# Why does the nexus score so low on benchmark tests?



## velocity92c (Jan 23, 2012)

I realize benchmarks on cellphones aren't the perfect way to judge a phone's performance but I'm curious why my girlfriend's stock T Mobile S2 absolutely crushes my OC'd Nexus in every benchmark out there. Same with her brothers HTC Amaze. Weren't our phones supposed to be the best of the bunch? I'm wondering if I just don't have it tweaked very well or if it's just not as powerful as I wish it was. If it's the former can anyone recommend some tweaks I can use to enhance performance? I'm running liquids most recent ROM and am OC'd up to 1.35ghz. I guess I'm a little upset that the most expensive, "flagship" phone is being outperformed by other phones. Is this a limitation of our phone or can I tweak this thing to make it run better?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## Burncycle (Aug 6, 2011)

Which phone feels faster?


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## zwade01 (Jun 16, 2011)

What were the scores?

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## landshark (Aug 6, 2011)

You do realize, of course, that benchmark tests can be manipulated so that you can get just about any phone to score a ridiculously high number. That's how completely invalid benchmark scores are as relates to the actual performance of the phone. Just saying.


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## kpluiten (Dec 28, 2011)

Probably because your phone is pushing around 2.4 times as many pixels as his is. 480x800 vs 1280x720. You do the math. Enjoy you smooth, good looking screen. Let him impress others with his pixelated, fast benchmarks.


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## Lumenii (Jan 25, 2012)

kpluiten said:


> Probably because your phone is pushing around 2.4 times as many pixels as his is. 480x800 vs 1280x720. You do the math. Enjoy you smooth, good looking screen. Let him impress others with his pixelated, fast benchmarks.


This.

The larger resolution being pushed out by the graphics on this phone, combined with graphics hardware acceleration not present on most older phones, put out a much higher graphics workload than on such older phones. This does, however, primarily concern GPU performance rather than raw CPU or I/O performance.


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## yarly (Jun 22, 2011)

As already mentioned, you should take little stock into benchmarks you run yourself or in benchmarks for phones in general since every single one has different hardware and does not provide for accurate results. However, the GPU in the Nexus is a little on the weak side compared to some others out there and a little older, but it's still better than nearly every other Android GPU out there for a phone.

http://www.anandtech...ial-performance



















http://www.anandtech...l-core-cortexa9

If you want a more relevant benchmark, you should be running the opengl test one, not some rubbish like quadrant. You can get it here: http://www.glbenchmark.com/ or here https://market.andro...k.glbenchmark21 . That will measure your GPU's raw power with a more modern and well development benchmark test.

If you want to measure the CPU's raw power, then linpack is a semi decent estimate. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LINPACK_benchmarks


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## jhankg (Nov 14, 2011)

How is this for a low quadrant score? 
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## velocity92c (Jan 23, 2012)

Yes that quadrant score is high but still much lower than my girlfriend's stock s2 and her brother's stock HTC Amaze. I hadn't considered the screen resolution so that makes sense. As I mentioned both of their phones are stock so there was no manipulation to score high on the benchmarks. Both of their screens look much better for some reason too, which is bizarre considering our screen resolution is higher. I guess I'm a little disappointed in my Nexus as I was hoping it would be the fastest phone out there and while it is definitely the fastest phone I've ever used, my girlfriend's s2 is definitely much faster/snappier and her screen looks much better too, all completely stock. I was running good looking apps like osmos and wind up knight side by side and her phone looked much brighter and just better overall. I'm still working on finding the right rom and kernel and tweaking my phone just right so hopefully by the time I figure it out my nexus will run circles around their phones, as it should.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## WhataSpaz (Feb 20, 2012)

jhankg said:


> How is this for a low quadrant score?
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


Is that all?


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## deltaechoe (Jul 20, 2011)

I'm waiting for people to learn that flexing benchmarks scores is little more than meaningless. The only real use for a benchmark is to mark a reference for yourself under certain conditions. If you continuously change how you do benchmarks, then the numbers become completely meaningless. Benchmarks tend to only be useful to developers and really don't do anything for the end user except maybe to tweak a few settings in their custom roms. My point, being, that benchmarks don't really matter to you if you aren't doing any real developement on the phone and instead you should be focusing on how responsive the os feels to you. For example I could get my old thunderbolt running sense up to around 3.5 or 4k (i don't remember the exact number but it was kind of high) on quadrant, what does this mean? Absolutely nothing, the oem skin was still laggy as hell.

Anyway, tl;dr version, benchmarks are pretty meaningless, take the natural smoothness of the gnexus at face value


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## Jubakuba (Sep 8, 2011)

Well if you wanted a phone to perform amazing Benchmark scores...
You shouldn't have gotten the GNex.
It's GPU is outdated.
Don't hate on me for saying that...but it's very true.
Combine that with a large dpi and 4.65in screen...bad benchmarks.
The GNex (for me) is primarily about software.
I would have still gotten it if it was 1.2ghz single core OMAP of some sort.

While they're rebooting their phones...
Waiting for it to settle...
And running quadrant 4-5 times to get the max score...
You can rub future versions of Android in their noses.
Combine that with the fact that 4.0 was BUILT FOR OUR PHONES...and you get a mega-snappy experience here.
5.0 or whatever comes next will feel the same.


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## yarly (Jun 22, 2011)

Jubakuba said:


> Well if you wanted a phone to perform amazing Benchmark scores...
> You shouldn't have gotten the GNex.
> It's GPU is outdated.
> Don't hate on me for saying that...but it's very true.
> ...


Was that a poem? Too long for a haiku though so I improvised



> Galaxy Nexus
> Benchmark scores questionable
> But still they persist


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## Jubakuba (Sep 8, 2011)

I have a terrible habit of hitting return and using ellipsis endlessly when I write informally. Don't judge me


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## yarly (Jun 22, 2011)

Jubakuba said:


> I have a terrible habit of hitting return and using ellipsis endlessly when I write informally. Don't judge me


No harm was meant  . It spurred to a improv a benchmarking haiku


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## Jubakuba (Sep 8, 2011)

yarly said:


> No harm was meant  . It spurred to a improv a benchmarking haiku


Lol, I realized that emoticon looked awfully harsh there. I took it in stride, sir. Lol'd to be honest. And am now refusing to tap return. Not even once.


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## m1ghtysauc3 (Jul 24, 2011)

Quadrant score contests are for guys with tiny wieners. The scores mean close to nothing.

Sent from my self-aware Galaxy Nexus running GummyNex


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## Drkknight74 (Dec 14, 2011)

I have compared both of these phones together as well and I would have to say that the gnex has a much better looking screen, especially on full brightness. They're both snappy phones but software and display wise the gnex is the winner here.

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## Rythmyc (Jul 23, 2011)

velocity92c said:


> Yes that quadrant score is high but still much lower than my girlfriend's stock s2 and her brother's stock HTC Amaze. I hadn't considered the screen resolution so that makes sense. As I mentioned both of their phones are stock so there was no manipulation to score high on the benchmarks. Both of their screens look much better for some reason too, which is bizarre considering our screen resolution is higher. I guess I'm a little disappointed in my Nexus as I was hoping it would be the fastest phone out there and while it is definitely the fastest phone I've ever used, my girlfriend's s2 is definitely much faster/snappier and her screen looks much better too, all completely stock. I was running good looking apps like osmos and wind up knight side by side and her phone looked much brighter and just better overall. I'm still working on finding the right rom and kernel and tweaking my phone just right so hopefully by the time I figure it out my nexus will run circles around their phones, as it should.
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


Sell your phone, or trade it for a SGS	II or HTC Amaze. This will solve your quadrant envy. Period, end of thread.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using RootzWiki


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## velocity92c (Jan 23, 2012)

I thought I had cleared this up, but I forgot that mentioning benchmarks on any android forum is a good way to get people to completely disregard your entire post and say something like omglolurstupid. FORGET that I ever mentioned the word benchmark. I compared these 3 phones, their 2 phones stock, straight out of the box, and mine with a custom ROM, overclocked and all jazzed up and both of their phones were still much better looking, and much snappier than mine. I only mentioned the benchmark because (as pointless as they may be), their scores absolutely CRUSHED mine, and the user experience does as well.

Someone suggested I go with one of their phones, unfortunately they're both T-Mobile phones or I can't. I would gladly use a GS2 if VZW offered one, it's clearly a superior phone.


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## EFoxwell (Jul 19, 2011)

When they brag about their benchmarks, play an HD video for them.  Or just show them how absolutely smooth it is. Especially vs a Sense phone.

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## m1ghtysauc3 (Jul 24, 2011)

Every couple of months a phone comes out that is better than the last, so even if your GNexus was your saviour phone, soon it would pale in comparison to what's available. So why care? Just enjoy what you have. If you spend the remainder of your contract putting your phone side by side with every phone you see, you're going to be a miserable person. Just let it go.

Sent from my self-aware Galaxy Nexus running GummyNex


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## nmyeti (Jun 7, 2011)

Jubakuba said:


> Well if you wanted a phone to perform amazing Benchmark scores...
> You shouldn't have gotten the GNex.
> It's GPU is outdated.
> Don't hate on me for saying that...but it's very true.
> ...


While i'm sure that your post was insightful, i was too distracted by your avatar to continue reading it.


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