WWDC 2012 keynote roundup. Thanks superchunk!

[famousringo]

superchunk said:

rocketpig said:

superchunk said:

There is no technical reason Siri couldn't have been on iPhone 4 and various iTouch/iPod devices, but it wasn't.

Actually, there was. There is hardware built into the 4S chipset that is specifically for noise-cancelling background noise. Siri would technically work on iPhone 4 but it won't work well (as people who have Jailbroken their iPhone 4's and used Siri can testify). The hardware doesn't meet Apple's requirements for the service. They could have put it on the device but Apple errs on the side of caution and would rather not have a feature on a device than have one that works poorly. It's not a perfect scenario but I understand their decision, though it kinda sucks for iPhone 4 owners.

iPhone 4 CPU is ARM Cortex-A8.
iPhone 4S CPU is ARM Cortex-A9. (dual core)

Both are 800MHz with 512MB ram.

While A9 has some newer features, there are many comparisons out there that show same core/clocks speed produce very similar and in some cases better results for A8. The only real difference that clearly matters is the 2nd core. But, I am not an expert in this area and can only relate to the few forums I read and personal experience with friends. Sad.man shows one angle and I have friends with 4S and 4 with Siri and get same results. Only time 4 users had issues is when the Apple server simply didn't connect.

I realy think it was just Apple wanting people to upgrade more so than a hardware difference. After all this is the same company that instead of saying, yeah the antenna design is bad, they said no you're holding it wrong... here's a free bumper case. (even though they redesigned the Verizon version to fix the issue) Surely the 2nd core makes what is definitely a complicated app run better, but I don't think it flat out wouldn't have worked or worked noticeably worse over all.

Rocketpig isn't just blowing smoke here. There's a lot more to mobile SoCs than just clocks and cores in the CPU:

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/02/another-reason-why-apple-may-be-limiting-siri-to-iphone-4s/

Despite these similarities, the iPhone 4S differs from the iPhone 4 in two important ways. The first is that Apple used a separate chip from Audience to perform the background noise processing for the iPhone 4. The iPhone 4S, on the other hand, relies on an integrated version of the processor built directly into the A5 processor.

According to an S-1 form filed with the SEC for Audience's stock IPO, the company disclosed that "Apple has integrated our processor IP in certain of its mobile phones." More specifically, Apple licensed the technology to integrate into its own silicon instead of buying separate chips. (Audience made this disclosure since it earns less revenue for the license royalties than it does selling chips to Apple, its biggest customer.)

More important is the fact that the A5 includes a newer version of Audience's earSmart background noise processing than that used in the iPhone 4. According to Audience, its second-generation technology includes a number of improvements to processing speed and filtering algorithms, including the ability to filter "far-field" communications. In other words, the improved processing can filter voice input when a device is held away from the face—the way Apple often shows Siri being used.

Now, if you want to talk about Apple and forced upgrades, you might want to talk about features like email VIPs and offline Reading List. Probably not very resource-intensive, still not making it to 3GS. On the other hand, if I still had my 3GS, I'd probably just be glad I was getting new features at all after three years.