(Image courtesy of 9to5Mac)
It goes without saying that the iPhone 4’s A4 processor smokes the previous iPhone 3GS, but those expecting a speed jump equal to the iPad might be disappointed, based on some new benchmarks run with one of the early arrival handsets.
9to5Mac is reporting that the new iPhone 4 shows a 31 percent speed improvement over last year’s iPhone 3GS model, as seen in the GeekBench scores above. That’s probably to be expected since this year’s iPhone 4 is running Apple’s custom A4 silicon to wring the most performance possible out of the diminutive device -- but if you were expecting the iPhone 4 to zip along equal to the iPad, we might have to let some air out of your balloon.
No one knows for sure if the iPhone 4 is running the same A4 chip that’s inside the iPad, but it seems unlikely since early GeekBench results show that the iPhone 4 lags the iPad in raw speed. The iPad has more or less been confirmed to have a processor clocked at 1GHz, but it’s still unknown exactly what speed the iPhone 4 is running at.
“We speculate that this reflects the different form factors of the devices, with one built to be pocket-sized, power will likely be clocked down to minimize heat and battery drain,” 9to5Mac notes.
Also factored in is the fact that the iPad is not yet running iOS 4, which makes a direct comparison that much more difficult. The tools to benchmark speed on iDevices is also quite primitive at this stage of the game, so we can expect things to improve over time.
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