Raspberry Pi interview: Eben Upton reveals all (Linux User)

> As for performance, I want to see the benchmark results.

I would be satisfied with real user experience. If it is a desktop used for browsing, how fast does it feel.

> The multi-issue super-scalar Cortex-A8 and A9 cores are reported to be able to perform 2.0 and 2.5 DMIPS/MHz, respectively.

The problem with all the nice multi-ussue, super-scalar (and you don't mention multicore for the A9) is that it needs a suitable workload and excellent compiler support or even hand crafted assembler (e.g. NEON) to perform optimally. All the nice high tech does not help if it waits for the network or the mass memory. Unfortunatley it often enough even waits for its "own" cache. I have seen A8 running at less than 30% of its theoretical performance far more often than I would have liked.

> The aging ARM11 core only does about 1.0 DMIPS/MHz. So the claim that a 700 MHz ARM11 (~700 DMIPS) is only 20% slower than a 600 MHz Cortex-A8 (~1200 DMIPS) just doesn't "add up"

Well maybe the imbalance between a too fast CPU and a two slow everything else is just not as bad on the older systems. So I would definitely not rule out a smaller observed difference in performance than what the theoretical maximum figures tell.