The Samsung Galaxy J7 is powered by a Snapdragon 615 chipset or a new-generation mid-range Exynos chipset. Both have 1.5GB of RAM. The Exynos chipset is a 7-series chip built on Cortex-A53 cores but with Mali-T720 graphics instead of Adreno 405. We have the Exynos version inside our review unit.
On paper, the A53 processor is clocked higher inside the Exynos chipset compared to the Snapdragon. In the Exynos chipset all 8 cores run at 1.5GHz, while the S615 version has them in a 2x1.4GHz + 2x1.0GHz setup.
On the GPU front, the Mali GPU should be faster, but both the Mali and the Adreno support OpenGL ES 3.1 for the latest graphics effects.
Our first benchmark, the AnTuTu 5, gives the Galaxy A8 a slight edge in performance. The Helio X10-based Xiaomi Redmi Note 2 also places higher, though not as high as its 2GHz octa-core A53 processor implies.
The Sony Xperia M4 Aqua is based on the Snapdragon 615 chipset and has a 720p screen, but is slightly behind the Galaxy J7 in this test. Basemark OS II 2.0 has the J7 and M4 Aqua swapping places - the speed advantage depends on the workload, apparently.
