the market is asking for more.
 
Rizen said:
You're completely missing his point. Desktops are not power constrained. What he is saying is that the advantages of having a multicore processor in a power and heat constrained package such as a phone doesn't make sense when the OS cannot effectively leverage those cores the majority of the time.

I somewhat agree. I would have to see the difference in performance, but frankly all I do on my phone is browse the internet, read email and check Facebook. I would prefer a longer battery life over an app opening a couple of seconds faster.
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Exactly. A LOT of people here are missing the point.
 
It wouldnt surprise me is 4 cores in Android is a bit marketing BS/unnecessary at the moment but dual cores should be largely utilised by now.

Up to the coders to prove Intel wrong really.
 
Godmachine said:
Yea this is just PR bullshit. If Intel firmly believed in this then they wouldn't be such HUGE proponents of multi-core CPU's for the desktop. Multiple Core's are the future period.

Ignore Intel and continue on.
Click to expand...

Desktops aren't phones. It'd be different if every desktop was run from a battery, but we're talking about devices that fit in your damn pocket.

Honestly, the need for Dual/Quad core phones would be drastically reduced if phone manufacturers would stop loading every phone with piece of shit bloatware that can't be removed unless you root and load a custom ROM onto it. :rolleyes:
 
techrat said:
I believe you touched on the biggest issue for Intel... IIRC they're not able to power off extra cores, just run them low in idle states.
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Then they should criticize themselves, not Android... If cores are able to power off completely, they will not consume any power unless they're in use. When they do kick into action, they will help the phone finish whatever CPU-intensive task it's doing more quickly, allowing it to get back to a low-power state sooner, saving power.
If the OS doesn't use multi-core CPUs properly, it would just mean more of the cores spend most of their time powered off...so no harm done in having the extra cores.
 
JimmiG said:
Most multi-core SoCs have the ability shut off unused cores, though. Tegra 3 even goes as far as to have *five* cores. When you're not doing anything demanding on the phone, all four cores are shut down and a fifth, slower, ~400 Mhz or something, low-power core is activated.

However I'd have to somewhat agree that more than dual-core seems a bit pointless on a phone. You're typically only working with one, full-screen app at a time. To save battery, you want as few background tasks as possible. While individual apps can be optimized for multi-core, there are limits in terms of thred dependencies etc. (ie. if C=A+B, and you want to calculate C+D, you first have to figure out A+B). Multi-core is really most useful for doing many, unrelated things at once - such as in multi-user environments or heavy multi-tasking, neither which is applicable on phones.
Click to expand...

Spot on.
 
The story SHOULD read "Intel has no multicore processor ready to use on Android".
 
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