If These Early iPhone 4S Benchmarks Are Legit, It's Pretty Fast [Guts]

By Adrian Covert Oct 11, 2011 10:19 AM 34,423 127

AnandTech has dug up some apparent benchmarks for the iPhone 4S, which they found around different benchmarking sites and believe to be true. Judging from the numbers, it seems like it'll be one of the most powerful mobile devices around.

Overall, these early benchmarks show the iPhone 4S is less powerful than the iPad 2. But it's superior to every other smartphone—the Samsung Galaxy S II and the Motorola Droid Bionic being the best of the bunch— and equal to Samsung's Galaxy Tab 8.9.

In terms of hardware, AnandTech has determined that Apple is underclocking the A5 chipset to ~800MHz and running a slower GPU than the iPad 2. And in case you're wondering why Apple likes to underclock their chips here's why:

A lower clock not only means higher yields from the factory, but likely a lower operating voltage as well. Dropping a CPU's core voltage, yields a greater-than-linear decrease in power consumption, making the marginal loss in clock speed a good choice. At a lower operating frequency than its Android competitors, Apple does have to exploit its strengths in software to avoid any tangible performance penalties. Apple has traditionally done this very well in the past, so I don't expect the loss of frequency to be a huge deal to the few who do cross-shop iOS and Android.

Even with the rumored 512MB of RAM, the iPhone 4S is shaping up to be a beast. [AnandTech]

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Sprint Nearly Doubles Early Termination Fee—Just Like Verizon Before the iPhone [Blip]

You used to be cool(er) Sprint. Now we're hearing that you're raising your pro-rated ETF (Early Termination Fee) to $350 from $200. Just because AT&T and Verizon are charging $350 doesn't you need to raise yours.

Sure you're the carrier that offers real unlimited data unlike your rivals and maybe you're getting the iPhone this fall, which would be super cool. After all, Verizon raised their ETF right before getting the iPhone. So we'll give you that. But it's a slippery slope. [Phone Scoop]

Image from elwynn/Shutterstock

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Stanford Researchers Develop Sunspot Early Detection System [Video]

We've studied sunspots for over 400 years but have never been able to reliably predict their appearances. That is, until three Stanford researchers developed a technique to find them days before they hit the Photosphere.

Sunspots—planet-sized islands of magnetism in the solar plasma—appear as black spots on the solar disc and are visible with the naked eye. They're often precursors to Coronal Mass Ejections (CME) and solar flares, phenomena that wreak havoc on Earthly electronics and the Aurora Borealis alike. The problem is that, up until now, sunspots were only visible when they reached the surface—leaving precious little time before the CME itself occurs and no means of knowing if it would actually strike the planet.

However, PhD student Stathis Ilonidis and her colleagues Junwei Zhao and Alexander Kosovichev have come up with a solution—a technique known as "time-distance helioseismology." It measures the acoustic waves that travel through the sun to "see" spots 60,000km below the solar surface, much in the same way that seismologists employ seismic waves to observe actions deep below Earth's crust.

"There are limits to the technique," Ilonidis said. "We can say that a big sunspot is coming, but we cannot yet predict if a particular sunspot will produce an Earth-directed flare." The team hopes to eventually refine their prediction algorithm and lengthen our advanced warning of solar activity from hours to days.

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