back to article Nvidia pledges to pass water on Core 2 Duo this summer

Two cores is not enough for chip maker Nvidia, so today it demo'd 'Project Kal-El' - aka Tegra 3 - its first quad-core processor for mobile devices. 'Kal-El' can drive a 2560 x 1600 display and run 1440p video smoothly on it. Not much call for that in a phone perhaps, but next year's tablets - imagine an iPad with a pixel …

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  1. Lottie

    I fear for the day

    they run out of MArvel superheroes and I get kicked in the face by a DREDD card.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I admit Dredd would be Awsome

      But I would quite like a "Laser Eraser" aka Mysta Mystralis.

      Oh damn. Fantasising about a teenage assassin. I'm as bad as Zirk!

    2. David Simpson 1
      FAIL

      not

      Superman is already not a Marvel character.

  2. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

    Protected names

    Kal-El might be a bit of a problem, but I can't imagine that the same would be true about Wayne, Logan or Stark. After all, Logan and Stark have other meanings, and if DC can prevent Wayne being used, then Mr Roonie and probably Harry Enfield would also have to look out.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not the only one

    This seems to compete directly with another smartphone-to-netbook Cortex-A15-based SoC due before the end of this year, Texas Instruments' OMAP5: http://newscenter.ti.com/Blogs/newsroom/archive/2011/02/07/not-just-a-faster-horse-ti-s-omap-5-platform-transforms-the-concept-of-mobile-615064.aspx Aside from all the graphical oomph, things like USB3 host support and SATA 2.0 make the OMAP5 look like a genuine contender for low-end laptops/nettops.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Boffin

      Not due before the end of this year, its by the end of next year 2012 infact.

      "due before the end of this year"

      that's an odd thing to imply/to say, remember samples do not make 'mass produced' products, only limited run's.

      that that page states

      "Availability

      TI's OMAP 5 platform is expected to sample in the second half of 2011, with devices on the market in the second half of 2012. The OMAP5430 processor is offered in a 14x14mm Package-on-Package (PoP) with LPDDR2 memory support. The OMAP5432 processor is offered in a 17x17mm BGA package with DDR3/DDR3L memory support. "

      that's samples by Q2 not products remember, and even Texas Instruments Brian Carlson on the OMAP5 spec said 'ready for Christmas 2012', so at least 18 months away before real products start being PR advertised it seems.

      http://armdevices.net/2011/02/14/texas-instruments-talks-omap5-omap4 around 2 minutes in

      the only officially stated quad ARM available for products on shelves this year 2011 is the Freescale i.MX 6Quad back in 3rd January so far

      "Freescale is targeting these chips at tablets and similar low power devices. While you hear a lot more about consumer tablets powered by Qualcomm, NVIDIA, and Samsung chips, Freescale’s low power chips are actually available in nearly a dozen tablets from white box Chinese vendors today, and the company’s low power chips power the majority of E Ink eBook readers on the market.

      The company has been a bit behind the curve in the dual core chip space, but by launching new single, dual, and quad-core chips at the same time, Freescale will be among the first companies to make quad core ARM-based chips available.

      All three new chips will begin sampling in the second quarter of 2011, and the company expects devices using the new chips to hit the market before the end of the year."

      see the other thread http://forums.reghardware.com/forum/1/2011/02/16/apple_nvidia_conspiracy

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Fair cop

        Yes, I just misremembered the date I'm afraid. Sorry about that: hope I haven't broken any hearts...

  4. K. Adams
    Boffin

    Yeah, but how long...

    ... can a Kal-El-based tablet push those pixels until it sucks the battery dry?

    More isn't always better, if it ends up being less...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Boffin

      can it even come close to the ARM Mali T604 at 850 milliwatts fully loaded, unlikely

      good question K, can it even come close to the ARM Mali T604 at 850 milliwatts fully loaded, unlikely.

      http://www.rethink-wireless.com/print.asp?article_id=3942

      "

      Mali is designed to work with ARM's latest CPU core, the Cortex-A15, which targets smartphones, tablets and even servers. Up to 16 2.5GHz cores can work together for these larger systems.

      Mali T604 will be compatible with Microsoft’s DirectX 11 and with OpenCL 1.1, both programming frameworks for parallel processing over multiple cores.

      The inclusion of DirectX 11 aroused speculation that this programming technology would soon be supported fully in Windows Phone 7. Currently"

  5. David Simpson 1
    FAIL

    Graph makers

    So who makes graphs that go from 1 to 10 then 10 to 100 ?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Headmaster

      Engineers and scientists among others

      Don't they cover the uses of log scales at school any more?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Boffin

    Graphs

    Quote

    So who makes graphs that go from 1 to 10 then 10 to 100 ?

    Log Scale Graphs thats what.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    did Nvidia cheat with kal_el

    did Nvidia cheat with kal_el to improve the perception!

    it seems maybe they did, perhaps someone should capture that video screen before it vanishes!

    http://blogs.nvidia.com/2011/02/tegra-roadmap-revealed-next-chip-worlds-first-quadcore-mobile-processor/

    comment care of

    BOB ON FEBRUARY 16, 2011 AT 7:53 AM

    "Look very closely at the Coremark slide – they say which compiler version and what switches are being used. The Nvidia SoC’s use GCC 4.4.1 with -O3 and Intel uses GCC 3.4.4 with -O2 etc…

    Why in the world use such radically different environments?

    What are the results if the same compiler and switches are used?

    This really is an unfair comparison it would seem.

    -Bob"

    1. DanielFriedrich
      Happy

      The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits.

      That was covered by heise.de: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Nvidia-zeigt-Quad-Core-ARM-Tablet-1190778.html

      It is in German but the gist is that the code on an Atom D525 (2 Kerne/1,8 GHz) compiled with GCC 4.4.4-10 -O3 -DMULTITHREAD=8 -DUSE_PTHREAD -lrt / Heap / 8:PThreads has a higher score.

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