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My take on TSMC vs Samsung (Chip-gate)

sanke1

sanke1

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Nov 9, 2010
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After reading so much material on the net, I came to the conclusion that

6S : TSMC chip runs 4-5 degrees cooler and has 10-15 % better battery life compared to Samsung chip. This is only when doing CPU intensive tasks like geekbench stress test.

6S Plus : Samsung chip runs at same temperature as TSMC. This may be due to larger size of phone allowing better heat dissipation. Battery life is more or less the same on both. But many tests put Samsung ahead with 1-2 % better battery life. This may be because of smaller die size 14nm vs 16nm of TSMC.

Final conclusion

If you want to buy 6S, you can try to exchange till you get TSMC as it is clearly better on there.

If you want to buy a 6S Plus, Samsung is better by margin of hair.
 
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Just curious if such differences really matter that much to people.

I know two people at work who have iPhones. They use them. If I told them about the the type of chip they may or may not have their eyes would glaze over and the reaction would be one of total indifference. They have absolutely no concern over what is in their phones, let alone how it functions. It's a tool and about the only thing they care about is what color they got and what case they put it in.

Those of us who care anything at all about this are a minority.

For everyone else this is…boring.
 
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I was also indifferent about it. We had 2 6S in our family. One with mother and the other with my sis. Out of them my sis used to complain a lot of phone heating while playing candy crush and battery not lasting even half a day. So out of curiosity I tested them both using the web based app. No surprise, she had the Samsung chip. But my mom's had TSMC. I got it exchanged and and luckily it's a TSMC for her too.

She immediately noticed the difference when it comes to battery life and heat.

I alao pitted my 6S plus (Samsung) against my friend's 6S Plus (TSMC) and the results were reversed.

Whatever you can to dismiss calling it beating a dead horse, but the horse is very much alive and the issue is real. That was my first hand experience.

I think both the chips are almost same but 6S plus has extra room for heat dissipation and hence does better on Samsung chip.
 
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This is the first that I have heard that Samsung is better than TSMC for the 6S Plus. Why would that be?
 
eyoungren said:
Just curious if such differences really matter that much to people.

I know two people at work who have iPhones. They use them. If I told them about the the type of chip they may or may not have their eyes would glaze over and the reaction would be one of total indifference. They have absolutely no concern over what is in their phones, let alone how it functions. It's a tool and about the only thing they care about is what color they got and what case they put it in.

Those of us who care anything at all about this are a minority.

For everyone else this is…boring.
Click to expand...

Just because laypersons complaints don't manifest in the form of what chip is inside doesn't make it any less relevant in their world. So many people in the real world were moaning about page and app refreshing, poor battery life, bending issues but don't know anything about RAM, chip manufacturer or what series of aluminium the device is made from.

Like I said, doesn't make any difference whether someone knows the cause of the problems or not, a problem is a problem. I bet if you said to your friends "would you prefer an iPhone with a slightly better battery life?" as opposed to waffling on about Samsung/TSMC they'd say "of course!"
 
sanke1 said:
After reading so much material on the net, I came to the conclusion that

6S : TSMC chip runs 4-5 degrees cooler and has 10-15 % better battery life compared to Samsung chip. This is only when doing CPU intensive tasks like geekbench stress test.

6S Plus : Samsung chip runs at same temperature as TSMC. This may be due to larger size of phone allowing better heat dissipation. Battery life is more or less the same on both. But many tests put Samsung ahead with 1-2 % better battery life. This may be because of smaller die size 14nm vs 16nm of TSMC.

Final conclusion

If you want to buy 6S, you can try to exchange till you get TSMC as it is clearly better on there.

If you want to buy a 6S Plus, Samsung is better by margin of hair.
Click to expand...

Can you post the links to the articles that say Samsung is better for the Plus model? I only found the Tom's Hardware one.
 
NovemberWhiskey said:
Can you post the links to the articles that say Samsung is better for the Plus model? I only found the Tom's Hardware one.
Click to expand...
There are few youtube videos saying Samsung is better on 6S Plus. One where the reviewer kept calling Samsung as Sony but his video looks legit apart from name gaffe.

I am unable to post youtube as it is blocked in my office.

Then my own test on 6S Plus confirmed it for me.

If it's just 6S, TSMC wins hands down even for day to day battery life. If buying 6S Plus, it is a non issue there.

I wonder how people here plainly defend Apple by dismissing the issue outright. They don't even consider an iota of possibility. Or they have Samsung in their 6S and hate to admit it?
 
If the performance difference were a huge contrast like the Exynos 7 vs Snapdragon 810, maybe I'd care but if it's only 1% or so, doesn't seem that important!
 
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Jsameds said:
Just because laypersons complaints don't manifest in the form of what chip is inside doesn't make it any less relevant in their world. So many people in the real world were moaning about page and app refreshing, poor battery life, bending issues but don't know anything about RAM, chip manufacturer or what series of aluminium the device is made from.

Like I said, doesn't make any difference whether someone knows the cause of the problems or not, a problem is a problem. I bet if you said to your friends "would you prefer an iPhone with a slightly better battery life?" as opposed to waffling on about Samsung/TSMC they'd say "of course!"
Click to expand...
Really?

Because all those complaints you mentioned I only seem to hear about here on MR.

Both of my coworkers use technology (one is having difficulty in grasping the concept of copy/paste on the computer) and neither of them has ever complained about battery life, bending, or anything else to me. They are happy with their iPhones. Neither of them is interested in tech beyond how to use it to make their life easier.

You may be right that if I were to ask them about slightly better battery life they might say "Sure!" Then again, they may not when I tell them exactly how much better "slightly" is. One of them has her iPhone in a dock on her desk all day. It's irrelevant to her. The other has a lightning cable at her desk if she needs it.

My point is that I don't think this matters much beyond the walls of MR or tech related forums.
 
HEK said:
0.1 mm larger, really? That's as thick as the width of this letter....l
Click to expand...
Yes 6S Plus has larger physical dimensions length x breadth compared to 6S. How hard is to understand that as both are of almost similar thickness.
 
Seeing a Samsung Chip in an iPhone is Deja Vu for me all over again. Heat Issues is a Samsung thing too. Just migrated from the Note Series. And now integrating both Google and Apple Ecosystems.
 
Whatever happened to using your phone and then charging when it gets low?

Question. What is 10-15% longer battery life? 1 hour? 30 minutes? Anything less than 1 hour is really not worth gambling another phone over.
 
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Elisha said:
Higher resale value?
Lol as if the average used iPhone buyer even knows anything about chipgate!
Click to expand...
And in that lack of knowledge would be willing to pay more for a marginal increase in battery life.
 
arjun90 said:
Seeing a Samsung Chip in an iPhone is Deja Vu for me all over again. Heat Issues is a Samsung thing too. Just migrated from the Note Series. And now integrating both Google and Apple Ecosystems.
Click to expand...
Well, quite a few different iPhone (and other Apple devices) parts have been made by Samsung (and/or other similar companies) over the years.
 
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