The LG Electronics Optimus 2X, the world’s first dual-core
smartphone, was introduced in December and followed shortly after by
the dual-core Motorola Atrix 4G and rumors of a dual-core HTC “Pyramid”
headed for T-Mobile. From smartphones to PCs, more cores grab more
attention. Consequently, according to analyst Jack Gold, with J. Gold
Associates, whether they’re necessary or not, the mobile industry
currently has a “core war” underway.
“For simple e-mailing, texting and basic Web
browsing, the need for multi-cores is minimal or non-existent. Current
smartphones with capable single cores do quite well at these mundane
tasks,” Gold said in a Feb. 21 report. Though for many of the newer
capabilities being added to phones, such as 3D gaming and HD video
viewing, there actually is a need for more processing power.
However, Gold added, “in these scenarios the real
benefit for multi-cores often comes not from having more CPUs, but from
having more GPUs. And here, the core wars gets really interesting.”
Gold said that Nvidia, with its 12 GPU cores and upcoming chips with
four CPUs, has staked out the high end of the market and jumped ahead
of rival Qualcomm — which will play catch-up with its own
in-house-designed multi-core GPU in upcoming chips. Following behind
them, Samsung, ST Ericsson, Texas Instruments and others will be
joining the competition, albeit at a later date.
Additionally, ARM is now battling long-time market
leader Imagination Technologies in the graphics core licensing
technology arena, as it’s decided whose GPU IP will be included in
licensed chip designs for the vendors that don’t have their own
graphics IP, Gold said. As ARM is a new player on this front, with
Imagination Technologies having been the primary licensor of ARM
attached graphics capabilities — and for other chip architectures,
including Intel’s Atom — Imagination Technologies is winning for
now.
While ARM is often thought to be synonymous with
mobile devices, Intel’s Atom line is putting pressure on the
competition — especially as the popularity of the tablet form
grows. (In December, Intel CEO Paul Otellini announced that
manufacturer partners, including Toshiba, Lenovo, Fujitsu and Asus, are
expected to introduce 35 Atom-based tablets in 2011.)
“Intel will need to compete in the core wars, more
for prestige and less for performance in my opinion,” Gold said in the
report, explaining that while Atom may be able to do more per core than
ARM, customers won’t understand this and so will demand the same
numbers of cores.
“Atom,” he added, “will need to show
graphics-oriented performance on a par with multi-core GPU
implementations from Nvidia and Qualcomm in particular.”
In short, Gold concluded, the core wars are just
heating up. Smartphones and other small devices with increased numbers
of cores will take some time to emerge and, in order to take hold, will
need to benefit from a trickle-down effect of “lower chip costs,
reduced chip geometries for power savings and increased app
functionality.”
For now, he advised, “users should select a device
not based on the number of cores, but on the overall performance,
functionality required and tradeoffs desired (e.g., battery life, size
of device, costs, primary use).”
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