iPhone 4S benchmarks out: mixed results for the A5 CPU

   So the iPhone 4S benchmarks are out and it would seem they are nothing less than amazing. Unfortunately the graphics benchmark that was released by Anandtech earlier today is as synthetic as it gets; the tests used were "offscreen", in other words no image was rendered during the test. Offscreen means that the would-be-rendered image is HD but unfortunately none of the tests used an actual 720p output and monitor to verify the results.

   Should you want to play games on an external monitor iPhone 4S is expected to perform better thanks to the fact that the image is mirrored as the iPhone real HDMI output does not consist of a real HD 720p image as Apple kindly informs us:

Apple Digital AV Adapter mirrors exactly what you see on iPad 2 or iPhone 4S so that everyone in the room can enjoy it on your widescreen TV[...]

   Mirrored means that the screen image is actually cloned and scaled to 720p instead of having to be rendered as a second HD output. In this case most android devices suffer a larger performance drop while displaying a better quality output.

Apple embareses itself at Computex 2011 without even showing up

    There are two reasons why Apple is always missing at world wide conventions and technology expositions; first, Foxconn makes all Apple products and apple doesn't want a Foxconn booth and second, Apple software is always behind, behind schedule, behind the competition and behind in all benchmarks that aren't ordered by Apple.

    During Computex 2011 Tweakers.net did some benchmarks on a prototype Android Honeycomb tablet, which ran on Intel x86-based version of the OS and compared the results with the current generation of ARM tablets.

    The tablet was made by Compal Electronics with Intel's new prototype and Oak Trail platform on board. The used CPU has two cores, both at 1.5 GHz do their work, assisted by 1GB of RAM. The Intel GMA600 GPU is based on the PowerVR SGX535.

Lower is better

    The benchmarks show the combination of ARM hardware versus the Intel's Oak Trail x86 platform.

   Using the SunSpider benchmark the speed of the Safari iOS JavaScript engine clearly scores last even though it has roughly the same processing power as the Tegra 2 and is based on ARM Cortex A8 just as the Playbook CPU.

    Finally Linpack benchmark, Quadrant and CaffeineMark 3 were run. The results of both benchmarks are less significant as iOS didn't even qualify for further tests, in spite of the ARM CPU.

iPhone: the worst browsing experience out there

    How does the tasteless, Flashless iPhone browsing compare to a full web experience? Well, after 45,000 page loads the answer was clear, Android wins by a huge margin even with Flash support.

    For the tests the company Blaze used iPhone 4 running iOS 4.3 and Google Nexus S running Android 2.3 Gingerbread along with custom apps that automatically load pages and measure the speed.

     The chosen websites were the thousand homepages of the Fortune 1000 companies. Each page was loaded multiple times on different days. Tests were run over Wi-Fi.

The two charts below summarize the results:

Android’s browser managed to load 84% of the websites faster than Safari, with whopping 52% faster load times on average.

Lower load times represent faster performance

No HTML5 for you! (No Flash either)

     Bad news for Steve "no Flash" Jobs and iPhone power users (hipsters, close your browser now!). With all the hype surrounding HTML5, the latest web standard has become a bit self-conscious of its designation. Therefore, it demands that you just refer to it—and all future iterations—as HTML. Got it?

    WHATWG and W3C, the main organizations leading the charge to create a final HTML5 spec, realized that updates and new standards are moving at such rapid speeds that they won't be able to deliver a final standard by 2022 as they promised previously (there, I've said it!). Instead, HTML will simply be a living, ever-evolving specification, the way it's been for years.

     But what does this mean for iPhone users? It means that you will be continuously milked by Apple and other corporations for media that is available for free on a PC or any other Smartphone because HTML won't replace Flash in the next decade. Apple's app-ification of the web stops at the point where you can see your favorite shows for free. Sure there's HULU and other streaming apps that all require a paid subscription and most likely won't work if you're not in the US.

iPhone users want Flash desperately!

iPhone users don't need Flash, Flash is no longer necessary.

Steve Jobs

     Yet the recently launched Skyfire with flash video support for iPhone has been "sold out".

   The pseudo-Flash-capable browser has just disappeared from iTunes App Stores around the globe, mere hours after its splashy debut. Trying to download it in the United States yields a "request could not be completed" message, and RazorianFly readers are chiming in with reports that the app is no longer available in Greece, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Australia, Canada, Switzerland, Norway, Spain and the UK.

    Skyfire said that the demand for a Flash video workaround is apparently so high that the company's having server issues and decided to pull the app rather than introduce new users to a sub-par experience. Skyfire assures us that it's adding servers as quickly as it can, but didn't provide an ETA on when we might see the app once more.

HTML5 & Flash on the iPad vs. Nexus One & BlackBerry Playbook

iPad put to the test. What follows is the magical experience Apple provides no Flash support at all and shabby HTML5 rendering:

Looks like the iPad barely renders 2D.

iPhone 5 wishlists are already showing up

     For some reason people have already started thinking about the iPhone 5 but the iPhone 4 has just started selling, and by just I mean a little over two months ago, if my memory serves right. Is the Death Grip to blame? Is it the fact that Verizon is going to get it? Is it the slim design of the iPod touch 4G?
We’ve already seen some iPhone 5 rumors in the recent weeks and today we have a couple of iPhone 5 interesting designs.
     The first one shows the next-gen iPhone 5 as a very thin device, a lot thinner than the current iPod touch 4G. We’re probably years away before Apple will launch such a device, and when they do, it will surely be magical. Until that time we’ll remember the iPhone 5 and quickly move to the next thing.
     The second iPhone 5 design shows an iPhone 4-like design and the outer antenna is still there. What’s interesting about it are the apps, which are totally new, and they’d definitely convince you to buy the phone. And here’s what regular apps will be able to do on this iPhone 5, as there will be an app that:

How much of a hypocrite is Steve Jobs? [about Flash and censorship]

      Steve Jobs has posted a defence to his position on Flash and not surprisingly it’s full of errors and misrepresentations.

Let’s look at the points he makes:

First, there's open

      He asses that “Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc.”
      Sure, Adobe’s Flash products are only available from Adobe. That’s what makes them Adobe’s.
      But there are many open source IDE’s, compilers, RTMP servers and players available.

      Also he claims that “By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system.”
      Flash is a complex system made up from many parts, but the most important part is the swf format. That is an open format, and you can write both a compiler and a player without needing a license.
So if the swf is open what is Jobs referring to when he says “100% proprietary”?
It cannot be the RTMP and AMF formats since they are open. And the whole SDK with compiler and Flex framework is open.

     The one thing that is not fully open is Adobes own implementation of a Flash Player. Since Apple is one of the licensors behind H.264 one would think that Jobs would be aware of why Adobe cannot release it publicly. It contains proprietary codecs and hence cannot be made open by Adobe.
But if Jobs is concerned with proprietary products, maybe he should work for making H.264 open to help Adobe open the Flash Player as well?

And let’s not forget that the canvas is Apple’s proprietary technology.

HTML5 Coming summer 2022

   Apple’s recent changes to their developer agreement have unleashed a torrent of anger, hate, and divisiveness on the Internet (which, to my knowledge, has never happened before).  To summarize, Apple announced that the only languages that can be used to develop applications for the iPhone are Javascript, C, C++, and Objective C.  This change was seen as a slap in the face to Adobe who was developing a Flash-to-iPhone app converter that would have made it easy to migrate a Flash application to the iPhone.

     Through all of this bitterness, many have argued that Flash is ready for the deadpool – some even cheering its demise.  I disagree.  Actually, I believe just the opposite is true.  Here are 5 reasons why Flash won’t be going away anytime soon.

1. HTML5 is still very immature.

        HTML5 is everyone’s favorite choice as a Flash replacement. Read the comments sections on just about any blog or article about this topic, and HTML5 is often hailed as the greatest thing to happen to computing since Apple “invented” the mouse (with Xerox’s help).  The problem with HTML5 is that it’s still an immature and unfinished platform.  While it’s supported by the very latest versions of Firefox, Safari, and Chrome, it’s not yet fully supported in Internet Explorer (although IE9 will bring support eventually). If most of the browsers on the web don’t yet support HTML5, it’s not a fully supported standard.

       Then consider that even the editor for the HTML5 standard says that it won’t be finalized until 2022, and that it won’t even be in a final draft stage until 2012:

     It is estimated by the editor that HTML5 will reach the W3C Candidate Recommendation stage during 2012. That doesn’t mean you can’t start using it yet, though. Different parts of the specification are at different maturity levels. Some sections are already relatively stable and there are implementations that are already quite close to completion, and those features can be used today (e.g. < canvas >). But other sections are still being actively worked on and changed regularly, or not even written yet.

      The canvas tag is the feature that most people associate with HTML5, but for browsers to simply support that one tag is a far cry from a Flash replacement.  Still lacking are any tools for syncing audio and video, interactive vector graphics, and any kind of development environment.  HTML5 canvas also has no performance optimization.  A recent study showed that unless you’re using Safari on the Mac, Flash performance beats HTML5 every time.