Motorola hits back with an Intel-core, Android 4.0 smartphone

Motorola is hitting back hard with not only its first Ice Cream Sandwich handset, but with a smartphone running an Intel core. The phone pictured above is an unnamed Android 4.0 device powered by Intel’s new Medfield platform.

What we can gather from the image above, is that the new Motorola phone will be button-free , as well as sport a newer version of the MotoBlur UI. And according to sources, the camera will be one of the hardware highlights of the device, offering 15-frame per second burst capture. Medfield though, will be the selling point.

It’s all about SoC

Medfield is a system on a chip, or “SoC” platform. This means that the CPU, memory, and other functions are embedded into a single device. Medfield clocks in at an impressive 1.6Ghz and contains a hyper-threaded CPU dubbed “Penwell”, as well as the controllers for the GPU, camera and radio.

In independent tests, it’s been shown that Medfield beats the dual-core Samsung Galaxy Nexus in processing performance. Weirdly, Medfield will be single-core, while the Galaxy Nexus is a dual-core beast. It also whips the iPhone 4S with its A5 CPU. Have Intel and Motorola come across the “next big thing” in smartphone technology?

Maybe not, as the GPU is woefully underpowered. Medfield’s GPU, a PowerVR SGX540, is said to be “on par with the competition”. It can encode/decode 1080p video and play it back at 30fps. Other details are as yet unknown.

One niggling detail which remains a mystery is the power requirement of the Medfield CPU. Sources indicate that the chip’s size may be a minuscule 28 nano-meters. The smaller the chip, the less power needed for various system functions. This will also drastically reduce the heat emitted by the mobile phone, something iPhones are notorious for.

Is Motorola primed to release this Intel rocking, ICS beauty? It will certainly place them in the smartphone spotlight. Stay tuned for more.

Image: Pocketnow.com