Overclocking the iphone ?

Exactly. I'd also be curious what people would hope to gain by doing this. Since the majority of the iPhones functions are internet bases, the limitations are more often set by data speed than processor speed.

Kudos for being able to say you've done it without your device going up in flames? 🙂

The apps I have seen that might benefit from a faster processor (i.e. the really laggy ones) are down to poor programming rather than a shortcoming of the CPU speed anyway. If they can get games like Monkeyball running well then I can see no reason for an application like Palringo (for example) to slow the device to a crawl.

Ed.

If you think that battery life is a significant limitation of the "stock" iPhone.... Don't try to transform the phone into a full fledged tablet notebook. Unless you want it to be a much larger device (i.e like a Newton), or there is a new revolutionary battery technology that no one has heard of, accept it for what it is - a cell phone with exceptionally good web/email access and limited app capabilities.

Apple has done it of course. See this regarding the original iPhone and the 1.1.2 update. Note that the internal ARM CPU is capable of running faster.
Now I may be wrong, but I thought I saw somewhere that the iPhone was actually clocked up with a later update to the 600Mhz speed. I don't think this is true, but I thought I read it somewhere else. Either way, it's possible. Well, there you have it.

-MacUser

"Overclocking" is defined as running the CPU faster than its was designed for. If Apple conservatively underclocked the original iPhone CPU when it was first released, then later bumped it up closer to max, that isn't overclocking.

I know what overclocking is. What I was meaning to say is that Apple has clocked it up before. Sorry for the confusion there. Poor choice of words on my part. 😉
Apparently it was underclocked to begin with, in order to conserve power. The ARM CPU is supposedly able to run up to 700Mhz. Not bad.

In this case, I don't think you would want to overclock this thing beyong that. The problems you could face with heating/cooling, overall performance, etc., would probably outweigh the increased the improved speed. No point to it I think.

-MacUser

Of course, cpu speed isn't the only variable. Whether or not you can speed up the bus and memory access, also factors in.

Another, more useful variation, would be to severely underclock at times to save more power.

There are several such utilities for WM phones. You can set which apps get what speed, and/or set speeds for different cpu loads.

For example, you can specify that SlingPlayer gets boosted to 440 MHz on a normally 390 MHz system. But other, simpler apps, drop to 100 MHz.

This can give many more hours of extra operation.

True, some cpus are powered "down" with lower voltage and/or frequency, by way of software and hardware that detects the need for less performance. The iPhone ARM has that option, called the "ARM Intelligent Energy Manager".

I know from earlier experience, that correctly messing with the voltage and clock at the same time is something not to be done without manufacturer aid.

Actually, that brings up an interesting thought. I wonder if the scroll and other delays people see in some software versions are in any way related to an attempt to save more power?

Actually once I had a Fujitsu-Siemens Pocket Loox T830, a WinMo based device, which had a built-in application allowing you to change the performance. It had three modes: normal, power saver and performance. When I would switch to the performance mode, ALL of the applications would perform considerably faster and you know on WinMo you can always "feel" this. It ain't as responsive as iPhone.

So, theoretically, it shall be possible to overclock the iPhone CPU to it's nominal speed (600 or so Mhz).

Its possible some of the unlocked phones have tried it.

Its probably a horrible idea since the iPhone has no way to adjust processor cooling.

And it runs a little on the warm side at times already. Overclocking sounds like a very bad idea indeed to me!

Ed.

I thought most mobile CPUs are automatically underclocked under lighter loads nowadays?

Ed.

Apple actually underclocks the processor on the iPhone.