How good is the domestic Loongson? I was shocked after watching the test

When talking about "Chinese chips", many people's first reaction will be Loongson.

Since the beginning of its development in 2000, Loongson has a history of fifteen years. Although the media occasionally reports some news about Loongson, the outside world knows very little about it because it is difficult to see the real thing on the market. From the beginning of the project, the Loongson R&D unit, the Institute of Computing Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has been determined to achieve a world-class CPU; so what level has their product reached today in 2015?

Let us first understand some background knowledge: Loongson is a CPU series developed by the Loongson Project Group of the Institute of Computing Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It is compatible with the MIPS instruction set and has completely independent intellectual property rights.

Loongson has three product lines: 1, 2 and 3, which correspond to the target markets of ultra-low power embedded chips, low power SoCs, mainstream PCs and server CPUs. Currently, the most powerful model of Loongson is the Loongson 3B-1500 CPU, which has 8 cores, 32nm manufacturing process and main frequency of 1.2GHZ; the second is the quad-core Loongson 3A 1.2GHZ.

Because the MIPS instruction set used is different from the mainstream x86 and ARM, the Loongson platform cannot directly run most common performance test sets; in addition, due to the lack of large-scale product launches and the scarcity of users, it is difficult for the media and evaluation agencies to understand its actual performance. Fortunately, the Institute of Computing Technology has released some internal performance test data, from which we can analyze the strength of Loongson.

The test software used for calculation is the cross-platform test set SPEC CPU 2000, which is commonly used in the professional field. Many mainstream CPUs have SPEC running scores available, which makes our comparison convenient.

First, let's look at the SPEC_int test. This test examines the CPU's single-threaded integer computing capabilities, which is related to the performance of common applications for general users. The comparison is between the Loongson 3B-1500 1.2GHZ, Apple A8 1.4GHZ, ARM Cortex A57 1.7GHZ and Intel Core i7 4770 4GHZ.

The performance of Loongson is quite miserable, with the score being only a little more than half of that of A57. In other words, in common single-threaded integer applications, mainstream flagship phones can easily beat Loongson 3B.

Next is the multi-threaded test SPEC_int rate. The Institute of Computing Technology only provides the multi-core test score of the quad-core version of Loongson 3A. We found the score of an old quad-core i7 965 3.2G for comparison.

The main frequency of Core i7 965 is less than 3 times that of Loongson 3A, but its multi-threaded integer performance is more than 7 times that of the latter. The performance of the new generation of mainstream Core series CPUs is even stronger now, which shows how big the gap is between Loongson and the CPU. Even if the performance of the 8-core Loongson 3B is twice that of 3A, it is still far behind the mainstream PC CPU.

SPEC test is still far from ordinary users, and in this test, CPU manufacturers can manually adjust the test code to optimize performance, but similar optimization methods may not be effective for mainstream applications. In a paper from the Institute of Computing Technology, we found the results of Loongson 3A running the common JS test Sunspider, and see how big the gap is between it and mainstream devices:

The results are quite astonishing: the performance of Loongson is less than one-tenth of the A8 chip used in iPhone 6.

It is not enough to talk about performance alone, the power consumption of the chip is also an important indicator. The Institute of Computing Technology gave a data: the typical power consumption of the 8-core, 32nm Loongson 3B is about 30w. Compared with its weak performance, 30w power consumption is too high.

You probably already know what Loongson is capable of. The actual performance of Loongson 3B, developed for servers, is not as good as that of mainstream mobile phones. This is the cruel reality facing computing. The current Loongson products are not competitive at all in the mainstream market, and the so-called replacement of imported chips is wishful thinking.

Fortunately, the research and development unit of Loongson has realized the huge gap between its products and those of its competitors, and is working hard to catch up. According to the public information of the Institute of Computing Technology, the next generation of Loongson with several times the performance will be available at the end of the year at the earliest, and is expected to reach at least the technical level of AMD. If the plan can be completed on time, PCs based on the Loongson core can meet the basic office needs of party and government agencies and begin to be widely promoted in government units. This is a very attractive prospect for Loongson.

Of course, what Loongson can achieve in the future depends entirely on how strong they are. In the past, the Loongson project team always liked to brag and aim too high, but the actual product performance was extremely poor, which made people laugh. If the Institute of Computing Technology throws away unrealistic fantasies and works steadily, Loongson can still get a share of the market; otherwise, it will just go down in history and be forgotten like those failed domestic brands in the past, and future generations will only talk about it after dinner.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.