Samsung has another problem regarding this whole 64 Bit story, which I'm sure they'll be keeping as quiet as possible. At the end of the day this is a numbers game for them. Real benefit to the user is not of their concern, simply to release bigger and better numbers, more megapixels, greater pixel density, etc with every year's phone.
While they might be able to build their own 64 bit ARM chip and get a 64 Bit Android Kernel onto their phones, this will only affect the kernel itself, system programs and NDK applications, such as most games. They are completely reliant on Google to actually get a 64 Bit version of the Dalvik VM onto their phones, which must also be compatible with Google Play and whatnot. Without this, most applications will simply continue running in a 32 Bit environment.
You are SO right on! As you say, Samsung thinks it's a numbers game, a la the '80s and '90s. Not only doesn't Apple take the bait, they stay true to their own tune. Samsung just remains tone deaf. However, most importantly, Tizen not-withstanding, Samsung has no path to 64 bits and that's why they cannot lay out a timeline. Samsung is totally phucked into the foreseeable future. If they add biometric sensors their devices will show down or be far less capable than Apple's iDevices.
This will show up as they follow Apple further and further into the dust cloud behind Apple. Apple knows where they are headed and can be building bridges that Samsung can't see, to get there. Meanwhile, as of today, Apple has a user base of tens of millions of users that are totally ready to run 64-bit "whatever" and another huge wave of users ready to upgrade this fall to the latest 64-bit revolution.
Samsung will have zero 64-bit user base this Fall... Samsung may rue the idea of "Leading by Following" by this year end.
What else has Samsung's management to worry about:
1. Cancer-gate? The genie is squirming free of the lamp.
2. Stock-holder unrest? The people who own the stock now know they were lied to about sales levels. THIS could cost Samsung more then the trial where it was discovered.
3. Dog Pile? Apple's patent suit may have emboldened other USA companies to follow suit (pun intended).
Samsung is a great industry leader. They lead other companies to follow Apple haha.
Regarding 64 bit, it's NOT TRUE that Samsung is copying Apple. The proof is that Samsung does not have a 64 bit phone! They've actually failed to copy in this regard.
However, Samsung is VERY original in other ways. For instance, they did a big screen iPhone before Apple.
And Samsung did the very FIRST Band Aid branded Dimplephone!
Samsung has another problem regarding this whole 64 Bit story, which I'm sure they'll be keeping as quiet as possible. At the end of the day this is a numbers game for them. Real benefit to the user is not of their concern, simply to release bigger and better numbers, more megapixels, greater pixel density, etc with every year's phone.
While they might be able to build their own 64 bit ARM chip and get a 64 Bit Android Kernel onto their phones, this will only affect the kernel itself, system programs and NDK applications, such as most games. They are completely reliant on Google to actually get a 64 Bit version of the Dalvik VM onto their phones, which must also be compatible with Google Play and whatnot. Without this, most applications will simply continue running in a 32 Bit environment.
I agree with you. Though I do wonder if the new ART run time that is going to replace Dalvik is 64bit capable....
No idea about that.
Why would anyone trust Knox? Samsung just doesn't have the rep.
Apparently damn few. The US GSA department ONLY allows ONE android phone to be purchased on contract and that phone is a Samsung mode with Knoxl. No other android phone made the cut. For what it's worth, no Microsoft OS phone made the cut either. ALL iPhones and ALL iPads made the cut — no other tablets than Apple can be purchased on contract, not even Samsung. Finally from the small numbers of Knox enabled Samsung phones, neither the U.S. government nor the rest of the enterprise market is impressed with the Samsung/Knox enabled work-around...
They may not even lead in marketshare as Sammy's shipment numbers have been found to be lies. Even the numbers Samsung reported to stockholders and the SoKo government were falsified... Really bad MOJO brewing up there!
DED I also don't particularly like Samsung, and they definitely are very capable of copying, but what you state here is not correct.
By the time Apple's A7 launched it was already known for a couple of years that 64bit mobile SoC's were in the pipelines. Qualcomm themselves in 2012 estimated the start of the production to be first quarter of 2014. When ARMv8 was launched pretty much every large chip designer/maker licensed it. Samsung was also rumored to use the architecture in its server chips (a rumor that appeared way before the A7).
Apple finished first and they deserve a lot of credit for that, it was quite a feat. But to say everyone who has a 64bit SoC now copies Apple is beyond ridiculous. 64bit SoC's were expected in 2014 with or without a 64bit A7.
Cortex A57/A53 were never discussed nor targeted as mobile chips, certainly not for a smartphone. They were aimed at server markets, where they could begin to compete against Intel.
So yes, as you note Apple surprised the industry by introducing the first mass market 64-bit ARM chip. But far more impressive was the fact that Apple achieved (in complete secrecy!) a new chip architecture that wasn't just 64-bit for bragging rights or to be first, but a practical advance that is much more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee, whether for server applications or in mobile chips.
Apple is significantly ahead in pursuing a particular strategy here. And as Chipsy wrote above, it's not just arriving at "64-bits" but also tying into the software platform in a way the developers can easily benefit from, as well as being tied into a series of integrated features including Touch ID and Secure Enclave, audio processing, camera features and lots of other things.
The idea of Samsung "copying the A7" comes from the fact that the company's president of System LSI announced to its investors (!) that Samsung's own 64-bit chip was right around the corner, after just acknowledging that prior to the A7, nobody was even talking about needing 64-bits.
There's no way to spin that to suggest that Samsung is doing anything other than playing follow the leader, failing at it, and then calling itself the leader. While failing.
Sure, at some point the rest of the mobile industry will begin migrating some high end phones to 64-bit, and sure this might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art before anyone even imagined it happening in the near future.
Saying that all of this reality is a misstatement of facts and that Apple being first doesn't matter because it probably would have happened anyway, and that Apple shouldn't get any credit for embarrassing the industry while even industry executives were blustering about how unnecessary it was to move to a modern ABI, is all a very mind blowing set of comments to make.
Cortex A57/A53 were never discussed nor targeted as mobile chips, certainly not for a smartphone. They were aimed at server markets, where they could begin to compete against Intel.
So yes, as you note Apple surprised the industry by introducing the first mass market 64-bit ARM chip. But far more impressive was the fact that Apple achieved (in complete secrecy!) a new chip architecture that wasn't just 64-bit for bragging rights or to be first, but a practical advance that is much more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee, whether for server applications or in mobile chips.
Apple is significantly ahead in pursuing a particular strategy here. And as Chipsy wrote above, it's not just arriving at "64-bits" but also tying into the software platform in a way the developers can easily benefit from, as well as being tied into a series of integrated features including Touch ID and Secure Enclave, audio processing, camera features and lots of other things.
The idea of Samsung "copying the A7" comes from the fact that the company's president of System LSI announced to its investors (!) that Samsung's own 64-bit chip was right around the corner, after just acknowledging that prior to the A7, nobody was even talking about needing 64-bits.
There's no way to spin that to suggest that Samsung is doing anything other than playing follow the leader, failing at it, and then calling itself the leader. While failing.
Sure, at some point the rest of the mobile industry will begin migrating some high end phones to 64-bit, and sure this might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art before anyone even imagined it happening in the near future.
Saying that all of this reality is a misstatement of facts and that Apple being first doesn't matter because it probably would have happened anyway, and that Apple shouldn't get any credit for embarrassing the industry while even industry executives were blustering about how unnecessary it was to move to a modern ABI, is all a very mind blowing set of comments to make.
It was pretty much a certainty ARMv8 was always going to follow ARMv7. And how was it never discussed as part of smart phones. The article from The Verge from 2012 even mentions it in the first part of the article. "Today, ARM's announcing the Cortex-A50 series of processor cores, which will likely feature prominently in the smartphones, tablets, and possibly even the server rooms of the future."
Face it 64bit mobile SoC's were always going to happen. Apple released one first and deserves a lot of credit for it, and everything surrounding it as you rightly say i.e. integration. The A7 is an amazing feat of engineering. But it was bound to happen (and by ARM's own prediction it was going to be 2014).
Cortex A57/A53 were never discussed nor targeted as mobile chips, certainly not for a smartphone. They were aimed at server markets, where they could begin to compete against Intel.
So yes, as you note Apple surprised the industry by introducing the first mass market 64-bit ARM chip. But far more impressive was the fact that Apple achieved (in complete secrecy!) a new chip architecture that wasn't just 64-bit for bragging rights or to be first, but a practical advance that is much more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee, whether for server applications or in mobile chips.
Apple is significantly ahead in pursuing a particular strategy here. And as Chipsy wrote above, it's not just arriving at "64-bits" but also tying into the software platform in a way the developers can easily benefit from, as well as being tied into a series of integrated features including Touch ID and Secure Enclave, audio processing, camera features and lots of other things.
The idea of Samsung "copying the A7" comes from the fact that the company's president of System LSI announced to its investors (!) that Samsung's own 64-bit chip was right around the corner, after just acknowledging that prior to the A7, nobody was even talking about needing 64-bits.
There's no way to spin that to suggest that Samsung is doing anything other than playing follow the leader, failing at it, and then calling itself the leader. While failing.
Sure, at some point the rest of the mobile industry will begin migrating some high end phones to 64-bit, and sure this might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art before anyone even imagined it happening in the near future.
Saying that all of this reality is a misstatement of facts and that Apple being first doesn't matter because it probably would have happened anyway, and that Apple shouldn't get any credit for embarrassing the industry while even industry executives were blustering about how unnecessary it was to move to a modern ABI, is all a very mind blowing set of comments to make.
First, how can you claim Apple's implementation is "more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee" when Samsung hasn't released a 64-bit chip.
Second, Samsung is making the A7 for Apple, so they were not at all blindsided by its introduction.
Third, regardless of how Apple's introduction of the A7 might have spurred Samsung to move to 64-bit processors earlier (and I think it likely has), you cannot reasonably say Samsung is copying Apple when they release a 64-bit chip. If Apple invented the 64-bit chip then you'd have a point.
Fourth, your comment that 64-bit "might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art" is absurd to the point that it makes the rest of your post look reasonable. Of course it would have happened! 64-bit computing has been around for ages (in technology terms), and it was only a matter of time before phones and tablets incorporated the technology.
Fifth, nobody in the industry was embarrassed when Apple introduced the A7. It was simply one more feature that Apple could tout as an advantage to counter the advantages of its opponents.
Considering the logic in your article and forum posts, I look forward to the article this fall that explains how Apple copied every other manufacturer when it releases its larger iPhone. And by the way, that article will be just as absurd as this one.
It was pretty much a certainty ARMv8 was always going to follow ARMv7. .
You appear to know far too much about chips and technology to assume that the industry was going to all move to ARMv8 at a specific time. IBM never moved to PowerPC G6, and Pentium 4 wasn't replaced with Pentium 5. It was completely rethought from a different branch that went back a generation to start work over, resulting in Core.
Also, don't confuse Apple A7 with Cortex A53/A57 reference designs.
And how was it never discussed as part of smart phones. The article from The Verge from 2012 even mentions it in the first part of the article. "Today, ARM's announcing the Cortex-A50 series of processor cores, which will likely feature prominently in the smartphones, tablets, and possibly even the server rooms of the future."
Even ARM's own slides (from 2012) mention the Cortex A53 and A57 for use in mobile devices. http://images.anandtech.com/doci/6420/Screen Shot 2012-10-30 at 12.23.05 PM.png
Face it 64bit mobile SoC's were always going to happen. Apple released one first and deserves a lot of credit for it, and everything surrounding it as you rightly say i.e. integration. The A7 is an amazing feat of engineering. But it was bound to happen (and by ARM's own prediction it was going to be 2014).
Verge idly speculating about the future of a coming generation of technology is not really the same thing as any serious, informed discussions about where the tech industry was going to leap in the immediate present.
Cortex A53/57 is very unlikely to ever appear in a smartphone that matters. The entire Android market is going down scale to deliver cheaper devices with minimal functionality. That's what Wired is celebrating. That's what all the short lived excitement about Moto X by sites like Verge were promoting right up until it all turned to crap.
If some high-end, non-iPhone device ever appears with 64-bit ARM Application Processors it will be as unlikely to sell in meaningful quantities as Samsung's tablets or Microsoft/Nokia/Windows Phone anything.
If you want to believe that migrating smartphones to a 64-bit architecture was not a novel idea in 2013 I will certainly let you, just like I allow people to believe in swishing coconut oil. But you can't convince me of that, because it doesn't fit any of the facts. One ARM PR embellished by the Verge doesn't change that.
You appear to know far too much about chips and technology to assume that the industry was going to all move to ARMv8 at a specific time. IBM never moved to PowerPC G6, and Pentium 4 wasn't replaced with Pentium 5. It was completely rethought from a different branch that went back a generation to start work over, resulting in Core.
Also, don't confuse Apple A7 with Cortex A53/A57 reference designs.
Verge idly speculating about the future of a coming generation of technology is not really the same thing as any serious, informed discussions about where the tech industry was going to leap in the immediate present.
Cortex A53/57 is very unlikely to ever appear in a smartphone that matters. The entire Android market is going down scale to deliver cheaper devices with minimal functionality. That's what Wired is celebrating. That's what all the short lived excitement about Moto X by sites like Verge were promoting right up until it all turned to crap.
If some high-end, non-iPhone device ever appears with 64-bit ARM Application Processors it will be as unlikely to sell in meaningful quantities as Samsung's tablets or Microsoft/Nokia/Windows Phone anything.
If you want to believe that migrating smartphones to a 64-bit architecture was not a novel idea in 2013 I will certainly let you, just like I allow people to believe in swishing coconut oil. But you can't convince me of that, because it doesn't fit any of the facts. One ARM PR embellished by the Verge doesn't change that.
It was and is definitely meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices. But I guess if the creator of the architecture (ARMv8/AArch64) mentioning it for use in smartphones doesn't convince you nothing will.
First, how can you claim Apple's implementation is "more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee" when Samsung hasn't released a 64-bit chip.
Samsung makes 32-bit Aplication Processors, and the track those "Octo Core" chips were on was grossly inferior in many ways, from compute power to efficiency to practicality.
Second, Samsung is making the A7 for Apple, so they were not at all blindsided by its introduction.
You don't seem to understand how Samsung's System LSI works. It contracts out manufacturing capability to other companies. It's not like Apple sends its A7 design to Samsung's CEO and says "hey can you crank some of these out?"
Third, regardless of how Apple's introduction of the A7 might have spurred Samsung to move to 64-bit processors earlier (and I think it likely has), you cannot reasonably say Samsung is copying Apple when they release a 64-bit chip. If Apple invented the 64-bit chip then you'd have a point.
Samsung completely shifted its strategy, without actually articulating a strategy. If you can't see that, then I don't think I can clarify things for you. But the fact that the president of System LSI referred to 64-bit as suddenly becoming a necessity at the public introduction of A7, rather than back when System LSI began gearing up to fab chips for Apple, should help you understand what is happening.
Fourth, your comment that 64-bit "might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art" is absurd to the point that it makes the rest of your post look reasonable. Of course it would have happened! 64-bit computing has been around for ages (in technology terms), and it was only a matter of time before phones and tablets incorporated the technology.
Technology doesn't follow a straight line. There are innumerable examples of things the industry (and pundits) believed would happen, only to have something else disrupt things and fundamentally change the goals. Samsung, for example, was working on 8 core 32 bit chips, rather than anything like what Apple developed for the A6 or the A7. You could just as well insist that the next step was 16 core chips, but that's not likely to happen.
Fifth, nobody in the industry was embarrassed when Apple introduced the A7. It was simply one more feature that Apple could tout as an advantage to counter the advantages of its opponents.
Considering the logic in your article and forum posts, I look forward to the article this fall that explains how Apple copied every other manufacturer when it releases its larger iPhone. And by the way, that article will be just as absurd as this one.
It was and is definitely meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices.
A better question might be: why didn't anyone in the industry create ARM's 64-bit BIG/Little chips, given that your slide exists? And why hasn't Samsung or any of the other highly advanced, top tier vendors on your slide been able to deliver a chip they can market as "64-bit" using the A53/57 architecture, given that they've had going on two years to do so? And why didn't any of them address that as even a goal, given that all of them were laying out highly publicized road maps regarding their Application Processors and other technologies, like Samsung's detailed "vision" of super high resolution 4K screens in a handheld device by next year?
Slide or not, the reality is that Apple blindsided the industry. If you can't see that, it's only because you don't want to see it. I can't make you, nor do I even want to. Please, hang on to that and tattoo it to your chest so you can life a rich full life knowing that Apple has never done anything and that the rest of the industry that is failing around it is far better at making PowerPoint slides to impress anonymous people on the Internet.
A better question might be: why didn't anyone in the industry create ARM's 64-bit BIG/Little chips, given that your slide exists? And why hasn't Samsung or any of the other highly advanced, top tier vendors on your slide been able to deliver a chip they can market as "64-bit" using the A53/57 architecture, given that they've had going on two years to do so? And why didn't any of them address that as even a goal, given that all of them were laying out highly publicized road maps regarding their Application Processors and other technologies, like Samsung's detailed "vision" of super high resolution 4K screens in a handheld device by next year?
Slide or not, the reality is that Apple blindsided the industry. If you can't see that, it's only because you don't want to see it. I can't make you, nor do I even want to. Please, hang on to that and tattoo it to your chest so you can life a rich full life knowing that Apple has never done anything and that the rest of the industry that is failing around it is far better at making PowerPoint slides to impress anonymous people on the Internet.
Lol, easily agitated are we? They blindsided them by releasing it so fast, but the ARMv8 64bit architecture was always meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices and if you can't see that maybe you are blindsided. They are slides from ARM itself (not just the competition), you know the creator of ARMv8 and AArch64 which Apple also uses in the A7. If the creator of the architecure/instruction set mentioning it doesn't convince you then nothing will.
Apple loyalists should want Samsung to have a strong presence in the smartphone and tablet markets. Decent competition keeps innovation high and prices low(er).
Apple's device share in enterprise is impressive. I just wish they'd turn iWork into a real office productivity competitor to MS Office. The current offering doesn't cut it for those that need a serious office package. Then so many more could cut the laptop cable and go primarily iPad/iPhone.
That's not part of their strategy for the moment. I wish it was, but replacing Word means replacing Office which means replacing Outlook and Exchange, and Active Directory, ecc... MS gives the whole package, and companies understandably prefer it because it's simpler to implement. Apple has no plan to displace that yet.
Apple did, in fact, blindside the industry. Not only did it get Samsung to make the "me too" statement about their upcoming 64bit processor but it also caused that guy (forget his name) at Qualcomm to make a stupid statement that was later retracted. Further, it exposed countless blog writers for the idiots they are when they almost unanimously went on a rampage publishing countless articles calling Apple's move to 64bit nothing but "marketing" or bringing up the 4GB memory myth (another way for someone to expose themselves publicly as an idiot who shouldn't be writing tech articles).
But the real way Apple blindsided everyone wasn't just going to 64bit - it was that Apple's implementation was far superior to stuff in the pipeline (like the ARM A57). When someone comes out with a first generation processor you expect it to have some limitations. The A7 didn't - it is highly advanced and is, by far, the FASTEST mobile processor core in mobile, even outperforming Intel. Apple didn't just make a "good first try" with the A7 - they knocked it out of the park.
As I mentioned last week, ARM has released Geekbench 3 64bit benchmarks for the A57. And the A7 is still ahead in performance. Qualcomm has announced A57 based processors for the start of 2015. When it comes out it will already be behind the A7, which will be 16 months old by them. People are kidding themselves if they think Qualcomm wasn't "blindsided" by just how good Apple made the A7 ON THEIR FIRST ATTEMPT.
Lol, easily agitated are we? They blindsided them by releasing it so fast, but the ARMv8 64bit architecture was always meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices and if you can't see that maybe you are blindsided. If the creator of the architecure mentioning it doesn't convince you then nothing will.
I bet the creator of the architecture (ARM) was completely blindsided that Apple shipped a 64bit custom processor core that completely outclasses (and outperforms) their own designs (A53/A57) that haven't even been released yet.
Lol, easily agitated are we? They blindsided them by releasing it so fast, but the ARMv8 64bit architecture was always meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices and if you can't see that maybe you are blindsided. They are slides from ARM itself (not just the competition), you know the creator of ARMv8 and AArch64 which Apple also uses in the A7. If the creator of the architecure/instruction set mentioning it doesn't convince you then nothing will.
Well ARM has intended a lot of things that never mattered.
BTW, I'm pretty sure that 1.8 million is not all Enterprise users. There are a lot of regular consumers who activated KNOX for their own use. There are numerous forum posts from users wanting to know how to uninstall KNOX (or turn it off). We don't know how many "power users" use (or used) KNOX, nor do we know how many use it without really knowing what it's for.
I bet the creator of the architecture (ARM) was completely blindsided that Apple shipped a 64bit custom processor core that completely outclasses (and outperforms) their own designs (A53/A57) that haven't even been released yet.
The A7 is great piece of engineering no doubt about that, but as he states that 64bit SoC's for mobile weren't thought of (not released) before the A7 and the Cortex A53 and A57 were never intended for smartphones is ridiculous. ARMv8 was always meant to end up in smartphones and ARM's own slides with the A53/A57 official presentation (which is the launch to partners as ARM doesn't make its own chips) in 2012 made that very clear.
I don't know for sure though, my whole strategy with new languages in school was to 'pass by failing'.
It's the same concept as innovating by copying and borrowing by stealing.
I could be wrong, but I think they mean when they say leading is that they lead the Android industry.
The problem is that Samsung seems to have gotten away by this misleading nonsense to the point where the journalist doesn't question these Samsung execs into explaining what they actually mean or when it makes no sense.
I would have ripped into the Samsung exec for trying to "sell" the concept of leading by following BS
Comments
You are SO right on! As you say, Samsung thinks it's a numbers game, a la the '80s and '90s. Not only doesn't Apple take the bait, they stay true to their own tune. Samsung just remains tone deaf. However, most importantly, Tizen not-withstanding, Samsung has no path to 64 bits and that's why they cannot lay out a timeline. Samsung is totally phucked into the foreseeable future. If they add biometric sensors their devices will show down or be far less capable than Apple's iDevices.
This will show up as they follow Apple further and further into the dust cloud behind Apple. Apple knows where they are headed and can be building bridges that Samsung can't see, to get there. Meanwhile, as of today, Apple has a user base of tens of millions of users that are totally ready to run 64-bit "whatever" and another huge wave of users ready to upgrade this fall to the latest 64-bit revolution.
Samsung will have zero 64-bit user base this Fall... Samsung may rue the idea of "Leading by Following" by this year end.
What else has Samsung's management to worry about:
1. Cancer-gate? The genie is squirming free of the lamp.
2. Stock-holder unrest? The people who own the stock now know they were lied to about sales levels. THIS could cost Samsung more then the trial where it was discovered.
3. Dog Pile? Apple's patent suit may have emboldened other USA companies to follow suit (pun intended).
Samsung is a great industry leader. They lead other companies to follow Apple haha.
Regarding 64 bit, it's NOT TRUE that Samsung is copying Apple. The proof is that Samsung does not have a 64 bit phone! They've actually failed to copy in this regard.
However, Samsung is VERY original in other ways. For instance, they did a big screen iPhone before Apple.
And Samsung did the very FIRST Band Aid branded Dimplephone!
No idea about that.
Apparently damn few. The US GSA department ONLY allows ONE android phone to be purchased on contract and that phone is a Samsung mode with Knoxl. No other android phone made the cut. For what it's worth, no Microsoft OS phone made the cut either. ALL iPhones and ALL iPads made the cut — no other tablets than Apple can be purchased on contract, not even Samsung. Finally from the small numbers of Knox enabled Samsung phones, neither the U.S. government nor the rest of the enterprise market is impressed with the Samsung/Knox enabled work-around...
They may not even lead in marketshare as Sammy's shipment numbers have been found to be lies. Even the numbers Samsung reported to stockholders and the SoKo government were falsified... Really bad MOJO brewing up there!
Cortex A57/A53 were never discussed nor targeted as mobile chips, certainly not for a smartphone. They were aimed at server markets, where they could begin to compete against Intel.
So yes, as you note Apple surprised the industry by introducing the first mass market 64-bit ARM chip. But far more impressive was the fact that Apple achieved (in complete secrecy!) a new chip architecture that wasn't just 64-bit for bragging rights or to be first, but a practical advance that is much more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee, whether for server applications or in mobile chips.
Apple is significantly ahead in pursuing a particular strategy here. And as Chipsy wrote above, it's not just arriving at "64-bits" but also tying into the software platform in a way the developers can easily benefit from, as well as being tied into a series of integrated features including Touch ID and Secure Enclave, audio processing, camera features and lots of other things.
The idea of Samsung "copying the A7" comes from the fact that the company's president of System LSI announced to its investors (!) that Samsung's own 64-bit chip was right around the corner, after just acknowledging that prior to the A7, nobody was even talking about needing 64-bits.
There's no way to spin that to suggest that Samsung is doing anything other than playing follow the leader, failing at it, and then calling itself the leader. While failing.
Sure, at some point the rest of the mobile industry will begin migrating some high end phones to 64-bit, and sure this might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art before anyone even imagined it happening in the near future.
Saying that all of this reality is a misstatement of facts and that Apple being first doesn't matter because it probably would have happened anyway, and that Apple shouldn't get any credit for embarrassing the industry while even industry executives were blustering about how unnecessary it was to move to a modern ABI, is all a very mind blowing set of comments to make.
Great article DED. Enjoyed you clobbering them with that quote
Even ARM's own slides (from 2012) mention the Cortex A53 and A57 for use in mobile devices (and the second link mentions smartphones specifically).
http://images.anandtech.com/doci/6420/Screen Shot 2012-10-30 at 12.23.05 PM.png
http://images.anandtech.com/doci/6420/Screen Shot 2012-10-30 at 12.22.20 PM.png
Face it 64bit mobile SoC's were always going to happen. Apple released one first and deserves a lot of credit for it, and everything surrounding it as you rightly say i.e. integration. The A7 is an amazing feat of engineering. But it was bound to happen (and by ARM's own prediction it was going to be 2014).
Cortex A57/A53 were never discussed nor targeted as mobile chips, certainly not for a smartphone. They were aimed at server markets, where they could begin to compete against Intel.
So yes, as you note Apple surprised the industry by introducing the first mass market 64-bit ARM chip. But far more impressive was the fact that Apple achieved (in complete secrecy!) a new chip architecture that wasn't just 64-bit for bragging rights or to be first, but a practical advance that is much more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee, whether for server applications or in mobile chips.
Apple is significantly ahead in pursuing a particular strategy here. And as Chipsy wrote above, it's not just arriving at "64-bits" but also tying into the software platform in a way the developers can easily benefit from, as well as being tied into a series of integrated features including Touch ID and Secure Enclave, audio processing, camera features and lots of other things.
The idea of Samsung "copying the A7" comes from the fact that the company's president of System LSI announced to its investors (!) that Samsung's own 64-bit chip was right around the corner, after just acknowledging that prior to the A7, nobody was even talking about needing 64-bits.
There's no way to spin that to suggest that Samsung is doing anything other than playing follow the leader, failing at it, and then calling itself the leader. While failing.
Sure, at some point the rest of the mobile industry will begin migrating some high end phones to 64-bit, and sure this might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art before anyone even imagined it happening in the near future.
Saying that all of this reality is a misstatement of facts and that Apple being first doesn't matter because it probably would have happened anyway, and that Apple shouldn't get any credit for embarrassing the industry while even industry executives were blustering about how unnecessary it was to move to a modern ABI, is all a very mind blowing set of comments to make.
First, how can you claim Apple's implementation is "more effective than what Samsung itself was designing as an ARM licensee" when Samsung hasn't released a 64-bit chip.
Second, Samsung is making the A7 for Apple, so they were not at all blindsided by its introduction.
Third, regardless of how Apple's introduction of the A7 might have spurred Samsung to move to 64-bit processors earlier (and I think it likely has), you cannot reasonably say Samsung is copying Apple when they release a 64-bit chip. If Apple invented the 64-bit chip then you'd have a point.
Fourth, your comment that 64-bit "might have happened even if Apple hadn't bothered to advance the state of the art" is absurd to the point that it makes the rest of your post look reasonable. Of course it would have happened! 64-bit computing has been around for ages (in technology terms), and it was only a matter of time before phones and tablets incorporated the technology.
Fifth, nobody in the industry was embarrassed when Apple introduced the A7. It was simply one more feature that Apple could tout as an advantage to counter the advantages of its opponents.
Considering the logic in your article and forum posts, I look forward to the article this fall that explains how Apple copied every other manufacturer when it releases its larger iPhone. And by the way, that article will be just as absurd as this one.
You appear to know far too much about chips and technology to assume that the industry was going to all move to ARMv8 at a specific time. IBM never moved to PowerPC G6, and Pentium 4 wasn't replaced with Pentium 5. It was completely rethought from a different branch that went back a generation to start work over, resulting in Core.
Also, don't confuse Apple A7 with Cortex A53/A57 reference designs.
Verge idly speculating about the future of a coming generation of technology is not really the same thing as any serious, informed discussions about where the tech industry was going to leap in the immediate present.
Cortex A53/57 is very unlikely to ever appear in a smartphone that matters. The entire Android market is going down scale to deliver cheaper devices with minimal functionality. That's what Wired is celebrating. That's what all the short lived excitement about Moto X by sites like Verge were promoting right up until it all turned to crap.
If some high-end, non-iPhone device ever appears with 64-bit ARM Application Processors it will be as unlikely to sell in meaningful quantities as Samsung's tablets or Microsoft/Nokia/Windows Phone anything.
If you want to believe that migrating smartphones to a 64-bit architecture was not a novel idea in 2013 I will certainly let you, just like I allow people to believe in swishing coconut oil. But you can't convince me of that, because it doesn't fit any of the facts. One ARM PR embellished by the Verge doesn't change that.
So why does ARM mention smartphone performance in its slides from 2012 (and BTW the slides are from anandtech where BTW in the article the cortex A53 and A57 for use in smart phones is discussed and used in the examples).
http://images.anandtech.com/doci/6420/Screen Shot 2012-10-30 at 12.22.20 PM.png
It was and is definitely meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices. But I guess if the creator of the architecture (ARMv8/AArch64) mentioning it for use in smartphones doesn't convince you nothing will.
Samsung makes 32-bit Aplication Processors, and the track those "Octo Core" chips were on was grossly inferior in many ways, from compute power to efficiency to practicality.
You don't seem to understand how Samsung's System LSI works. It contracts out manufacturing capability to other companies. It's not like Apple sends its A7 design to Samsung's CEO and says "hey can you crank some of these out?"
Samsung completely shifted its strategy, without actually articulating a strategy. If you can't see that, then I don't think I can clarify things for you. But the fact that the president of System LSI referred to 64-bit as suddenly becoming a necessity at the public introduction of A7, rather than back when System LSI began gearing up to fab chips for Apple, should help you understand what is happening.
Technology doesn't follow a straight line. There are innumerable examples of things the industry (and pundits) believed would happen, only to have something else disrupt things and fundamentally change the goals. Samsung, for example, was working on 8 core 32 bit chips, rather than anything like what Apple developed for the A6 or the A7. You could just as well insist that the next step was 16 core chips, but that's not likely to happen.
If you want to understand that, read http://appleinsider.com/articles/14/05/06/before-apples-iphone-was-too-small-it-was-too-monstrously-big
So why does ARM mention smartphone performance in its slides from 2012 (and BTW the slides are from anandtech).
http://images.anandtech.com/doci/6420/Screen Shot 2012-10-30 at 12.22.20 PM.png
It was and is definitely meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices.
A better question might be: why didn't anyone in the industry create ARM's 64-bit BIG/Little chips, given that your slide exists? And why hasn't Samsung or any of the other highly advanced, top tier vendors on your slide been able to deliver a chip they can market as "64-bit" using the A53/57 architecture, given that they've had going on two years to do so? And why didn't any of them address that as even a goal, given that all of them were laying out highly publicized road maps regarding their Application Processors and other technologies, like Samsung's detailed "vision" of super high resolution 4K screens in a handheld device by next year?
Slide or not, the reality is that Apple blindsided the industry. If you can't see that, it's only because you don't want to see it. I can't make you, nor do I even want to. Please, hang on to that and tattoo it to your chest so you can life a rich full life knowing that Apple has never done anything and that the rest of the industry that is failing around it is far better at making PowerPoint slides to impress anonymous people on the Internet.
That's not part of their strategy for the moment. I wish it was, but replacing Word means replacing Office which means replacing Outlook and Exchange, and Active Directory, ecc... MS gives the whole package, and companies understandably prefer it because it's simpler to implement. Apple has no plan to displace that yet.
But the real way Apple blindsided everyone wasn't just going to 64bit - it was that Apple's implementation was far superior to stuff in the pipeline (like the ARM A57). When someone comes out with a first generation processor you expect it to have some limitations. The A7 didn't - it is highly advanced and is, by far, the FASTEST mobile processor core in mobile, even outperforming Intel. Apple didn't just make a "good first try" with the A7 - they knocked it out of the park.
As I mentioned last week, ARM has released Geekbench 3 64bit benchmarks for the A57. And the A7 is still ahead in performance. Qualcomm has announced A57 based processors for the start of 2015. When it comes out it will already be behind the A7, which will be 16 months old by them. People are kidding themselves if they think Qualcomm wasn't "blindsided" by just how good Apple made the A7 ON THEIR FIRST ATTEMPT.
I bet the creator of the architecture (ARM) was completely blindsided that Apple shipped a 64bit custom processor core that completely outclasses (and outperforms) their own designs (A53/A57) that haven't even been released yet.
Lol, easily agitated are we? They blindsided them by releasing it so fast, but the ARMv8 64bit architecture was always meant to end up in smartphones and other mobile devices and if you can't see that maybe you are blindsided. They are slides from ARM itself (not just the competition), you know the creator of ARMv8 and AArch64 which Apple also uses in the A7. If the creator of the architecure/instruction set mentioning it doesn't convince you then nothing will.
Well ARM has intended a lot of things that never mattered.
It's the same concept as innovating by copying and borrowing by stealing.
I could be wrong, but I think they mean when they say leading is that they lead the Android industry.
The problem is that Samsung seems to have gotten away by this misleading nonsense to the point where the journalist doesn't question these Samsung execs into explaining what they actually mean or when it makes no sense.
I would have ripped into the Samsung exec for trying to "sell" the concept of leading by following BS