Things in the tablet world have heated up considerably over the previous month. Samsung and both have strong contenders in the market. Samsung launched the Galaxy Note 4 and the Note 4 Edge a month back. Apple soon followed suit with the launch of the iPhone 6 Plus which was the company's first attempt at an iPhone in the 'phablet' category.
In terms of hardware, both the devices are armed to the teeth. The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 comes with a Snapdragon 805/Exynoss 5433 on board. The Snapdragon 805 is a 2.7 Ghz, Quad-Core Krait beast with 2MB L2 cache. The Exynos 5433 is Samsung's own offering and comes with eight-cores on board.
The iPhone 6 Plus on the other hand, comes with Apple's A8. The A8 doubles the transistor number on the A7, is manufactured using TSMC's 20 nm manufacturing process and has a reduced die size by 13%. Apple claims the A8 has 50% increased graphics performance and 25% more CPU performance over the A7. This comes with added 50% decreased power consumption on board.
With this being only light coverage of what the devices truly have to offer, let's see what the benchmarks have to say. For an in-depth analysis of the Galaxy Note 4 click here. And for the one on the iPhone 6, click here. Let's take a look at some browser benchmarks of both the devices. Browser benchmarks provide useful insight into the workings of a device's processor and computing capabilities.
Galaxy Note 4 vs The iPhone 6 Plus - Browser Benchmarks.
The iPhone 6 has a SunSpider score of 336.8 in SunSpider 1.0.2.
The Galaxy Note 4 on the other hand maxes out at 414.
When these scores are compared, the iPhone 6 ends up having a clear lead over the Samsung Galaxy Note 4. Bear in mind that the versions of the software are different in the benchmarks above. But even in SunSpider 0.9.1 the score for the iPhone 6 is 353.4. Apple's software optimization on the iPhone can be expected to have worked in this case.
Browsermark on the other hand puts the Galaxy Note 4 in a clear lead. The iPhone 6 scored 1232, while the Galaxy Note 4, as you can see above has a score of 3025. The iPhone 6 lags further behind in Geekbench multi-core with a score of 2927. You can see the Galaxy Note 4's scores below.
The iPhone 6 Vs The Galaxy Note 4 - GPU Benchmarks.
Things become more clearer in the graphics' department, with the decreased screen resolution of the iPhone 6 working in it's favor. On a GFX Bench T-Rex variant, the iPhone 6 Plus has a score of 2873 On-Screen and 2384 off-screen. Remember, higher is better in this case.
In the table underneath you can also see scores of other devices for a better comparison. 3D Benchmark results in the iPhone 6 maintaining a graphical lead over the Galaxy Note 4. The Note 4 ends up having a score of 1405 (On) and 2112 (Off). The Galaxy Note 4 on the other hand makes a strong comeback in 3D Mark Ice Storm Unlimited.
The 3D Mark Ice Storm tests your device in three different stages, with three different angles. The iPhone 6, in IceStorm gets a score of 17540, Graphics score of 22954 and a Physics score of 9608. Other devices that you can see below are the Nvidia Shield, Samsung Galaxy S5 and Apple's iPad Mini 2.
An interesting anomaly in this result is the score of the Samsung Galaxy Note 4. The version being tested here is the Exynos 5433 version of the Note 4, with improved Cortex cores. This stands true to it's specifications in the score on the top. However, the one on the bottom (in red) puts the iPhone 6 in the lead.
Looking that the difference between scores, the iPhone 6 has a lead of 5432 in IceStorm and 10,851 in Graphics. Results may vary or be skewed owing to software differences. Apart from this anomaly, the Galaxy Note 4 does show a strong performance, but overall no single device manages to shine. Improved Galaxy Note 4 benchmarks will be carried out once the device becomes available here in the U.S on the 17th. Nevertheless, these initial results show that no device appears to have a significant advantage over the other. Let us know what you think in the comments section.
