Samsung Exynos 4412 Quad vs Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro APQ8064A vs Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 8930AB

Samsung Exynos 4412 Quad

The Samsung Exynos 4 Quad (also called Exynos 4412, introduced in 2012) is an ARM SoC for tablets and smartphones. It includes a quad-core processor based on the Cortex-A9 architecture (including NEON SIMD extension), which clocks with 1.4 to 1.6 GHz (depending on the model). Thus, the computing power is similar to competitors like Nvidia's Tegra 3 SoC. The memory controller supports LPDDR2, DDR2 and DDR3 with a maximum of two 32-bit channels and 400 MHz clock speed, resulting in a bandwidth of up to 6.4 GB/s.

The SoC integrates an ARM Mali-400 MP4 GPU (15.8 GFLOPS at 440 MHz). Typical smartphone games (2012) will run fluently even in high resolutions like 1280 x 720 pixels. Videos can be accelerated by a multi-format video decoder (1080p AVI, WMV, H.264, H.263, VC1, MPEG2, MPEG4).

The chip is produced in Samsung fabs in 32nm HKMG and mainly found in high-end devices like the Samsung Galaxy S3 or Note 2. Depending on the clock speed, the power consumption should be between 2 and 4 W (estimated).

Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro APQ8064A

The Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro APQ8064A is a high-end SoC for Android smartphones and tablets, which was introduced in 2012. The chip integrates 4 CPU cores, which are based on the ARMv7-compatible, but by Qualcomm designed Krait architecture. This provides a much higher per-MHz performance than Cortex-A9 chips such as Nvidia's Tegra 3 or the Exynos 4412 from Samsung, but does not quite reach the performance of the Cortex-A15 (for example in the Tegra 4). The memory is accessed via 2 x 32 bit LPDDR2 at up to 533 MHz, which offers a bandwidth of 8.5 GB/s.

Thanks to a dedicated decoder, the SoC can accelerate 1080p video playback up to a frame rate of 30 fps. 3D photos are possible up to a resolution of 20 megapixels. In addition, the chip also integrates a wireless module with Bluetooth 4.0 and WLAN 802.11ac/a/b/g/n. Produced by TSMC in 28 nm (LP), the power consumption should be around 4 watts (estimated, depending on the clock speed).

Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 8930AB

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 8930AB is a high clocked dual-core ARM based SoC for smartphones. It integrates two Krait 300 CPU cores clocked at max. 1.7 GHz (the MSM8930 offers only Krait 200 cores at 1.2 GHz) and an Adreno 305 GPU. The whole chip is produced in 28nm LP at TSMC.