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ARM Cortex A-15 MPCore image via ARM

Almost all high-profile mobile devices use a version of ARM’s microprocessor. Samsung, Texas Instruments, and Qualcomm compete to get their chips on different devices, and Apple now makes their own, but all of them license their tech from ARM. Now ARM has announced their next-generation Cortex chip, the A-15, and it’s a doozy.

The new chip was announced at a press conference last night in San Francisco. Eric Schorn, ARM’s vice president of marketing, said, “Today is the biggest thing that has happened to ARM, period.” The chips, which will support up to four processing cores, should appear in consumer devices sometime in 2012.

The big breakthrough for the Cortex A-15 is virtualization. For instance, Samsung’s new Orion chip, which is based on ARM’s Cortex A-9, can send different video images to multiple screens. The A-15 can actually support different operating systems or virtual appliances on those screens. So when VMWare Fusion finally hits your iPad, it might really have something to work with.

Hardware virtualization has traditionally been the hallmark of chips designed to power servers, which frequently have to support different environments; with this chip, ARM is bringing a little bit of the server’s versatility to the smartphone, and (it hopes), some of the power-conserving elements of smartphone chips to servers.

Finally, there’s the markets everywhere in between: tablets, laptops, and home media servers, among others. Om Malik calls the A-15 “a tiny chip with superpowers.” That might not be far off.

See Also:

• Why You Should Get Excited About New Mobile Processors
• Texas Instruments Embraces Next-Gen Mobile Processor
• IBM and Intel Getting a Makeover for Mobile
• Rumor: Apple to Consider Acquisition of ARM
• Development of Apple's iPad Chip Estimated at $1B
• Rumor: iPad's A4 Chip Was Outsourced

We still consider Samsung’s Hummingbird application processor to be among the very best for mobile computers, but this morning Sammy itself is stepping up the charge to make it look real old real fast. The freshly announced dual-core Orion promises to whip us all into a frenzy of geek lust with “5 times the 3D graphics performance over the previous processor generation from Samsung,” 1080p video encoding and decoding at 30fps, embedded GPS, a native triple display controller, and on-chip HDMI 1.3a interface. Those last two bits mean you can drive two displays on your mobile device while feeding a third, such as a HDTV, all thanks to the one all-powerful chip inside. Availability for “select customers” is coming late this year, with mass production set for the first half of 2011. To say we’re looking forward to it would be a massive understatement.

Continue reading Samsung’s Orion is the 1GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 we’ve all been waiting for

Samsung’s Orion is the 1GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 we’ve all been waiting for originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Sep 2010 02:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s a beautiful combination, really — lower power consumption, and support for high bandwidth applications. That marriage is evident in Samsung’s newest Wireless USB chipset, which was built around Ultra Wide Band (UWB) technology and designed to enable high-def streaming between a mobile host device and a tethered device for viewing. According to Sammy, the two-chip solution will be aimed at cameras, camcorders, TVs, PCs, tablets, beam projectors, portable HDDs, Blu-ray players and handsets, and given that it can handle a theoretical high of 480Mbps with an average power consumption of less than 300mW, even the weakest smartphone battery should be able to stream at least a single episode of Family Guy to the tele. Mum’s the word on who all will be lining up to adopt this stuff, but since it’s slated to hit mass production in Q4, we’d say those details should be worked out right around CES 2011.

Continue reading Samsung’s new Wireless USB chipset enables HD streaming with less power

Samsung’s new Wireless USB chipset enables HD streaming with less power originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 04 Sep 2010 08:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yearning for a bit of dual-core action on the move? Who isn’t. Hannspree will soon try to quell that 1080p-sized hunger in all of us with its freshly announced €399 ($507) Froyo tablet. There’s no lack of spec sheet ambition here: a 1GHz Tegra 2 SOC is surrounded by 16GB of internal storage (expandable via MicroSD), an accelerometer, WiFi and Bluetooth 2.1 connectivity, a 1,024 x 600-pixel capacitive touchscreen, and mini versions of HDMI and USB ports. Flash 10.1 is also proudly supported, while the 3,500mAh battery is said to last up to 8 hours when playing 1080p movies. We’d be getting real excited right about now, but we’ve learnt to be cautious with such lofty promises — remember the Gemini?

Continue reading Hannspree pairs Android 2.2 with Tegra 2 for a 10.1-inch multitouch tablet

Hannspree pairs Android 2.2 with Tegra 2 for a 10.1-inch multitouch tablet originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 31 Aug 2010 08:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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And you thought a dual-core 1.2GHz chip was quick. If all goes to plan (that’s a big “if,” by the way), Qualcomm will one-up its Computex standout before the end of this year, with vice president of product management Mark Frankel affirming that his company is on track to ship a 1.5GHz dual-core QSD8672 chip prior to the dawn of 2011. He’s quoted as saying that the blazing new Snapdragon could find a home in smartphones, low-cost laptops and tablet PCs, and while we’re led to believe that the vast majority of said products won’t actually greet consumers until early next year, a few aggressive partners may get wares out “by Christmas.” For those unfamiliar, the fancy new 8672 is based on an ARM design and will be crafted using a 45nm process technology, and the individual voltage scaling will enable each core to be clocked independently of the other in order to maximize battery life and performance. Naturally, 1080p video playback will be supported, as will DDR2, DDR3 and HDMI interfaces. Oh, and don’t sweat it — you’ve still got plenty of time to get on Santa’s ‘good’ list.

Qualcomm to ship 1.5GHz QSD8672 Snapdragon processor in Q4 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Aug 2010 03:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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