Nvidia ‘Tegra 4′ Trumps Fastest QCOM ‘Snapdragon,’ Says Linley Group

Venerable chip analysts Microprocessor Report today offer up an assessment of Nvidia‘s (NVDA) “Tegra 4” application processor as to how it stacks up against Qualcomm‘s (QCOM) “Snapdragon” family of processors, based on benchmark data released by Nvidia two weeks ago at the Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona. (All articles require a subscription to Microprocessor Report.)

The conclusion of the Report’s Kevin Krewell is that Tegra 4 is the fastest mobile processor using ARM Holdings (ARMH) technology, even in comparison to the fastest projected versions of Snapdragon:

At MWC, the company continued its product reve- lation by disclosing new details of the architecture and its capabilities (as well as limitations). Judging from this pre- liminary information, Tegra 4 rates as the highest-perform- ing mobile ARM processor�if power constraints don�t throttle the cores. This performance takes aim at Qual- comm�s newest Snapdragon processors; Nvidia offered a wide range of benchmark results that clearly showed Tegra 4 leading both the APQ8064 and (judging from our estimates) the forthcoming Snapdragon 800 [�] We also estimated the performance of the Snap- dragon Series 800, assuming that it will achieve its rated 2.3GHz clock speed and applying a 10% gain to represent the improvements from the Krait 200 CPU to the Krait 400 CPU. This approach is probably optimistic, as most bench- mark scores do not improve linearly with CPU speed, although the Series 800 will also get a boost from faster DRAM. Based on these estimates, even Qualcomm�s best processor, which is due to enter production at about the same time as Tegra 4, won�t surpass Nvidia in these tests.

Krewell argues Qualcomm still has some advantage for devices that use less than the maximum power possible:

Tegra 4 delivers outstanding benchmark results, showing off its considerable capabilities. These results seem to have caught Qualcomm by surprise and expose some deficiencies in the memory subsystem of the Krait- based processors. Qualcomm, however, has designed its CPU for power efficiency, whereas Tegra 4 delivers maxi- mum performance at maximum power. Snapdragon will challenge Tegra 4�s performance in smartphones, but in tablets, Tegra 4 will really shine.

Nvidia shares today fell 13 cents, or 1%, to $12.70, while Qualcomm stock rose 5 cents to $66.70.