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ARM Announces Dual-Core Cortex-A9 Processor Designs
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I'd just like to point out that the article says these are macro cores. ie. this isn't a processor just yet and certainly not an SoC that iPhone uses.
Someone has to take this 'design' and build external bus's around, functional blocks like IO ports, GPU etc. Then FAB it out somewhere.
Unless Apple had early access like around a year ago, we will not be seeing this in any Tablet or iPhone by July 2010.
PA Semi are working off either Cortex A8 or the single core A9 macro's and if they're wanting dual core they will have built their own bridging/power mgmt logic around these older designs.
I'm expecting great things to come out of the PA Semi acquisition but this isn't one of them, certainly not first time out of the gate.
Someone has to take this 'design' and build external bus's around, functional blocks like IO ports, GPU etc. Then FAB it out somewhere.
Unless Apple had early access like around a year ago, we will not be seeing this in any Tablet or iPhone by July 2010.
PA Semi are working off either Cortex A8 or the single core A9 macro's and if they're wanting dual core they will have built their own bridging/power mgmt logic around these older designs.
I'm expecting great things to come out of the PA Semi acquisition but this isn't one of them, certainly not first time out of the gate.
Seems well suited for an Apple tablet though. This is probably why it's coming out next year instead of last week.
The Cortex-A8 is rated at 0.59 mW/MHz which at the iPhone's 600MHz is 354mW which is still significantly less than 500mW.
OK, I'll take the bullet and potentially look like and idiot and ask.....
ARM- is this a type of processor and the name of a business? P.A. Semi works with ARM chips- so they get chips from ARM or they design their own ARM style chips?
ARM- is this a type of processor and the name of a business? P.A. Semi works with ARM chips- so they get chips from ARM or they design their own ARM style chips?
I still think the reason Apple kicked PPC support out of SL is so they can bring in ARM support. x86/ARM fat binaries. You read it here first...
It makes a lot of sense when you put the pieces together. Why would they spend so much time overhauling the inside of SL to be more efficient (to make sure it compiles and runs well on ARM).
It makes a lot of sense when you put the pieces together. Why would they spend so much time overhauling the inside of SL to be more efficient (to make sure it compiles and runs well on ARM).
this nicely sums up why my sig is what it is.
Anyway, this will be great. It's truly amazing how powerful these tiny devices have gotten.
ARM is the name of the chipline and the company.
ARM designs the core of the chip. They then license that core to companies with chip expertise that build or buy components to add to the chip. PowerVR is one provider of additional components. Samsung, NVidia, and, presumably, Apple take the core and build a system out of it.
So, an ARM announcement about new cores means that the cores will appear at the heart of a someone else's design at a later date.
The Cortex-A9 is slightly faster than the A8 and is available as a single core chip, so that is probably the version that will end up in the iPhone. Since it uses less power per core, it should help with the battery life and overheating iPhone situation.
Hopefully we'll see these in future iMacs.
If we wanted our iMacs to run 1/2 as fast as they currently do, then yes. These processors are great for laptops / mobile devices. Desktop computing needs power, not energy efficiency. Intel does a great job keeping the horsepower up, and the energy down. ARM will not outdo Intel in the desktop market anytime soon, if ever.
Hopefully we'll see these in future iMacs.
iMac, not. But we might see these inside things like high end tablets and wifi routers. I think 0.5W is to much power for a phone battery to handle.
The big market for this is "embedded". Maybe a controller for a xerox copy machine or ATM bank machine or even a marine radar on a small boat.
Most of thre computers you own are embedded in other devices. For example your $95 microwave oven or your TV set. You car has four or five computers. Set top boxes, routers, modems all of these have computers inside
I suspect that is in the plans.
Right now the kernel running on the Mac and the one running on iPhone are very similar. So porting GCD to iPhone should be easy in that respect, porting UIKit and Foundation may be a bit more work. Like on Mac I suspect there would be immediate benefit to some apps.
However I don't think GCD will be porter because of dual core ARM processors, instead I see the need to support OpenCL as a big factor. Once Apple has multi core GPUs in the SoC that are compatible with OpenCL people will want to use them. I could even see Apple using a core or two for signal processing. So OpenCL compatible GPUs will be a big factor in GCD moving to iPhone OS.
This isn't something flowing out of my behind either as Imagination has already announced that a future GPU core is compatible with OpenCL. It would be an interesting engineering study but I suspect that GPGPU computing could have a big thermal pay off on iPhone. But yah two normal CPUs would be nice too.
Dave
Right now the kernel running on the Mac and the one running on iPhone are very similar. So porting GCD to iPhone should be easy in that respect, porting UIKit and Foundation may be a bit more work. Like on Mac I suspect there would be immediate benefit to some apps.
However I don't think GCD will be porter because of dual core ARM processors, instead I see the need to support OpenCL as a big factor. Once Apple has multi core GPUs in the SoC that are compatible with OpenCL people will want to use them. I could even see Apple using a core or two for signal processing. So OpenCL compatible GPUs will be a big factor in GCD moving to iPhone OS.
This isn't something flowing out of my behind either as Imagination has already announced that a future GPU core is compatible with OpenCL. It would be an interesting engineering study but I suspect that GPGPU computing could have a big thermal pay off on iPhone. But yah two normal CPUs would be nice too.
Dave
GPGPU computing would probably be VERY efficient on the iPhone, the question would be how _useful_ it is for iPhone-style apps. Vector arithmetic wouldn't be the constraining factor on most of the apps I've ever seen. I could see more efficient threading being useful to a wide variety of applications, but OpenCL, not so much.
But none-the-less, GCD is at the heart of OpenCL, so if they don't get GCD running, they won't get OpenCL running. So if I'm wrong (and I'm happy to be wrong) if OpenCL is important, so is GCD.
Someday the iPhone will be the Mac Mini. Just plug it in a docking station and have it be the computer to power your 24 inch display, mouse, and keyboard running the full Mac OS X desktop. Perhaps have a Bootcamp feature to run iPhone Apps on your touch screen 24 inch display.
Imagine...
Mac on the Apple Tablet.
ARM on the Appe Tablet.
That means recompiling the current Mac applications for the new chip, as well as implementing a new touch-like interface.
How much effort may that require from developers? THAT IS THE KEY QUESTION WHEN DECIDING IF CHOOSING ARM FOR THE TABLET OR WAITING FOR INTEL PINE TRAIL OR LATER INTEL CHIPS (ALREADY IN THE WORKS AT INTEL).
Mac on the Apple Tablet.
ARM on the Appe Tablet.
That means recompiling the current Mac applications for the new chip, as well as implementing a new touch-like interface.
How much effort may that require from developers? THAT IS THE KEY QUESTION WHEN DECIDING IF CHOOSING ARM FOR THE TABLET OR WAITING FOR INTEL PINE TRAIL OR LATER INTEL CHIPS (ALREADY IN THE WORKS AT INTEL).
Things that need to happen:
Apple brings a new design to the table featuring the nice aluminum back of the original iPhone, maybe curved? I think this would settle better with the heat.
Allow multi-tasking. If you're gonna have that much power in a phone (hopefully with a great deal more RAM) let tasks run in the background. Would be a nice 4.0 update.
Apple brings a new design to the table featuring the nice aluminum back of the original iPhone, maybe curved? I think this would settle better with the heat.
Allow multi-tasking. If you're gonna have that much power in a phone (hopefully with a great deal more RAM) let tasks run in the background. Would be a nice 4.0 update.
Hopefully we'll see these in future iMacs.
Are you high?
Put a fu*king desktop processor in the iMac already!
Some have already tried but I will give it another go.
That is I will try to clear up what this means.
First; with respect to PA Semi we don't know what they are up to with respect to a new chip for Apple. They could be doing their own ARM compatible core, the could be doing a high integration Atom SoC, the could be building on ARM macros or none of the above.
Let's assume that PA is actually taking the route that most think they are taking which is an ARM based System on Chip (SoC) implementation for Apple. For those that don't know a SoC is a chip that has the processor core and many of it's subsystems integrated on board. On some embedded platforms this includes flash and RAM, but I doubt Apple will go that route.
So how is a SoC built. Well in simple terms out of blocks often referred to as IP. These blocks or cells represent various parts of the functionality required for the design goals for the chip. In the case of this announcement ARM is saying they have a dual core functional block ready to go for the designer. It is an important thing to understand that this is not a fully functional chip yet.
This is where firms like PA Semi, TI, Samsung and the like come in. They take this IP mix it with IP from Imagination, ARM, other companies and themselves to come up with a tailored SoC. This is bleeding edge and allows for fast time to market. In the case of Samsung they have recently worked with a firm called Intrinsity (hope that is spelt right) to lower the power profile of their A8 implementation.
In any event these sorts of announcements are carefully planned and may hint at what is coming from PA for the tablet, AppleTV and other Apple devices. It is a given they had early access if you believe they are going the SoC route with mostly standard IP. So we have the potential to see this core soon in Apple prducts.
Now the above is all well and good if you believe that PA is being charged with glueing up a custom SoC from standard IP. I'm going to suggest that that is not the case, they could continue down that route with Samsung. Instead I see Apple putting the strength of PA Semi into something more custom and with a longer life potential. What I'm suggesting is that PA is working on a fully custom Extended ARM compatible processor.
Why you may ask. Well it is simple really, ARM is 32 bit and as such has a finite life in a device like this. I suspect Apple would hit the 32 bit wall rather quickly so I'm thinking this will be either a 64 bit refactoring or a extended 48 bit chip. The idea of course is to give them the additional address space they will need real soon now. Wishful think, nuts or what?
@@@@@@@@
As a side note this release corresponds or marches forth with a lot of others of the last few weeks that point to somebody driving the industry to a new round of tech releases suitable for tablets. For example:
1.
A new RAM standard was recently finalized for low power devices.
2.
One company announced a new compacitive Touch screen controller for devices up to 11" in size.
3.
Samsung has announced a partnership that created a lower power version of iPhones processor.
4.
This ARM announcement is interesting if PA had early access.
The list goes on but a whole generation of chips are becoming available that have the potential to enable some really interesting handheld hardware. Interesting times are ahead.
I just hope this tablet of Apples is Sized and configured in a way that people will want to buy it. Oh and priced right.
Dave
That is I will try to clear up what this means.
First; with respect to PA Semi we don't know what they are up to with respect to a new chip for Apple. They could be doing their own ARM compatible core, the could be doing a high integration Atom SoC, the could be building on ARM macros or none of the above.
Let's assume that PA is actually taking the route that most think they are taking which is an ARM based System on Chip (SoC) implementation for Apple. For those that don't know a SoC is a chip that has the processor core and many of it's subsystems integrated on board. On some embedded platforms this includes flash and RAM, but I doubt Apple will go that route.
So how is a SoC built. Well in simple terms out of blocks often referred to as IP. These blocks or cells represent various parts of the functionality required for the design goals for the chip. In the case of this announcement ARM is saying they have a dual core functional block ready to go for the designer. It is an important thing to understand that this is not a fully functional chip yet.
This is where firms like PA Semi, TI, Samsung and the like come in. They take this IP mix it with IP from Imagination, ARM, other companies and themselves to come up with a tailored SoC. This is bleeding edge and allows for fast time to market. In the case of Samsung they have recently worked with a firm called Intrinsity (hope that is spelt right) to lower the power profile of their A8 implementation.
In any event these sorts of announcements are carefully planned and may hint at what is coming from PA for the tablet, AppleTV and other Apple devices. It is a given they had early access if you believe they are going the SoC route with mostly standard IP. So we have the potential to see this core soon in Apple prducts.
Now the above is all well and good if you believe that PA is being charged with glueing up a custom SoC from standard IP. I'm going to suggest that that is not the case, they could continue down that route with Samsung. Instead I see Apple putting the strength of PA Semi into something more custom and with a longer life potential. What I'm suggesting is that PA is working on a fully custom Extended ARM compatible processor.
Why you may ask. Well it is simple really, ARM is 32 bit and as such has a finite life in a device like this. I suspect Apple would hit the 32 bit wall rather quickly so I'm thinking this will be either a 64 bit refactoring or a extended 48 bit chip. The idea of course is to give them the additional address space they will need real soon now. Wishful think, nuts or what?
@@@@@@@@
As a side note this release corresponds or marches forth with a lot of others of the last few weeks that point to somebody driving the industry to a new round of tech releases suitable for tablets. For example:
1.
A new RAM standard was recently finalized for low power devices.
2.
One company announced a new compacitive Touch screen controller for devices up to 11" in size.
3.
Samsung has announced a partnership that created a lower power version of iPhones processor.
4.
This ARM announcement is interesting if PA had early access.
The list goes on but a whole generation of chips are becoming available that have the potential to enable some really interesting handheld hardware. Interesting times are ahead.
I just hope this tablet of Apples is Sized and configured in a way that people will want to buy it. Oh and priced right.
Dave
Grand Central could help with that. The OS can close the UI thread and leave special background queues with CPU and I/O quotas open.
Can someone explain to me why an ARM processor is so power efficient, while my Intel uses ~20 watts, and my desktop uses closer to ~100 watts?