Hardware acceleration - Android General

Hi, I have a question regarding hardware acceleration with the coming of ICS ports to older phones. ICS supports full hardware acceleration, and is also optimized for dual core phones. So I was wondering how the single core phones would take the hardware acceleration? Choppy/better speed, etc?
I'm not very savvy about hardware acceleration and so this is why I ask. Any clarification would be appreciated!
Thanks!

I've enabled hardware acceleration on my galaxy S with ICS beta 2. All animations are smooth, though flipping between launcher screens can be a bit choppy at times. Overall, it feels smoother than gingerbread, especially with page scrolls.

I'm running ICS on my Nexus S and for the most part it's smooth. Some lags here and there, but when the official hits it will probably much better.

Hardware Acceleration means using the GPU to help render pages, so CPU core count isn't what you're looking at here. The N1 has a really poor GPU so don't expect any improvements there. Not that it matters, because even the best phone hardware can't solve what is actually a fundamental problem. Everybody should have a read of this:
https://plus.google.com/10505198573...8x93s#105051985738280261832/posts/2FXDCz8x93s
Bottom line: Android will never be rid of the choppy/lag issue unless it is completely overhauled. It doesn't matter how much hardware power is thrown at the problem, there are fundamental flaws in the OS.
If a brand new Galaxy Nexus still has the same problem as my N1, which it does, why would i want to upgrade?

Hardware Accel.
Im using evervolvs rom on my htc evo 4g and the HA that hes included with the rom is amazing...but im not sure if hes gotten a build for your phone yet.

DirkGently said:
Hardware Acceleration means using the GPU to help render pages, so CPU core count isn't what you're looking at here. The N1 has a really poor GPU so don't expect any improvements there. Not that it matters, because even the best phone hardware can't solve what is actually a fundamental problem. Everybody should have a read of this:
https://plus.google.com/10505198573...8x93s#105051985738280261832/posts/2FXDCz8x93s
Bottom line: Android will never be rid of the choppy/lag issue unless it is completely overhauled. It doesn't matter how much hardware power is thrown at the problem, there are fundamental flaws in the OS.
If a brand new Galaxy Nexus still has the same problem as my N1, which it does, why would i want to upgrade?
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Click to collapse
Don't know if you've read it, but here's a response to Dianne's post:
https://plus.google.com/100838276097451809262/posts/VDkV9XaJRGS

Those 2 Google+ links were great reads, thanks!
Sent from my Incredible S using xda premium

BazookaAce said:
Don't know if you've read it, but here's a response to Dianne's post:
https://plus.google.com/100838276097451809262/posts/VDkV9XaJRGS
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Click to collapse
Yep, i had a read of that too. It's all eye opening stuff, in fact every Android user needs to read those posts.

Related

GPU acceleration ?

Does anyone know if 2.3 will include GPU acceleration for the OS (animations, scrolling, etc.) or if it is still only utilizes the GPU in specific applications (games mostly)?
I know there were some rumors about 2.3 utilizing hardware GPU acceleration, similar to the way Windows Phone 7 does.
In my opinion it would seem like that would be a big factor in having Samsung produce the Nexus S instead of another manufacturer, since the main advantage of the Hummingbird processor (in comparison to the current Qualcom processors) is the GPU.
engadget said that all the animations are the smoothest they've ever seen with no lag at all. I know in the galaxy s phones animations and scrolling is so smooth it looks fake.
so it may not be GPU acceleration for the OS, we don't know, but according to engadget it's pretty good.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/12/07/google-nexus-s-preview/
I would disagree with the Galaxy S animations looking smooth, but it is hard to tell what is caused by the RTF file system causing lag.
Compared side by side the Vibrant's animations in moving around the OS (not gaming or anything like that) is not as smooth as the G2 and I would say it is more on par with the Mytouch Slide.
atlp99 said:
I would disagree with the Galaxy S animations looking smooth, but it is hard to tell what is caused by the RTF file system causing lag.
Compared side by side the Vibrant's animations in moving around the OS (not gaming or anything like that) is not as smooth as the G2 and I would say it is more on par with the Mytouch Slide.
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i guess each vibrant may be different, my dads vibrant is amazingly smooth and gets almost no lag ever.
On ics
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA App. Developer of brickROM, and OP of XDA Thread of The Year 2011.
Dude why are you littering the front page with old irrelevant threads
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium

So....no hardware acceleration even after Ice Cream.....?

YouTube - ‪Google I/O 2011: Accelerated Android Rendering‬‏
At the beginning of this video, they basically state that because "Dual core and quad core devices are coming out" that there will be no FULL hardware acceleration in Android...ever...
In a nutshell, they're saying the general public will buy a phone because "IT HAS 5 CORES!" or w/e and not know the difference between GPU and CPU usage. I find this amazing that Android phones, often associated with lag on even dual core phones, still find this a low priority when they are trying to compete with Apple (and potentially Windows Phone 7 someday).
I played with a Motorola Xoom yesterday in the Sprint store (to see what hardware acceleration would POSSIBLY be like in ICS and further beyond). The animations were smooth, but there was STILL some lag (I suppose this is because of larger screen and more pixels needing to drawn.....but why does the iPad and iPad 2 use hardware acceleration so much better with large screens....?) I know in 3.1 they say they're supposed to better support hardware acceleration, so maybe the demo unit I tested still had 3.0....
For the first time, I've actually been considering dropping Android and moving onto Windows Phone 7 in the future. I was really looking forward to the future of Android, but it looks like Google really is only a cash cow looking to cash in on consumers' lack of knowledge on this issue...
EDIT: I know that it has been said that Android will be hardware accelerated, but I guess I was posting to get an understanding on WHY Romain Guy said this....it's conflicting to what has been stated and confusing....
Why don't you consider this for one second. Open the app drawer in Android...thats the whole iOS basically. Does not take much power to run that smooth.
Then consider that the App Drawer is only one part of a huge OS with widgets running and multiple panels and its easy to understand why it takes a bit more power to run this OS.
As for lag, zero with my Nexus S everything is lightning fast. My captivate, x10, and Arc had lag yes, but not my Nexus S.
gunstar3035 said:
Why don't you consider this for one second. Open the app drawer in Android...thats the whole iOS basically. Does not take much power to run that smooth.
Then consider that the App Drawer is only one part of a huge OS with widgets running and multiple panels and its easy to understand why it takes a bit more power to run this OS.
As for lag, zero with my Nexus S everything is lightning fast. My captivate, x10, and Arc had lag yes, but not my Nexus S.
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Click to collapse
This is a ridiculous statement. Use iOS for a couple of days and then say that. It's a lot smoother doing everything, especially scrolling.
gunstar3035 said:
Why don't you consider this for one second. Open the app drawer in Android...thats the whole iOS basically. Does not take much power to run that smooth.
Then consider that the App Drawer is only one part of a huge OS with widgets running and multiple panels and its easy to understand why it takes a bit more power to run this OS.
As for lag, zero with my Nexus S everything is lightning fast. My captivate, x10, and Arc had lag yes, but not my Nexus S.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've actually been playing with my Nexus S a little more and try to push it to see if there is lag, and I agree wholeheartedly....if the speed only improves from here then I'm a happy camper I guess. I think this is due to the fact that there are some parts of hardware acceleration present in Gingerbread currently. If they enable "more hardware acceleration" then I guess it will be much smoother (which there already is virtually zero lag to this phone). I played with other phones in Sprint yesterday, and even comparing the Nexus to the Xoom, the Nexus was faster (albeit, smaller screen means faster drawing and smoother....). I used to have the Epic and that lagged also quite a bit as well (thanks Touchwiz).
You do make an interesting point that I never thought about when comparing iOS to Android with the app drawer example (thanks for that). I hate iOS, and Apple (although the iPhone 4 device itself is dead sexy). Lol...I'm actually kind of disappointed in myself for comparing the smoothness I guess and falling for the Apple "trap".
If you listen a little further, they start talking about tablets and how in Android 3.0 all the basic drawing is now hardware accelerated, and needs to be because they are trying to push so many more pixels through the same pipeline.
They then talk about GPUI - GPU-accelerated UI. That's the core of what they're moving forward with.
Long story short, Honeycomb has HW acceleration in the basic UI. ICS will have that too.
jonnythan said:
This is a ridiculous statement. Use iOS for a couple of days and then say that. It's a lot smoother doing everything, especially scrolling.
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THIS.....At the event, they said that apps can be hardware accelerated. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but this will bring the true "iOS" like experience to opening apps, and once the app is open it will be smooth like iOS from there (if the line of code is added by the developer(s)).
The scrolling IS smooth on Android, but not iOS smooth. For example (using a static wallpaper) scroll and notice it is smooth. However, add a YouTube widget to the screen and then click the search icon.....on my Nexus it will lag for a second or two (like it's thinking about it) and then present me with the window transition to the search bar screen. THAT, to me, suggests CPU "thinking" and NOT GPU "thinking". I guess I just notice a lot of elements that can sometimes tax (an extremely light tax thanks to EXT4, but a tax) on the CPU sometimes when it comes to animations and window transitions.
jonnythan said:
This is a ridiculous statement. Use iOS for a couple of days and then say that. It's a lot smoother doing everything, especially scrolling.
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Click to collapse
No its not and though I didn't start with the original iphone or iphone 3g, I have a iphone 3GS, iphone 4, and an ipad. Statement holds bud.
I like to switch around, I also have a black berry, but Android is superior in every way...though I do not own a windows phone 7 device as of yet.
I love how you say my entire statement is ridiculous and bring up scrolling...did I mention scrolling? NO...did that have anything to do with what I posted? NO...
Common sense, level it up.
jonnythan said:
If you listen a little further, they start talking about tablets and how in Android 3.0 all the basic drawing is now hardware accelerated, and needs to be because they are trying to push so many more pixels through the same pipeline.
They then talk about GPUI - GPU-accelerated UI. That's the core of what they're moving forward with.
Long story short, Honeycomb has HW acceleration in the basic UI. ICS will have that too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. I noticed this, and this was what led to my confusion. They say they're moving forward HW acceleration, but why then are there so many contradictory statements such as "there are these limitations to it....etc...." or other statements that basically say "yea...it's coming....but it's not gonna be what you expect it to be.....".
I'm at work, so I can really watch it again to come up with specific quotes, but if you listen there are some in there IMO...
Does a little bit of lag really bother people this much? I've used an iPhone 4 and still prefer android any day of the week. My Nexus S is the best phone I've ever used.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA Premium App
Zardos66 said:
Does a little bit of lag really bother people this much? I've used an iPhone 4 and still prefer android any day of the week. My Nexus S is the best phone I've ever used.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA Premium App
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Click to collapse
It bothers me, yeah. I find it very frustrating.
I think the lag has been slowly bugging me more and more....i seem to still get scrolling lag and some lag opening the app drawer in cm7 regardless of what I do.... That kind of lag is the first thing people notice... It should be one of the highest priorities for the future
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App
Android 3.0 hardware acceleration, see here:
http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2011/03/android-30-hardware-acceleration.html
ICS is the next evolution (revolution?) from 3.0, so expect the same there.
If ICS will be used in the phone, it would have the same hardware acceleration as well.
So, be happy and wait for the Nexus Prime !
gunstar3035 said:
Your really coming off as a little troll ****. If you love apple so much stick with that and GTFO, thanks.
You come into this topic, posting that iOS is anything more than a giant menu (which by the way it is just an app menu and nothing more) and now your *****ing because you get frustrated by the nonexistant lag in the Nexus S...if that frustrates you I'd hate to see how you cope with a real issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Booooo to you sir, for being a flamer. He posted a reasonable question about a legitimate issue.
There IS lag in Android UI. I see it all the time. The main time I notice is the application opening/closing transition animations. Sometimes they literally render at about 2 to 4 frames per second.
Also there is major lag in Honeycomb on Tegra 2 tablets, but it is because of Tegra 2 bug in portrait mode. It is smooth in landscape but very laggy in portrait.
Holy crap, someone has issues
jonnythan said:
Holy crap, someone has issues
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Click to collapse
Lol. I think his parents never loved him.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App
malikadnanm said:
Lol. I think his parents never loved him.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Love is for the weak.
gunstar3035 said:
Love is for the weak.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The surest sign of strength is calling someone names on an internet message board for speaking about weaknesses of a mobile operating system.
gunstar3035 said:
I'll let you know when I give a ****.
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Click to collapse
I lol'd...
They better add gpu support...
gunstar3035 said:
Love is for the weak.
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Click to collapse
Lol
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App
derekwilkinson said:
I lol'd...
They better add gpu support...
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No GPU support! It's perfectly 100% smooth as it is!
iOS is smoother because it's just an app drawer! iOS is incapable of the incredible things we do on Android.
I mean, iOS isn't smoother, AND it's just an app drawer! Wait, what am I saying?

Hardware acceleration

I've always wondered why the iphone is smooth compared to android, and after a little research I found it's because of one thing: hardware acceleration.
My only question is what is this and why doesn't android have it?
brian85 said:
I've always wondered why the iphone is smooth compared to android, and after a little research I found it's because of one thing: hardware acceleration.
My only question is what is this and why doesn't android have it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This has been asked and answered a zillion times before.Rumor has it that Icecream sandwich is supposed to bring HW acceleration to android.I hope it's true as this is the one thing that makes android feels/seems unrefind.
NYCguy2020 said:
This has been asked and answered a zillion times before.Rumor has it that Icecream sandwich is supposed to bring HW acceleration to android.I hope it's true as this is the one thing that makes android feels/seems unrefind.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
People have said that Android 2.3.5 enables it. Anyone know if this is true?
Hardware acceleration depends on the actual hardware.
iPhone's are all the same hardware so it is pretty easy to implement hardware acceleration for all of them.
The story is different with Android though, because all Android devices use different hardware.
In the end, it depends on the manufacturer to allow hardware acceleration.
boodee0110 said:
Hardware acceleration depends on the actual hardware.
iPhone's are all the same hardware so it is pretty easy to implement hardware acceleration for all of them.
The story is different with Android though, because all Android devices use different hardware.
In the end, it depends on the manufacturer to allow hardware acceleration.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not only that - but I read an article where they state that when Android was being developed - they weren't going to require a dedicated GPU for it to work which is why hardware acceleration isn't native or something like that.
What are you guys talking about hardware acceleration is on Android
debug.af.hw=1
Put that in your build.prop and it enables hardware acceleration
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA Premium App
You can switch to a different launcher or a non-Sense ROM or a ROM like InsertCoin and the UI will definitely be noticeably faster. Take InsertCoin for example. The UI performance is really great and easily outshines an iPhone 4.
boodee0110 said:
Hardware acceleration depends on the actual hardware.
iPhone's are all the same hardware so it is pretty easy to implement hardware acceleration for all of them.
The story is different with Android though, because all Android devices use different hardware.
In the end, it depends on the manufacturer to allow hardware acceleration.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's true, so why doesn't HTC enable hardware acceleration on their Sense powered Android sets, like the Sensation?
Samsung did so on the international Galaxy S, you can see YouTube vids of how incredibly smooth the phone was with that update.
dsexton702 said:
What are you guys talking about hardware acceleration is on Android
debug.af.hw=1
Put that in your build.prop and it enables hardware acceleration
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Guess I was mistaken. Odd that HTC wouldn't enable it.
dsexton702 said:
What are you guys talking about hardware acceleration is on Android
debug.af.hw=1
Put that in your build.prop and it enables hardware acceleration
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Correct me if I am wrong but isn't it debug.sf.hw=1 not debug.af.hw=1
No,don't replay from google developer forum
pakraider said:
That's true, so why doesn't HTC enable hardware acceleration on their Sense powered Android sets, like the Sensation?
Samsung did so on the international Galaxy S, you can see YouTube vids of how incredibly smooth the phone was with that update.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Samsung only integrated hardware acceleration into its web browser. Not the entire UI. Samsung is the new HTC. They are the ones who are innovating now with a hardware accelerated browser, the most powerful mobile chips in the biz, the best mobile memory in the biz, the prettiest displays in the biz (releasing the Super AMOLED HD 720p display next month) and every itteration they make their UI less intrusive. Samsung is definitely taking Android to the next level and leaving everyone else behind. They are listening to their customers and delivering. Along with keeping the bootloaders unlocked and giving phones to popular DEVS so they can start devolopement for them, they are also listening to the people about the plastic they use in their phones. Case and point. Look at T-Mobile's GSII which has the brushed metal cover.
Sent from my HTC Sensation 4G using XDA Premium App
jrwingate6 said:
Samsung only integrated hardware acceleration into its web browser. Not the entire UI. Samsung is the new HTC. They are the ones who are innovating now with a hardware accelerated browser, the most powerful mobile chips in the biz, the best mobile memory in the biz, the prettiest displays in the biz (releasing the Super AMOLED HD 720p display next month) and every itteration they make their UI less intrusive. Samsung is definitely taking Android to the next level and leaving everyone else behind. They are listening to their customers and delivering. Along with keeping the bootloaders unlocked and giving phones to popular DEVS so they can start devolopement for them, they are also listening to the people about the plastic they use in their phones. Case and point. Look at T-Mobile's GSII which has the brushed metal cover.
Sent from my HTC Sensation 4G using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Too bad their devices still feel like cheap plastic. Maybe they should borrow a page from HTC on that one.
--
Sent from my HTC Pyramid.
I would never buy a Samsung again. I don't care what "improvements" they are making. I've had bad experiences with their devices in the past.
Plus, I hate hate hate their super amoled plus screens. I just hate how they look. Reminds me of hdtvs on display at best buy where they crank up all the settings. Then when I buy one I take it home and calibrate to make it look how it should.
Sent from my HTC Sensation 4G using XDA App
dsexton702 said:
What are you guys talking about hardware acceleration is on Android
debug.af.hw=1
Put that in your build.prop and it enables hardware acceleration
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It doesn't really though does it.
It's the same amount of lag even with it on. You want true hw accel look at the SGS2.
It's all to do with the drivers.
None of you still answered his question. Instead of wasting time mention that it's been answer a zillion time just say what it is. PHHUCK!
barondebxl said:
None of you still answered his question. Instead of wasting time mention that it's been answer a zillion time just say what it is. PHHUCK!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The answer is Android does have it, the HTC Sensation does not and changing the build prop won't change jack ****. Hardware acceleration means just that, hardware implementation which allows the GPU and drivers to assist the software/UI. The SGS2 and Nexus S have it, beyond that I'm not sure what other devices do.
jlevy73 said:
The answer is Android does have it, the HTC Sensation does not and changing the build prop won't change jack ****. Hardware acceleration means just that, hardware implementation which allows the GPU and drivers to assist the software/UI. The SGS2 and Nexus S have it, beyond that I'm not sure what other devices do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So many conflicting opinions. This sounds more reasonable because I don't think a simple line in your build.prop can automatically make your phone support hardware acceleration.
So, does this mean that the Sensation is incapable of hardware acceleration, or that it just is for now?
Matt
brian85 said:
I've always wondered why the iphone is smooth compared to android, and after a little research I found it's because of one thing: hardware acceleration.
My only question is what is this and why doesn't android have it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When android was initially in development google didn't specify that a GPU was required (this is pre-iphone, think windows mobile) so they didn't code in HW acceleration. The rumor is that ice cream sandwhich will rectify this since every android phone since late 2009 has a gpu capable of HW acceleration

How well do you think the Nexus S will handle ICS?

I'm sure most of you have seen this video,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=DvsXyeY0HVE#!
Of course this is running on the new Prime which has 1GB ram and a Dual Core processor
But, do you think that ICS will be as fast as Gingerbread was on the Nexus One?
I'm not looking for a definite answer, i'd just like to see your thoughts on the matter.
I fully expect it to run just fine.
It will be faster and smoother with hardware acceleration. Like how the stock launcher is on gingerbread is how the phone should be with ICS
Sent from my Nexus S using xda premium
It will have the same pathetic ammount of RAM, but HW acceleration should theoreticly make it much faster.
Here's another thing id like to add in. I'm thinking that Google may disable the hardware buttons. I noticed that when the screen is off on my Nexus S, you cant even see the outline of the hardware buttons. So if they turned off the hardware lights. It could look like a smaller version of the Prime
There are way too many ICS-ready smartphones I think to not have an ICS version that uses hardware buttons. ICS will run flawless on the Nexus S, even better if hardware buttons are disbled I'd say.
I say yes..... At least hope so. My question is.... will ICS be hardware accelerated? has this been confirmed?
Yes it has been confirmed.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using xda premium
Then honestly, I don't see a reason for ICS to not be smooth as long as long as it's hardware accelerated. If it can match the smoothness of the iPhone 4 then it would be pure epicness.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA App
I fully expect ICS to boost the value of the Nexus S on the used market. Then we sell it and get the Prime!
This was kinda my master plan when I came from the Captivate. Nexus will always have better value.
tylerwatt12 said:
Here's another thing id like to add in. I'm thinking that Google may disable the hardware buttons. I noticed that when the screen is off on my Nexus S, you cant even see the outline of the hardware buttons. So if they turned off the hardware lights. It could look like a smaller version of the Prime
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There would be benefit to disabling the buttons that are already there. It would just waste screen space, that unlike the Prime, we don't have to spare.
It should be fine since its hardware accelerated!!
063_XOBX said:
There would be benefit to disabling the buttons that are already there. It would just waste screen space, that unlike the Prime, we don't have to spare.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if ics has screen buttons to use then to me, there would be no point in theory for the buttons. yea you can keep them and have them running. but i'd much rather have them disabled and have a slicker / nice view of ics running on my phone.
to me its kinda like the same concept of people that use clock widgets when there is the time in the notification panel. disable one, no need for both to be running. ya know
Is hardware acceleration essentially guaranteed to be in ICS?
I thought I read something somewhere that it was possible that some "important" features were going to be pushed back to Jelly Bean. Just hoping hw acceleration isn't one of them if true.
mattkroeder said:
Is hardware acceleration essentially guaranteed to be in ICS?
I thought I read something somewhere that it was possible that some "important" features were going to be pushed back to Jelly Bean. Just hoping hw acceleration isn't one of them if true.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I thought the same thing... I heard that from somewhere too. Is it really that difficult to make Android fully hardware accelerated? I know vanilla android is smooth but not as smooth as IOS.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA App
surveysays said:
if ics has screen buttons to use then to me, there would be no point in theory for the buttons. yea you can keep them and have them running. but i'd much rather have them disabled and have a slicker / nice view of ics running on my phone.
to me its kinda like the same concept of people that use clock widgets when there is the time in the notification panel. disable one, no need for both to be running. ya know
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well yeah, my assumption is that if the phone has hardware buttons that the software ones will be disabled. The point is that while it's dumb to have both, there's no reason to waste screen space on software buttons when there are perfectly good hardware ones. Thus, if it's a choice between disabling the hardware ones or the software ones, the sensible thing to do is disable the software ones. I would be very surprised if Google engineers it any differently.
zorak950 said:
Well yeah, my assumption is that if the phone has hardware buttons that the software ones will be disabled. The point is that while it's dumb to have both, there's no reason to waste screen space on software buttons when there are perfectly good hardware ones. Thus, if it's a choice between disabling the hardware ones or the software ones, the sensible thing to do is disable the software ones. I would be very surprised if Google engineers it any differently.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bingo! Exactly what I'm talking about.
The buttons seem like they took up roughly 1/3 inch from the Prime's screen in all the videos I've seen. With a 4.65" screen that's no big deal but with a 4" that's a pretty significant amount of wasted space, especially when there are perfectly functional buttons on the phone.
zorak950 said:
Well yeah, my assumption is that if the phone has hardware buttons that the software ones will be disabled. The point is that while it's dumb to have both, there's no reason to waste screen space on software buttons when there are perfectly good hardware ones. Thus, if it's a choice between disabling the hardware ones or the software ones, the sensible thing to do is disable the software ones. I would be very surprised if Google engineers it any differently.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yea that is true. i didn't really think it all the way through
Hw acceleration is what I want. One thing about android that fails against the iPhone (for general reasons obviously) is the uneven experience across full use of the phone. Like launcher pro is buttery smooth. But scrolling down the menus in voodoo control is choppy and uncomfortable. Hopefully ics will fix this.
sent from my Touchwiz'd Nexus S 4g
Here's a true question... =_= besides the Prime, Which Version Of Nexus S Will Receive the ICS Update First .... <_< ill be super pissed if sprints receives it first
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Here’s Why Android’s UI Will Never Be As Smooth As iOS Or Windows Phone 7

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The news comes straight in the form of two posts over on Google’s struggling social network Google+: one by a Google engineer who talks about how graphics work on Android and the other by a 3rd year software engineering student in reply to the first post. Both are pretty lengthy and can get pretty technical, so we’ll try simplifying it as much as we can.
We’ll start off with Google engineer Dianne Hackborn’s post. She states that hardware acceleration – i.e. using the GPU, instead of CPU alone, to render the user-interface – has existed on Android since version 1.0 for things such as sliding the notification bar, pop-up dialogues etc. Full hardware acceleration only came with Android 3.0 Honeycomb and, unsurprisingly, Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich actually has the same kind of hardware acceleration and this won’t necessarily sweeten things up.
Hackborn states that hardware acceleration “is not all full of win” since it takes away a lot of RAM when used for devices like Nexus S, Galaxy Nexus with OpenGL. Each process takes about 8MB of RAM and “isn’t worth it” considering the minimal effect it has on how “smooth” the UI looks after implementing it. So yes, hardware acceleration certainly helps, but it takes far too much processing power for it to be implemented to all parts of the UI.
She ends her post on how full, complete, A-to-Z hardware acceleration that results in 60 frames-per-second graphics is simply not possible, even with powerful chips like the Tegra 2.
Now, the question arises: why is it that even seemingly outdated phones like the iPhone 3GS offer a smoother UI than the latest Android smartphones? iOS uses hardware acceleration and that too on weaker hardware. How does Apple’s engineers manage to pull it off, then? Why can’t Google do the same?
That has been answered by Andrew Munn – software engineering student, ex-intern at Google and future intern with Windows Phone 7 team at Microsoft – who states that UI rendering processes in iOS occur with dedicated threads with real-time priority whereas on Android, UI rendering processes occur along with the main thread with normal priority. Whenever an iOS devices detects touch, it stops other processes and focuses all attention to rendering the UI. Android devices don’t do this, instead general processing and UI rendering occurs concurrently which results in choppy UI.
OMG....now developers...any help!!
First of all, it's all in our minds that gingerbread and ICS are all so much better than their predecessors. In reality, if you want 99.99% lag-free, just flash froyo 2.2.1 onto your Galaxy S. I've used JVQ, JVR,JVS, JVT, L41D's ICS and a bunch of custom roms, but the most lag free of all roms was Froyo ZSJPK.
So full acceleration will be in ics OK.
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Drift spunk said:
So full acceleration will be in ics OK.
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Click to collapse
No... The article said they will try to compensate for it with ram. Hardware acceleration well be turned off if it in fact makes the phone slower.
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To my mind, the Android way is the only real multitasked way (if what the intern says is correct...)
Sounds rather silly to stop all background tasks if you touch the screen?
k|zer said:
To my mind, the Android way is the only real multitasked way (if what the intern says is correct...)
Sounds rather silly to stop all background tasks if you touch the screen?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Dude which background process is using your GPU??
It sounds correct, and like some one says, its really random, i mean... you may use a GB and is super smooth, or an ICS and everyone claim it to be super smooth, and for me, is not, and is not by any mean... lets hope, in some ways this things to be corrected at some point...
k|zer said:
To my mind, the Android way is the only real multitasked way (if what the intern says is correct...)
Sounds rather silly to stop all background tasks if you touch the screen?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Indeed, but obviously Apple obviously value smooth UI above strict task scheduling... personally I don't care for style over substance... But if it's THAT important to someone buying a phone for it to look far better than it actually functions, they buy an iPhone!
I LOLd... then I LOLd again. Then stopped, had a deep breath and LOLd for the 3rd time.
So iOS is better because it gives priority to UI rendering, meaning that if you touch the screen like you're possessed, you get low framerate, and that sounds ok to you.
Ok.
That's a different approach, and may I remind you that multitasking was added (well, kinda...) to iOS in... like... 4.0? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS#Multitasking
next gen phones with 2 gb ram
absro said:
So iOS is better because it gives priority to UI rendering, meaning that if you touch the screen like you're possessed, you get low framerate, and that sounds ok to you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What are you talking about?
There are no fps drops.
Actually iOS (and WP7) is incredibly smooth, unlike android.
And to be honest that's a huge advantage for those OSes.
It just feels better.
Android seems to be targeting quantity rather than quality.
At least for now.
The only reason android lag is because of low ram. My galaxy s lags when on JVT and ICS because the free ram is always less than 120mb, hence the cpu has to constantly close and reopen background processes. But on froyo 2.2.1, I always have more than 150mb of free ram and it never lags.
---------- Post added at 01:40 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:38 AM ----------
k|zer said:
To my mind, the Android way is the only real multitasked way (if what the intern says is correct...)
Sounds rather silly to stop all background tasks if you touch the screen?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To me, the only true multitasker that doesn't sleep your programs without your permission or keep programs running when you actually want to exit them are symbian and maemo. At least on those two, when you exit an app, it really exits and when you minimize an app, it really minimizes.
On a multi (core) cpu only bandwidth should limit performance. Using a proper kernel / scheduler it is possible to dedicate a certain amount of processing power to any thread. Why not to the ui?
never say never.
ICS on my galaxy nexus is incredibly smooth.
zyo said:
never say never.
ICS on my galaxy nexus is incredibly smooth.
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teamhacksungs ICS on my i9000 is pretty darn smooth already- Not having seen it on the Galaxy Nexus in person, I can imagine it runs like a dream
moonbeamsyndicate said:
teamhacksungs ICS on my i9000 is pretty darn smooth already- Not having seen it on the Galaxy Nexus in person, I can imagine it runs like a dream
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Click to collapse
It's not smooth. Don't be a dreamer. But it will be smooth. We are sure.
For me 2.3.6 is the most stable stock rom I have ever used. And after adding tweaks and semaphore on deodexed jvx its just better. It dances on my fingers but still their are things which are not as smooth as they should be or can be. I don't think it's is that smooth, windows 7 is smoother(ios Is also pretty smooth but after using them personally I found that wp7 is smoother) . But whatever it is, android is just getting better and better so no problem. Regarding cm9 or ics ports, they are not as good as some people claim. They are good but the best ics will be from samsung. Still I am pretty sure cm 9 will be very good once it goes into nightly.
burakgon said:
It's not smooth. Don't be a dreamer. But it will be smooth. We are sure.
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Click to collapse
Yes not smooth but has less fc's all over other android versions
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zyo said:
never say never.
ICS on my galaxy nexus is incredibly smooth.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've got one as well. It's not that smooth, in fact it seems less smooth than my Galaxy S II.
If it is just about priority, will this app help ?
https://market.android.com/details?...SwyLDEsInNvYXBib3guc3ltM3RyeS5tcm5pY2VndXkiXQ..

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