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The point of a powerful android?

C

chris24803

Lurker
I understand how it will speed up your overall experience, eliminate lag, have a smooth browsing experience, improve multitasking an what not.

However, are these the only advantages to a more powerful phone? A friend of mine has the nexus s (a single core device), and from what I can tell, it's as smooth as butter. Are the power of these new dual core phones really necessary? With the new dual core devices such as the Galaxy S2, what apps will demand this much power? Is it just games and emulators, or am I missing something here?

I'm thinking of switching to android, and although I have been considering the Galaxy S2, i'm just not sure if that power will go to waste.

Any help will be much appreciated :)
 
Dual core phones actually use less power then a faster single core because they dont need higher voltages to run certain applications.

Wait will December until quad core phones come out they'll be even faster and use 44% less power ;)
 
Many of the high end single core processor phones will run the current batch of apps very well but we continually push our digital devices to the brink of their capabilities. As the new apps appear the existing phones will seem slower and slower until they seem almost unusable. There was a time that a 16-bit 200 MHz 386 processor was cutting edge and people cried "How can we use all this processing power?" Now dual and quad core processors run 64-bit apps at multiple GHz speeds and we lust for more.

Pool_shark is right, though, that the benefit of the multiple cores really won't be realized until the apps and OS are optimized for parallel processing. When that will be is anybody's guess, but because these phones are already hitting the streets, you can be very sure they are working on it.
 
Many features of future Android releases may require more power to run apps natively. See the omission of native tethering on the original Droid.
 
Beyond a certain level of power (a 1GHz single core) there really is very little point at all at the moment.

I mean, only having to wait 0.8 seconds instead of 1.2 seconds for your phone book to appear on-screen. Who cares?
 
What about media playback and recording better quality videos? They require a large sustainable amount of power. And as quality goes up and screen resolutions get higher the need for faster processors and gpu cores goes up.

Who here wants to be limited to a single core when they can opt for a dual/quad core which will be more future proof?
 
Rhydian said:
Who here wants to be limited to a single core when they can opt for a dual/quad core which will be more future proof?
Click to expand...

Most people upgrade their phones every two years. Less if you are a power user, longer if you rarely use the full capabilities of the device. By the time the software catches up to the hardware, it's time for a new phone.

There are very few devices that were considered cutting edge two years ago that are considered capable today, so even if you go for "future proof" you will be shortly obsolete. It's the nature of the beast.
 
daveybaby said:
Beyond a certain level of power (a 1GHz single core) there really is very little point at all at the moment.
Click to expand...

"...at the moment." is the key statement. In the USA most people purchase a phone for 2 years (length of the standard contract) so what is good for the moment may be terrible in another two years. Dual cores will give you the furtherest reach in the future. Plus it's not all about the processor. My N1 has a 1GHZ processor and so does the NS, but the NS runs circles around my phone because it has a much better GPU.

I mean, only having to wait 0.8 seconds instead of 1.2 seconds for your phone book to appear on-screen. Who cares?
Click to expand...

I care. When you use your phone enough those extra seconds add up. Plus when multitasking that time really adds up.

If you can afford it, buy the latest, faster, and greatest. Your future self will thank you.
 
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