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Suppose when both Qualcomm and Mediatek CPUs are labelled as "Quad Core 1.2GHz Cortex A53" , Are they completely identical as far as CPU is concerned ?
bharat
Posted 2017-07-03T14:33:45.177
Reputation: 3
Is the core arm chip same in both Qualcomm and Mediatek processors?
Answers
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Maybe and maybe not.
ARM licences the architecture and IP core to companies like Qualcomm and Mediatek. The companies licencing the core have the option to enhance the core as they see fit so long as they retain binary compatibility.
Qualcomm are well known, along with Apple, for customising their cores for performance beyond the standard core provided by ARM. I do not know if Mediatek enhance their cores. What this means is that any company that has customised their processors potentially can have optimised their architecture and made it perform better, clock higher or just be generally better in terms of power efficiency.
You can only tell which processor is better by comparing benchmarks of similarly clocked processors.
Mokubai
Posted 2017-07-03T14:33:45.177
Reputation: 64 434
What is meant by "ARM licences the architecture and IP core". Won't ARM prepare the CPU part and distribute it to companies like Mediatek ? – bharat – 2017-07-04T01:52:34.450
ARM does prepare an example CPU design that will work and can be used by manufacturers, but manufacturers have the option of modifying and enhancing it. Qualcomm is well known for optimising their ARM CPUs for performance and generally will be better than the reference design that companies like Mediatek will use. Mediatek could improve the design as well, but I do not believe that they do. ARM do not manufacture the actual CPU, what they do is design it and guarantee it will work then licence out the design files, it is up to Qualcomm and Mediatek to actually manufacture the CPU. – Mokubai – 2017-07-04T05:21:20.010