[Nexus 9 General] doitright:
Ok, lets look at this from a different angle;

For something to be defined as supporting "OpenGL 4.5", it has to support all of the "extensions" that define that version of OpenGL, as well as pass the definition of "appropriateness" and a set of conformance tests. When something is defined as "OpenGL ES 3.1" it doesn't mean that it has *precisely* the extensions that define ES 3.1, it means that it has AT LEAST the extensions that define ES 3.1.

Not to say that it has EVERYTHING that defines OpenGL 4.5 though... since some of those extensions are NOT present (or available... remember that what the driver advertises at the native level and what ANDROID EXPOSES are two separate things....) because they would actually be HARMFUL to a mobile device. Think of it in terms of storage space and RAM -- the CHEAPEST desktop graphics card these days has a GB of dedicated RAM, on top of 8+ system RAM, and desktop storage space is measured now in TERABYTES and is cheap as hell. On Nexus 9, you have 16 or 32 GB total storage, and 2 GB of SHARED RAM. Really not all that much available to waste. So the heavy RAM parts are stripped out.

BUT, there are certainly more extensions available than the minimum defined by ES 3.1. In particular, there is the Android OpenGL ES Extension Pack, which confirms the presence of a bunch more extensions that make up OpenGL 4.5, still without the ones that would be HARMFUL to the mobile experience.

https://developer.android.com/about/versions/android-5.0.html#Graphics

https://www.khronos.org/registry/gles/extensions/ANDROID/ANDROID_extension_pack_es31a.txt

What this all adds up to, is a definition of what is appropriate API to use on Android devices. This is basically the LIMIT of what software developers are ALLOWED to use in writing software for Android. Whether a *device* advertises "OpenGL 4.5" or not is irrelevant, since Android is what defines the limits permitted by software developers.

I.e., there is no software available in play store that will make use of more than OpenGL ES 3.1 + Extension pack, and any software developer who ACTUALLY USES extensions beyond that is an utter MORON because (a) virtually nobody will actually be able to use that, and (b) it will be a poor end user experience on those device that have a hacked-up build of Android (shield) that claim support for the extensions that are not appropriate for mobile, since it will clog up storage and RAM and grind the tablet to a choppy low-FPS halt.

---------- Post added at 05:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:39 PM ----------

That is a very weak claim... basing your opinion of a CPU on poorly written software.

We've already addressed this; when the SD810 is crammed into a phone, they throttle back early due to poor heat dissipation. They are also throttled from the get go in those phones in order to reduce the RATE of heat buildup. As a result, whatever benchmarking sites you've "learned" this from are actually providing inconclusive results... especially since they are obviously comparing phones to tablets, which have very different heat management capabilities.

The fact is that the A57 cores are stronger than Nvidia Denver cores on a core-by-core basis. *IF* you were to apply equal heat management to an SD810 and a Denver, and unthrottle them both, you would see the Denver fall behind *slightly* in single-threaded, and MASSIVELY in multi-threaded.

According to what? http://www.phonearena.com/news/Prel...mm-made-the-faster-SoC---with-caveats_id65973

** SD810 and Exynos 7420 are virtually *identical*. Samsung went with their own chip because it saves them MONEY. On top of that, Samsung has been caught red handed CHEATING on benchmarks in the past. What do you do when you get caught cheating? Do you learn not to cheat? No, you find a more sophisticated way to cheat so you don't get caught.