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Underclocking the iPhone 4? Discuss!

B

berrytarts

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 7, 2010
55
0
Hey people!
I was wondering if it was possible to underclock the iPhone 4's processor even further, to conserve battery power?
If iOS 4.1 has brought better/lousier battery power, wouldn't underclocking be better?
Or are there 'side-effects' attached to this method of saving the battery?
Unless the iPhone 4 is already underclocked to be the same speed as the 3GS, i don't see why it isn't possible to bring iPhone 4 to be the same speed as iPhone 3GS then.

What do you think?

-Lawrence
 
You want to cripple a device like the iPhone 4 for the sake of conserving battery power?
Would you buy a Ferrari and put a lawnmower engine in it to save fuel? Enjoy the damn thing and stop worrying. Or buy a 3GS.
 
You do know I'm not trying to cripple the device, do you?
The 3GS functions perfectly normally.
Why I wouldn't get a 3GS?
Cause the battery is better in the iPhone 4 of course. So it would be like having a 3GS with a better battery, and considering how the 3GS has no issues at all, why not?

-Lawrence
 
So you're of the impression the 3GS would run the higher res screen, HD recording, Facetime and whatever else iPhone 4 has, just as well, just not with as good a battery?
 
No, I am not.
Please stop flaming me. I just wanted to know if its possible.
And what exactly am I worrying about? I'm sure its not the damn thing.

-Lawrence.
 
A lot of it depends on how you use your device. Do you tend to do lots of FPS gaming vs accessing stuff like calendar, the odd card game, book reading and "easy" stuff like that?

Apple don't tend to release details like this but I suspect that for my usage (more the latter category above rather than extensive FPS gaming) my A4 is massively underclocked most of the time anyhow. Modern processors dynamically change their clock speed when they're idle or near idle so, just because the A4 is rumoured to clock at 800MHz, that is the maximum clock frequency and I would guess that for my usage pattern it is running at more like 100MHz for most of the time. The holy grail on this is to be able to totally power down unused parts of the CPU or reduce their clock frequency to 0Hz and they (the CPU design industry) are working hard on that but it is much more difficult to do than a layperson might think.

Apple have purchased two entire semiconductor design companies in the last 12 or 18 months and they both have a lot of expertise in dynamic clocking within the CPU and other power saving techniques. As long as you're not an FPS gamer constantly running your iPhone at max CPU power then, the better the job that Apple have done on dynamic underclocking, the less benefit you will see from user underclocking, i.e. lowering that 800MHz upper bound to something lower. This is an area of innovation that I hope will see real strides made by Apple in the A5/A6/Ax silicon moving forward.

Bottom line is that I have no idea how to do it but, if it was possible, then I expect that if you are an avid FPS games you would lower performance and ruin your gaming and if you run less demanding apps then it's probably not worth it anyhow since the CPU will be doing this for you.

- Julian

P.S. I share your concern with Battery life, it's something of an obsession of mine.
 
I see, and I tend to just use the native apps that Apple provides us with, other than Winterboard, but that's about it.
I do enjoy light gaming such as Tap Tap Revenge but not frequently.
Thanks for letting me understand about this!:) Okay now how about overclocking!

Just kidding.
-Lawrence
 
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