Choosing the SOC for your next budget tablet.

Nexus 7, Redefining Budget Tablets

With the recent announcement of Nexus 7 by Google, it is only fitting that I dedicate a post to help consumers in deciding which SOC is the best for their usage. Consumers in the USA should have less of a headache, after all the Nexus 7 8GB costs USD199 there so it makes little to no sense why you should settle on anything else especially on unknown chinese tablets. Unfortunately, for the rest of the world the decision making is not as simple.

In the UK the Nexus 7 8GB costs at least GBP199 and that is approximately USD312! In Australia the same device costs AUS319 (~USD335) and MYR868(~USD277) in Malaysia. Clearly, those unknown Chinese tablets still worth considering for budget conscious consumers outside US.

The Contenders 

If you currently still undecided on which SOC to settle on, there are about 6 SOCs embedded in the tablets which I think are worthy of consideration. On this day and time, you should NEVER settle on single core devices. So, the SOCs of my choice are as listed followed by their specifications.

• Tegra 2, 
• Qualcomm APQ8860, 
• TI OMAP 4430/4460, 
• AML8726-MX, 
• RK3066 and 
• Tegra 3 T30L as used in all the Nexus 7 tablets. 

However, I would advise against buying Tegra 2 and APQ8660 devices simply because they are too outdated. Unless you can get them with a very CHEAP price, say less than USD100 otherwise stay away. The main reason I included them here is to show just how much the performance have increased since the Tegra 2 era.

Benchmarks
CPU

Please note that I do not have any devices with RK3066 and T30L so I stole the numbers from many sources online. The T30L scores were taken mainly from Anandtech.com and the RK3066 scores from the slatedroid.com forum. I will list my sources in the References section later.

These benchmarks primarily stresses the CPU with the exception of AnTuTu as it tests all the components and combines them to get an overall score. The scores have been normalized so that the T30L scores represent 100% performance. Single threaded performance varies between the SOCs with Tegra 2 having 76% on average of Tegra 3 single threaded performance and on the other end RK3066 having 100%. 

It is interesting to see that RK3066 actually beats T30L on many CPU bound benchmarks like SunSpider and BrowserMark. However, none can challenge the raw power of the 4 A9 cores in T30L when it comes to multi-threaded performance. The RK3066 only possess 61% of the multi-threaded performance of T30L while Tegra 2 only have 49%. 

Overall, if we were to believe the AnTuTu benchmark score, the Tegra 2, APQ8660 and OMAP 4430 performs similarly having ~60% of the T30L performance. The AML8726-MX improves this by providing about 72% of the T30L performance and finally the RK3066 with about 89% of the T30L performance. All of this is to be expected as T30L is the only quad cores SOC in the list. However, once we get to the GPU benchmarks it is a totally different story.

GPU

*Both Egypt and Pro tests were offscreen test so the native resolutions of the specific devices should not have mattered/affected the scores much.

The quad core Mali 400MP4 in RK3066 really rocks! We all know the ULP Geforce GPU in the Tegra 3 is not the most powerful so the fact that the GPU in RK3066 surpasses it isn't really that shocking. Depending on the type of load, the GPU in AML8726-MX can perform similar to the Tegra 3 or at worst it can perform at ~68% of the Tegra 3. Considering that I bought the Ramos W17Pro at USD140, I really have no complain.

I am considering removing Basemark results in future reviews as it have a tendency to favour QualComm GPUs as well as being dependent on the device's native resolution. Just for fun, lets compare RK3066 with iPhone 4S and Galaxy S3 in GLBenchmark!

In Egypt, RK3066 is 1.4x faster than iPhone 4S while in Pro, it performs similarly to the iPhone 4S. Nothing else to say here other than well done to the Rockchip engineers! 

Form Factor

Once you have decided on which SOC to go with for your next tablet, the task becomes easier as you have now narrowed down the choices. All you need to do now is decide which size is suitable for you and which brand has the most support by the community (i.e. tabletrepublic.com and slatedroid.com). Whereas the performance of the tablets are objective as in we can objectively measure their performance using third party applications, we cannot objectively 'measure' which form factor is better than the other.

The usage patterns of different customers will be different hence it is not possible to give a general advice on this matter. What matters is what YOU think of the size and whether you can live with it or not. For me personally, I have tested the 7inch, 9.7inch as well as the 10.1inch tablets and I can say for ME, I prefer the 7inch form factor as it is bigger than a smartphone while weighing almost the same. The screen size is big enough for me to surf on and does not limit my usage. I also noticed that the bigger form factors tires me after prolonged usage mostly because of their weight and is not suitable for one hand operation. 

Therefore, it is important that you try these different form factors on your own and see which one you like the most. Reading other peoples' thoughts on this matter is useless as you will be the one using it in the end. If you don't like it then do not buy it regardless of whatever people think of it.

Conclusion

In the end, after all these benchmarks, the decision is still yours to make. If I can offer you any advice, try to not spend more than USD150 on any Chinese tablet as there are plenty of choices which cost less than that. If you decided to spend more than that, make sure the tablet have IPS screen, at least 1GB of RAM and of course a dual core SOC. Check the forums AND youtube for reviews on the tablet as well as any problems reported by early users. If more than one user is reporting a fault, this most likely means that it is a widespread issue and it is best for you to stay away from the tablet however tempting the specifications are. It is ultimately up to you to decide just how much is brand name, reliability and mainstream support worth. After all, peace of mind goes a long way. 

References
On T30L, Samsung S3 and iPhone results you can go to Anandtech and search for scores there.
http://results.rightware.com/devices/535
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAdC5HAyV7A

For the RK3066 results:
http://tabletrepublic.com/forum/cortex-a9-rockchip-3066/window-n90-dual-core-benchmark-results-2053.html
http://bbs.imp3.net/thread-10712275-1-1.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGf6f97gzwE&feature=related
http://www.glbenchmark.com/phonedetails.jsp?benchmark=glpro21&D=Yuandao+N90+DUAL+CORE2&testgroup=overall

Ramos W17 Pro and AML8726-MX review

Ramos W17 Pro

Why
I wanted to know if relatively unknown manufacturers like AMLogic can stand a chance against dual core chips I have tested before (TI OMAP 4430, APQ8860 and Tegra 2). I got this from a seller on Aliexpress.com for about GBP90 with UPS shipping.

Store:Shenzhen Eternal Technology Co., Ltd.

Supplier: Sles-May ET

Took a day for them to ship it and 3 working days to reach me.

Specifications
CPU: AMLogic ML8726-MX, dual-core Cortex A9 at up to 1.5Ghz.
GPU: Mali400MP2
RAM: 1GB
OS: Android 4.0.3
Firmware: 0517
Internal Memory: 816
Screen Size: 7"
Screen Resolution: 1024x768
Webcam: 1.3MP (front only)
Battery: 3200mAH Li-Ion.

Build Quality

When I first lifted the tablet, I cannot get over just how light it is. It is advertised as weighing only 304g and I have no trouble believing that. It is so damn light! Fortunately, it also does not feel cheap. I think this is mostly because of the textured back.

The front is like any other buttonless tablet. Nothing special here. There is a little bleeding of light from one side of the screen of my unit but I can live with this very minor issue. It won't be visible unless you look for it.and I can't even take a picture to show it. Maybe it is time for me to invest in a proper camera :) Ignore the background. Please.

The usual ports such as MiniUSB, 3.5mm headphone jack, rest button, volume buttons as well as TF card slot are available. Notice the lack of any HDMI ports.

Screen
Before I get on with the screen, let me just show you the packaging.

In case you didn't catch that, here's a closer look at the important bit.

Yeah, the screen is not IPS. BUT do not let that deter you from reading any further as the screen performed admirably... for a non IPS panel that is. Here is how the screen looks at its lowest brightness. Its visible head on but not so much on any other sides. Use this if you are using it in your bedroom without any other competing light sources switched on.

And here is the screen at 50% brightness. This is my usual setting and is the one I recommend using. The sacrifice on battery life is worth it. It is visible on most angles except if you are viewing it perpendicularly. Since its an 7" tablet, I doubt you would need/want to do it anyway so its really almost a non-issue. 

Finally, at its full glory. Clearly whatever anti-glare coating/technology Ramos is using here is working. Good job on improving the viewing angle as well as maintaining the low price!

Camera
Nothing special. It works well without stutters and works with Skype. Low quality camera but I rarely use it anyway. Image quality is sharp when there is enough light. It does not handle low light conditions well so make sure to use it in a well lit room.

Speakers and Headphone jack
To be honest, I was prepared to be disappointed with the Ramos' speaker (its only a mono speaker). BUT somehow Ramos continues to impress here! I mean of course, the quality is far and way below those of the Touchpad's but it is WAY better than the ones in SmartQ Ten3 T15 I reviewed earlier.

Obviously, there is no bass and just a hint of mids but the vocals are clear and crisp. The treble are not harsh and more importantly it does not distorts under any volume setting. That is really an accomplishment for a chinese tablet manufacturer!

Playing back music using headphones is easy due to the standard 3.5mm jack. Audio output is clean with no obvious noise at any volume. Dynamic range is good. Volume is plenty so it should not have any problem powering most consumer headphones.

Battery Life
I no longer uses the tablet as I gave it to my niece for her birthday (and hence the background and the bed sheet) so this part is purely based on my 2 weeks experience of using the tablet. First off, if you used it fully with wifi turned on, screen at 50% and running 3D games it would last at most 4 hours. If you are a light user e.g. you surf periodically and let the tablet sleep every now and then expect to see about 8hrs or so of usage. And if you are like my niece, who happened to be a very light surfer hence wifi almost always turned off, brightness turned all the way down and use it mainly for gaming then according to her (but remember, she is 8 but with an amazingly well developed systems of thought I must say) you will need to charge it after 12 hours of usage. That really is the upper limit of what you can expect and I do not remember ever getting that much out of the battery.

ML8725-MX
Finally! The main reason why I bought the tablet in the first place. The SOC! For this unit, I decided to benchmark under the different CPU governing modes i.e. Power Saving, Normal and Performance. Power saving will cap your CPU clock to 1GHz while Normal sets it to 1.2GHz and Performance to its full 1.5GHz speed.

The main reason is that different people have different needs and expectations from the tablet. What is deemed acceptable by one person might not be enough for another. And also, it seems like there are complaints about the Ramos being too hot while in operation. Based on my experience, the Performance mode does certainly heats up the back side of the tablet but it is still within the acceptable side for me. Using it under Normal mode will heat it up a little bit but is comparable to the heat produced when you use any modern smartphones to surf on a 3G connection. You can feel it but it really is nothing major. And finally under the Power Saving mode the tablet will turn at most lukewarm under any load. This is what my niece is using all the time and the performance is apparently enough for her needs.

General Performance
Under all the three CPU governing modes, the tablet still operates smoothly. These are occasional brief stutters in the Power Saving mode but does not really affect the user experience.  Browsing is smooth using the stock browser even with the pre-installed flash player enabled but obviously the Chrome browser is way smoother.

Performance

Sunspider 0.9.1

Rightware Browsermark

GLBenchmark 2.1.4

Basemark Taiji

Linpack

Antutu

Overall
Just to put things into perspective, here is a table showing the different performance of the SOC under all the modes. Performance under Performance mode is considered as 100%.

So, on average you get 70% of the maximum performance on Power Saving mode and 88% on Normal mode. You will have to decide on your own which mode to use based on your usage. From these limited data, it suggested that 3D performance is not really affected by the modes but otherwise the performance difference are pretty striking between Power Saving and Performance mode.

Comparison with other SOCs
Please note that I do not have any data for AnTuTu under Tegra 2 hence the 0 score.

Simply put, the SOC with the fastest CPU is still clearly the TI OMAP 4430 with the AML8726-MX coming in second. However, put the GPU into account then without any doubts the AML8726-MX clearly dominates the benchmarks thanks to the dual Mali400 cores. If you plan on gaming on a cheap tablet, among these 4 choices the obvious winner is AML8726-MX. Of course, provided that the design allows it to properly dissipate heat.


Wireless Performance
The wireless performs okay when you are close to the router but sucks otherwise. My router is a pretty good performer (WHR-HP-G54) with a built-in amplifier and Tomato firmware installed so this should be more than enough. For whatever reasons, the wireless just will not work on areas where the signal is worse than -65dB. Good thing I have mini routers lying around so turned one of them into a repeater and all is well.

Conclusion
I love this tablet! The best chinese tablet I have reviewed so far. If somehow they can improve future revisions to fix the wireless reception as well as perhaps adding some cheap heatsink to help with the heat issue, I would easily recommend this to anybody looking for a cheap tablet but as it is, the Ramos W17 Pro is an excellent performer.