A Nagging Issue
Concerns are growing over the competitiveness of Android smartphones as controversy over the performance of application processors (APs) from Qualcomm and Samsung Electronics continues.
The Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 AP powers most of the flagship products of Android phone manufacturers, including Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy series, which ranked No. 1 in global smartphone sales in 2021.
Samsung Electronics used either the Samsung Exynos 2100 or the Snapdragon 888 for the Galaxy S21 series, depending on the region. The Exynos 2100 was loaded into the model for the Korean market.
Both the Snapdragon 888 and the Exynos 2100 are based on the ARM Cortex-X1 architecture and produced on a 5-nm process. They have been plagued by overheating and throttling issues.
In the case of the Galaxy S21 series powered by the Snapdragon 888 and the Exynos 2100, test results showed that the two APs underperformed the Snapdragon 865 series, an AP released in the previous year, due to overheating.
Xiaomi’s flagship phone Mi 11, which was equipped with the Snapdragon 888, also showed overheating and high power consumption, recording up to 64.5 degrees Celsius, in a 3D mark test conducted by overseas IT media outlets in 2021.
On the other hand, Apple successfully improved the performance of its own AP, Apple Silicon, widening its gap with the Android phone group in terms of AP performance.
The iPhone 12 Pro, which ran on Apple's A14 Bionic AP, recorded 1,603 points in single-core testing and 4,177 in multicore testing in a Geekbench benchmark test, overwhelming the Galaxy S20 Ultra, which used the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 and earned 890 in single-core testing and 3,179 in multicore testing.
In 2021, despite the criticism that the A15 bionic installed in the iPhone 13 series was not improved significantly compared to its predecessor, the Geekbench benchmark scores of the iPhone 13 Pro Max were 1,755 in single-core testing and 5,014 in multicore testing. The iPhone 13 Pro Max is far superior to the Galaxy S21 Ultra, which was powered by Exynos 2100 and recorded 1,110 in single-core testing and 3,499 in multicore testing.
Industry experts expect Android phones’ AP inferiority to continue in 2022. In December 2021, Qualcomm announced the first-generation chip of the Snapdragon 8, the flagship mobile AP for the first half of 2022. The performance of the first-generation chip has improved significantly to rival the AP of the iPhone 13. It earned 1,227 in single-core testing and 3,838 in multicore testing in a leaked Geekbench report on the Xiaomi 12 Pro. Yet, it reportedly was not free from the overheating and poor performance per watt issues.
The Motorola Edge X30, which was equipped with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, emitted so much heat that its temperature reached 58 degrees in a 3D mark test conducted by Chinese IT media outlet Phoenix New Media. Its high power consumption led to fast battery consumption.
Apart from the Snapdragon AP, the Exynos 2200, which will be used for the Galaxy S22 along with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, is dogged by controversy over performance and yields. Samsung Electronics canceled the Jan. 11 (U.S. local time) unpack event for the Exynos 2200 on short notice, further fueling the controversy. Although Samsung Electronics took the wraps off the Exynos 2200 on Jan. 18, it did not disclose the level of improvement in the CPU and GPU compared to its previous model or clock information for each core.
Some industry insiders say that Samsung failed to address the overheating issue with the Exynos 2200 due to problems with its 4-nm production process. Samsung expected the Exynos 2200 to reach more than 1.9 GHz in a computational speed test, but it fell to 1.29 GHz due to overheating, according to IT tipster Ice Universe.
Some analysts say that the production process is the main culprit behind the controversy over the performance of APs for Android phones. Since 2020, Samsung’s Foundry Business Unit has produced Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888 as well as the Exynos.
On the other hand, others point out that the overheating and performance issues should be comprehensively judged because they are affected not only by their production process but by AP design, parts, and smartphone’s own performance limitations.