***Official Galaxy Nexus Pre-Release speculation thread**

[vandyman]

I don't care about the Prime anymore. I got the "new" Phandroid App now.

Said as another box of cheerios go flying across the room.

 

[r4yN]

You obviously did not see my last post.

do it... feel the dark side growing inside of you... or simple: come to the dark side, we have cookies

 

[BLD]

Lol. Totally. With that, who cares whatever process-a-majigger it has!

Latest rumor I've heard is that there is an abacus and nanomites inside doing the calculations.

 

[kastleberg]

do it... feel the dark side growing inside of you... or simple: come to the dark side, we have cookies

If they're nestle tollhouse, I'm in.

 

[Nashdroid]

Are they three hard buttons at the bottom or three soft buttons?
Sorry its hard to tell.

Technically, THIS picture is right-side-up. The other one of the profile shot is upside down. The bulge in the phone is the bottom lip/radio. The smaller/thinner end is where the camera is. It's the top of the phone.

Edit: Obviously, the profile picture needs to be mirrored, but besides that, this picture is right as far as it being right side up.

 

[kastleberg]

Latest rumor I've heard is that there is an abacus and nanomites inside doing the calculations.

And a couple Asians? Lol. Its funny, my girlfriends Asian and Im always asking if she was born with an abacus.

 

[Dubbin1]

do it... feel the dark side growing inside of you... or simple: come to the dark side, we have cookies

 

[xtop]

Technically, THIS picture is right-side-up. The other one of the profile shot is upside down. The bulge in the phone is the bottom lip/radio. The smaller/thinner end is where the camera is. It's the top of the phone.

http://i55.tinypic.com/25ixlzc.jpg [/ IMG][/QUOTE]

thank you for posting that. the op should be updated with this as well

 

[vandyman]

Back to the soft/hard button questions.
If this device does not have any hard buttons on the front, How can you stop an app from luanching without a back (cancel) button?
I am always hitting the wrong soft buttons.

 

[r4yN]

well but we all have to admit... the nexus prime isn't as awesome as the xphone ...


xphone promo HD 2011 - YouTube


[sorry that this is in german, but there's no english version, just mute the video and enjoy ]

 

[Namrak]

I have to agree that the artists rendering is downright sexy. Whereas the ones in the videos are much less appealing. Also, the shape could he improved if the hump were at the top IMO

 

[kastleberg]

Back to the soft/hard button questions.
If this device does not have any hard buttons on the front, How can you stop an app from luanching without a back (cancel) button?
I am always hitting the wrong soft buttons.

The facial recognition can see when you're pissed and asks if you want to undo.

 

[Dubbin1]

Back to the soft/hard button questions.
If this device does not have any hard buttons on the front, How can you stop an app from luanching without a back (cancel) button?
I am always hitting the wrong soft buttons.

The same way you would by hitting a hard button.

 

[BlueBiker]

However, A9 is a true symmetrical multi-processor while Scorpion is not (you can reference the multiple discussions at XDA or even Qualcomm's documents that state as much). What this means is the A9, being SMP capable, can have both cores address memory at the same time and process threads at the same time. Scorpion's cores have to "take turns" addressing memory. To simplify this, let's take 2 cores on each CPU, and 4 tasks that want to be executed at the same time.

For the A9, cores 1 and 2 process tasks one and 2 simultaneously, before moving on to tasks 3 and 4. For the Scorpion, Core 1 handles task 1, then core 2 handles task 2, then core 1 handles task 3, then core 2 handles task 4. (NOTE: This is simplified, as both CPUs can process multiple threads on one core similar to Intel's hyper-threading. This was meant to be a simplified example.)

This isn't possible. It may well be that A9 cores can both address memory simultaneously while Scorpions must compete for memory accesses. But if Scorpion cores couldn't execute at the same time, then what you have is plain old hyperthreading and there would be no point in having multiple cores.

I think what you're assuming is that every instruction references memory, and that isn't true. I don't know ARM instruction set, but they must have many register to register instructions which don't touch RAM (other than the fetching of the opcodes themselves), and these certainly will happen at the same time on as many cores as you have.

But you're right that A9 cores are more efficient, mainly because they have fewer bottlenecks with their out-of-order execution instead of the older/simpler in-order.

According to Qualcomm's technical docs, I'm spot on. Because Snapdragon is asynchronous, you can view a dual-core CPU @ 1.5ghz as one big 3.0ghz CPU if needed. If an app requires relatively little CPU power (Angry Birds), you're not going to see that second core fire up, as shown in your post in that thread. Something more demanding, like a malware scan or encoding (Lookout app in that thread is a prime example) will try to max out both cores to finish the task in less time. The bottom line is that both cores are only used when needed, and when needed, it handles tasks in the order that I specified.

Ouch, I hate seeing that statement quoted and repeated, because it's almost always wrong in the general case -- see Amdahl's_law. The only time that's true is when some combination of apps and/or the OS itself have fired up enough threads that cumulatively fill up as many cores as you've got. It may well be true in the malware scan or encoding tasks you mentioned, but most apps are not multi-threaded and only rarely keep both cores maxed out for any length of time.

And therein is the benchmark dilemma that frustrates me - people consume benchmark results like horse racing results, when they mean very different things in very different contexts. Benchmarks can be aimed at compilers, iron, or end-user use cases.

Good points. They generate page views and excite users, but they're often used to make purchase decisions where they don't apply.

Enter the SMP approach - an effective way to get dual cores working and threaded apps (read: most all of our apps) working aok and running better on dual cores without needing to be re-written or re-compiled - it just works.

Most all of which apps are threaded?

That being said, I may be in a situation where it would be better for me to "wait for the next best thing". There's a good chance that I'll be redeploying to Afghanistan at the beginning of 2012 for like a 4 month tour.

Just want to add my voice to the others thanking you and hoping that you come home safe to your family.

 

[vandyman]

I guess the soft buttons would work like windows task bar at the bottom with auto hide. Does that sound right?

 

[Millinium]

I think I like this thread more than the epic incredible thread. I seem to be a lot more excited about this phone than the incredible!

 

[Dubbin1]

I guess the soft buttons would work like windows task bar at the bottom with auto hide. Does that sound right?

There might be a setting to auto hide but I kind of doubt it.

 

[kastleberg]

I guess the soft buttons would work like windows task bar at the bottom with auto hide. Does that sound right?

That would be sweet. From what I understand, they supposedly only show in the homescreen. I could be way off with that, though.

 

[Dubbin1]

From what I understand, they supposedly only show in the homescreen.

If that's the case how would you back out of an app?

 

[kastleberg]

If that's the case how would you back out of an app?

I'm probably way off then. I thought I read it somewhere.

 

[r4yN]

That would be sweet. From what I understand, they supposedly only show in the homescreen. I could be way off with that, though.

what i'Ve heared is that they will only display in portrait mode... so that you'll have true 16:9 aspect ratio in landscape mode for movies and games, but when you rotate your device the buttons will appear

 

[vandyman]

There might be a setting to auto hide but I kind of doubt it.

No. I mean after an app is launched the buttons will hide. But will they stay there when the app is launching(loading).

 

[GoogleFanBoy]

I'm probably way off then. I thought I read it somewhere.

The "soft" on screen buttons work exactly like the "hard" ones you are used to. There will be a back, home, and multitask "soft" button that remains on screen at all times (even in apps). They go away if you start watching a full screen video but you can always bring them back by tapping in the status bar area. This is nice for changing orientation. The buttons will move with the screen.

You all should watch some videos of honeycomb and you will see these buttons in action... I imagine they will work the same way on phones with ICS.

 

[vandyman]

what i'Ve heared is that they will only display in portrait mode... so that you'll have true 16:9 aspect ratio in landscape mode for movies and games, but when you rotate your device the buttons will appear

That would make sense if they stayed there on portrait mode.

 

[kastleberg]

The "soft" on screen buttons work exactly like the "hard" ones you are used to. There will be a back, home, and multitask "soft" button that remains on screen at all times (even in apps). They go away if you start watching a full screen video but you can always bring them back by tapping in the status bar area. This is nice for changing orientation. The buttons will move with the screen.

I didn't see them in the camera app from the video...