We live in an amazing time when, thanks to the rapid development of microelectronics, it becomes more and more difficult to determine what is the difference between a phone and a smartphone.
Just a dozen years ago, this was obvious: an enlarged color screen indicated that the device belonged to a more advanced class. Accordingly, ordinary cell phones dispensed with displays that display a black and white picture in pseudographic mode. Since then, much has changed, and this difference between a smartphone and a mobile phone has lost its relevance. For example, now you can buy a mobile phone with only basic functions, but a huge
touch screen.Smart Devices
To answer the question of what is the difference between a smartphone and a phone, it is necessary to recall what functions were added by developers to an ordinary mobile phone, which later made it possible to call such an improved model a “smart phone” (from the English smart). At the time, the appearance of new modifications was restrained by the fact that all existing devices already coped wonderfully with their main task - making calls both in the networks of mobile operators and to stationary terminals.
Increasing the transmitter power to increase "range" was impossible, since it was necessary to meet the requirements for an acceptable level of radiation. Something fundamentally new was needed to attract potential buyers and interest them. So, first a calendar appeared in mobile phones, then a scheduler with a reminder mode, a converter of the most “popular” currencies. Soon, in almost every communication device, one could find a browser for browsing Internet resources, an email program, a calculator, etc. In other words, the phone from the device for making calls began to turn into a kind of pocket electronic assistant - a smartphone. That was the beginning.
So, in the light of the above, the first difference between a smartphone and a phone can be formulated - this is the presence in the device of additional features that are in no way connected with the main purpose. Currently, this direction is actively developing: smartphones allow you to work with office documents, tables, watch movies and play games.
Platform ... core ... brain
Of course, the difference between a smartphone and a phone is not limited to built-in additional programs. Since it is more expedient to use a large color display for the convenience of using all the features, this has become the standard in most modern mobile communication devices. The graphic component also underwent a change, becoming much more perfect. To ensure an acceptable speed of complex programs and graphics, it was required to install fairly efficient processors in the devices. Hence the following difference between a smartphone and a phone - in the first there is a high-speed computing unit, and the amount of RAM is hundreds of megabytes. To understand where the “smart” and where the “simple” phone are, it is enough to compare the power of their processors: for example, it can be 1 GHz and 200 MHz, respectively.
Applications
Finally, one of the key differences is the presence of an open operating system, for which a large selection of programs from third-party developers is available, which the user can install at his discretion. It is worth noting that although most cell phones allow you to install programs for the Java virtual machine, this does not rank them as a class of smartphones. Also, if in an ordinary mobile phone the operating system is tightly protected and does not provide updates for new versions, then in smartphones running Android, Windows Phone, iOS, Belle, and others, the user can install an advanced control program.