Samsung has been releasing two different versions of the same smartphone every year with different processors, since the Galaxy S2. Ever wondered why and what is the difference? If these questions have been troubling your mind then you are at the right place. In this article we will be discussing about the two different processors that Samsung uses for different versions of their flagship devices: the Exynos processor and the Snapdragon chipset.
For starters, Exynos is Samsung’s in-house SoC, while Snapdragon is designed by Qualcomm. Samsung uses the two different processors for two different markets: the Exynos majorly for the Asian markets, while the devices with Snapdragon processors find their way to Europe and North America. This is done partly due to the supply chain. Samsung is dominating the smartphone industry, manufacturing andriod smartphones in the world by largest volumes, and the in-house production would reduce its dependency on other companies as well as there are obvious cost-reduction benefits.
Now let’s compare the two processors.
Exynos differs from Snapdragon in the fact that it is an octa-core chip while the Snapdragon is a quad-core chip. Clocking skill-wise the Exynos cores might be clocked at lower speeds than the Snapdragon cores, but it utilises the cores systematically. Due to the Heterogeneous Multi-processing supported by Exynos LITTLE architecture, the smaller four cores are assigned to handle lighter tasks, whereas for heavy tasks, the four bigger cores are activated. This enables power management effectively as the device is never struck with more power than it actually requires at a time.
Another difference Snapdragon makes use of Adreno GPU, which has a faster speed compared to the Exynos chips that use Mali graphics processor. InIn terms of RAM speed Exynos is faster than Snapdragon, at the same time it has a smaller semiconductor which means it can handle faster speed in memory as well. On the other hand, Snapdragon boasts of having integrated LTE and is also capable of recording 4K video, which the Exynos 5430, for instance, is not.
All these factors make the small differences in determining the speed of the processors- the Exynos processors are fast when it comes to firing up apps, whereas the Snapdragon chipset is more efficient in running graphics rich content.
Although we have compared the main factors determing performance of the two peocessors, there are numerous other differences as well, like the availability of LTE infrastructure, Qualcomm’s licensing of 3G and frequencies in various markets. In many ways, Qualcomm is the standard in Android processors although the recent Exynos chipsets have consistently outgunned their Snapdragon equivalent in benchmark tests.
As mentioned above, there is only a marginal difference in the performance of the two processors. But the small differences make all the impact on the consumer demand and popularity. Also, the availability of the chipset also matters as we already know that the Exynos variant is catered to the Asian markets while Europe and America receive the Snapdragon ones.
Which chipset do you think is better? Will Samsung’s in-house processor be able to take over Qualcomm’s market in the coming years? We will leave that for the future generations to decide.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
Visit us- applex.in
Linkedin -https://www.linkedin.com/company/applex-in/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/applexTeam
