The recent release of the Tegra 3 powered HTC One X led me to think whether we needed Quad Core processors or were they just an added spec to create a marketing hype ?
They're used on PCs , why not my phone ?
Now Quad Core processors on PCs are perfectly justified because developers code apps in a way where applications can make use of the multiple cores or 'threads' on your processors , majorly I believe because there is a fairly large number of people using quad core processors on their PCs but taking a look at android there are currently only two devices running the Tegra 3 namely the One X and the Asus Transformer Prime , so if I as a developer were to make an app for the android platform , I wouldn't really bother optimizing my app for use on quad core devices because it would be a lot of work for such a niche customer base .
More cores does not equal more power .
At the surface of it , it might appear as if "multiple cores are like multiple processors , so more cores should mean more power , right ?" well not really , think about it , if you ran 'Dangerous Dave' on your PC it would run the same or at best slightly better than it did on your PC in '95 right ? So until the software end is optimized to be run on multiple cores , if it's not it's kind of useless , your OS however is optimized to run on quad cores so most first party apps should work really fluidly up-to the full potential of your processor .
Well They Can't be all Useless , can they ?
No , not at all , quad core processors are awesome and really great if used with optimized software , at the same time there are some really innovative uses , for example 'Ubuntu for Android' which utilizes your phones processor to run your PC dock / Lap Dock . I think in this transient tech world in a while quad cores would be standard on all phones and we'd be calling octa core processors 'overkills'.
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