It seems like the processor game has just gotten interesting again. Samsung and Qualcomm have been going at it for some time now as each one-ups the other with a newer, better, faster chip each quarter. Last year we saw Qualcomm’s Snapdragon edge out Samsung’s Exynos by making its way into almost every major phone released in 2012. Samsung recently announced its newest lineup of Exynos 5 processors to challenge Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 800 in the new phones this fall, and now it looks like Motorola will be joining that processor game as well.
As The Verge is reporting, Motorola is using a brand new logical architecture in the upcoming lineup of DROID Ultra, DROID MAXX and DROID Mini phones that feature 8-cores of processing prowess. These aren’t just 8 “dumb” cores though, as many of them are dedicated to single functions and are designed to take the stress off the main cores in order to gives users a better experience. 2 cores are dedicated to application processing only, meaning that only apps can utilize these cores entirely. 4 cores are dedicated to graphics processing, meaning that not only will your games play better and faster, but the overall user interface will be smoother and quicker than before. The last two cores are dedicated to contextual computing and natural language processing, which are likely used for things like touchless gestures, voice recognition and other similar tasks. Since the new lineup of DROID phones can listen in even with the screen off, a dedicated core for these kinds of tasks makes sense.
Motorola is saying that the new lineup of DROID phones will feature 24% faster overall processing power and 100% faster graphics processing power, and we can surmise that this new octa-core technology is the reason. As we see more and more cores added to these processors, it makes sense to dedicate some to certain features in order to hone in the power of the device for specific tasks rather than letting the processor or OS decide on its own. It’s also great to see another player in the processing game, competition is always good, especially when it comes in the form of innovation like Motorola has shown today.