Smartphone Processors: Everything you need to know about them

Here’s what you need to know about processors when you’re looking for a new smartphone or tablet.

Read the processor specifications of a smartphone and you may assume it as a cast of a superhero movie, There's Snapdragon, Exynos, Mediateks and the Hero among all Apples Fusion chipsets. What do these technical terms mean and to what you need pay attention, by end of this article you will come to know.

Starting with some basics, what is a processor ?

A processor executes what you want your smartphone to do. Early mobile phones were essentially cousins of traditional landline telephones. Smartphones, however, are portable computers that happen to have telephone capabilities built in. Underneath that amazing touchscreen display is a full-fledged computer, responsible for telling your apps how to function, your GPS how to get you home and you who to call on the telephone. The processor is the brains of the operation.

What's a core ?

It’s an element found in the main processor that reads and executes instructions. Devices began with a single-core processor, but engineers created more powerful devices by including more cores in one device. That led to dual-core devices. Soon there were quad-core processors (as in four cores), and now there are hexa- (six) and octa-core (eight) smartphones and tablets.

Whats the benifit of having multiple cores ?

Its simple if you think of a processor as a team then number of cores are like number of team mates. The more cores, the faster they can divvy up the work you’re asking the phone to do. That means multiple cores make your experience snappy: Apps load quickly. You can capture high-quality photos or HD video and then browse through your collection without pause. Animations and videos play smoothly without stuttering. Games don’t get bogged down. But there's the trick having more cores always doesn't meant to have better performance, its same as having more team mates is just not enough if you don't know how to distribute and manage workload between them. More on that later.

Does Double the number of cores means twice better performance ?

The simple answer to this question is NO. For example a quad core processor is not twice as faster as a dual core processor or an octa core processor is not twice as faster as a quad core processor. Its just that what a dual core processor can do at its full power the quad core processor will do it at half of its power. Quad core is not faster, but can handle more data at a single time. So with dual core you will not be able to calculate more, but a quad core will be able to provide 100% more capacity to process.

How well performance of a processor will be is dependent on some other factors too, like its architecture, fabrication process etc.

What things to consider when buying a new smartphone or tablet today ?

Major smartphone processor manufacturers are Qualcomm Snapdragon, Mediatek and Samsungs Exynos. Now days most of the manufacturers manufacture devices based on snapdragon chipsets or they now call it as mobile platforms. Qualcomm has 400series 600series and 800series of processors in its lineup, with their latest being 435 and newly announced 450, 625(one of the most popular one),650 series and their flagships 835's.

Consider a phone which is based on new generation processors which are based on 10nm and 14nm fabrication process. This significantly increases battery efficiency and thus increasing battery life. Some of these are Snapdragon 450 for entry level devices, Snapdragon 625 for mid-rangers and Snapdragon 835 for flagship devices. 

Verdict: 

Summarizing everything, if you are about to buy a new smartphone make sure that you are buying one based on 14nm or 10nm fabrication process. These are not more powerful than previous generation 28nm based processors but are significantly power efficient as compared to them.