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Windows Phone 8 to support multi-core CPUs, HD resolutions, SD cards and NFC
Microsoft is on stage at the Windows Phone Developer Summit offering us a bite of what's to come in Windows Phone 8, and one of the tastiest morsels may just be the noticeably more diverse hardware it will support. The new platform won't just support dual-core processors -- it will support as many as 64 cores, should such massively parallel chips come to exist in the platform's lifetime. Also gone is that long-criticized 800 x 480 display resolution ceiling: if phone builders like, they can either opt for the increasingly common 1280 x 720 or a rarer 1280 x 768. A few subtler feature parities are coming with the upgrade, such as NFC for tags and payments as well as a long, long requested support for SD cards beyond the crude initial expansion. All told, Microsoft just brought Windows Phone right up to hardware parity with its biggest rivals, and possibly a bit beyond. To check out the latest updates from Microsoft's Windows Phone event, visit our liveblog! %Gallery-158713%
Researchers get CPUs and GPUs talking, boost PC performance by 20 percent
How do you fancy a 20 percent boost to your processor's performance? Research from the North Carolina State University claims to offer just that. Despite the emergence of fused architecture SoCs, the CPU and GPU cores typically still work independently. The University hoped that by assigning tasks based on each processor's abilities, performance efficiency would be increased. As the CPU and GPU can fetch data at comparable speeds, the researchers set the GPUs to execute the computational functions, while the CPUs did the prefetching. With that data ready in advance, the graphics processor unit has more resources free, yielding an average performance boost of 21.4 percent though it's unclear what metrics the researchers were using. Incidentally, the research was funded by AMD, so no prizes for guessing which chips we might see using the technique first.
Tilera sees sense in the server wars, puts just 36 cores in its newest processor
While Tilera's forthcoming 100-core processors threaten to set off fire alarms around the world, the company has finally brought out its more sensible 36-core variant. The 1.2GHz Tile-GX36 sips just 24 watts and is designed to be especially handy with short and sharp jobs like processing internet transactions. It's a reduced instruction set (RISC) chip, so it's less power hungry and cheaper than Intel's x86 silicon. It also sports 64-bit architecture, whereas rival ARM is set to remain 32-bit until 2014. Then again, with Tilera lagging behind in terms of brand recognition and software support, a two-year head start might not be long enough.
Engadget Primed: are multi-core chips worth the investment?
Primed goes in-depth on the technobabble you hear on Engadget every day -- we dig deep into each topic's history and how it benefits our lives. Looking to suggest a piece of technology for us to break down? Drop us a line at primed *at* engadget *dawt* com. My, how times have changed over the last eight months. At CES 2011, we ecstatically witnessed the introduction of mobile devices with dual-core CPUs and drooled over the possibilities we'd soon have at our fingertips. Now, we look down at anything that doesn't have more than one core -- regardless of its performance. Not only are these new chips quickly becoming mainstream, Moore's Law is in full effect with our handheld devices since tri-core and quad-core systems are just over the horizon. We can't even fathom what's in the pipeline for the year 2015 and beyond (we don't think we're too far away from that 3D shark seen in Back to the Future 2). Let's not get too far ahead of ourselves here, however. After all, we first need to wrap our puny human minds around the idea of what this newfound power can do, and why it's changing the entire landscape of smartphones and tablets. In this edition of Primed, we'll focus on why multicore technology makes such a difference in the way we use our handheld devices, whether we should even consider purchasing a handset with a single-core chip inside, and why one-core tech is so 2010. Check out the whole enchilada after the break.
ARM hopes to strengthen grip on mobile PCs, take 50 percent of the market by 2015
We've already heard rumors that chip designer ARM has been trying to get its wares into the Macbook Air. While we can't add anything to that particular story, we do have further evidence that ARM is going beyond smartphones and tablets in order to target bigger form factors. The company's president, Tudor Brown, has just appeared at Computex to declare that ARM wants to conquer the "mobile PC market", where the company currently only has a 10 percent share. He's aiming for 15 percent by the end of this year, and an Intel-provoking 50 percent by 2015. "Mobile PC" is a pretty ambiguous category, but we think it's safe to assume the focus is on low- and mid-power netbooks and ultraportables. Such devices could potentially run off ARM's forthcoming multi-core chips -- like perhaps the quad-core beast inside NVIDIA's mind-blowing Kal-El processor, or the more distant Cortex-A15. It's hard to imagine these tablet-centric chips ever competing with Intel's top performers, but four years is a mighty long time in this business.
Researchers boost multi-core CPU performance with better prefetching
Piling on cores is one way to boost performance, but it's not necessarily the most efficient way -- researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a new prefetching technique for processors that could boost performance by up to 40-percent. As you may know, any data not stored in a CPU's cache must be pulled from RAM, but as more cores are added they can create a bottleneck by competing for memory access. To counter this designers use prefetching to predict what information will be needed and grab it ahead of time, but guessing wrong can hurt performance. Researchers tackled this problem from two fronts: first, by creating a better algorithm for divvying up bandwidth, and second, by selectively turning off prefetching when it might slow the CPU. Full PR and an abstract of the study being published June 9th are after the break.
Madfinger announces new Shadowgun game, with Tegra 2 and Kal-El support (update: video)
Madfinger Games, the Czech Republic-based company behind Samurai II: Vengeance, has just announced Shadowgun -- a futuristic, shoot 'em up game for Tegra 2-equipped Android phones and tablets. Available on both the Tegra Zone app and Android Market, Shadowgun promises to bring console-quality graphics and performance to mobile platforms -- presumably with the extra geometric detail and high-res textures we've seen in other Tegra 2-tailored games. Madfinger is also developing a version for devices powered by NVIDIA's forthcoming quad-core processor, alluringly known as Project Kal-El. Price and availability have yet to be announced, but you can find more information in the PR after the break. Update: NVIDIA has just released a demo video, see it for yourself after the break. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Researchers tout self-repairing multi-core processors
The race for ever-tinier computer chips is on, and barring physical limitations, doesn't seem to be slowing anytime soon -- but with chips, as with humans, the smaller they get, the more fragile they become. A team of researchers called CRISP (Cutting edge Reconfigurable ICs for Stream Processing) is working to create a self-repairing multi-core processor that would allow on-chip components to keep on shrinking, while combating concerns over accelerated degradation. Basically, the team's conceptualized a chip that allows for 100 percent functionality, even with faulty components. With multiple cores sharing tasks, and a run-time resource manager doling out those tasks, the chip can continue to degrade without ever compromising its intended functions -- a process CRISP calls graceful degradation. Once one core fails, the on-chip manager assigns its task to another core, continuing on in this fashion for the complete lifetime of the chip. Of course the technology is still in its infancy, but if CRISP's chips comes to fruition, we could see virtually indestructible processors that make 14nm look bulky by comparison.
NVIDIA touts the benefits of multi-core processors for smartphones and tablets
It may simply be a case of stating the obvious, but NVIDIA has just published a rather lengthy whitepaper extolling the many benefits of multi-core processors for mobile devices. That obviously includes some talk about Tegra 2, which is now shipping for tablets (and appearing in some phones), and a couple of fairly bold statements -- namely that dual-core processors will be "the standard" for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets in 2011, and that quad-core processors are coming "in the near future." The ultimate conclusion, of course, is that smartphones and tablets will effectively follow in the footsteps of desktops and laptops, and that as far as NVIDIA is concerned, it intends to be a big part of making that happen. Hit up the source link below for the complete paper (in PDF form).
Console scuttlebutt: multi-core CPU for next-gen PlayStation, Intel inside future Wii
We're but three years removed from the US introduction of both Nintendo's Wii and Sony's PlayStation 3, and already the rumors are running rampant about the future iterations of both consoles. Two separate reports from Japan's Impress touch on both units, with speculation and insider information on the former suggesting that Intel could be in talks with the Big N about powering the second Wii. Hard details are obviously tough to come by, but word has it that the two are mulling a GPU / CPU combo similar to the Larrabee; granted, we'd prefer something a touch more potent in the Wii 2, but we wouldn't be shocked if Nintendo chooses the less powerful path yet again. In related news, it seems as if Sony could be looking for an alternative to its Cell CPU in the PlayStation 4, an alternative that involves some sort of "multi-core CPU." Potentially more interesting is the notion that Sony's next-gen handheld could be out before said console, which is loosely pegged for a 2013 release. We wouldn't take any of this to heart just yet, but we're pretty certain we can't stop the dreamers from going too far.
Microsoft unveils Barrelfish multi-core optimized OS
With current operating systems, as the number of cores increases efficiency decreases. Microsoft Research has just announced an experimental OS, called Barrelfish, that they're developing in conjunction with ETH Zurich, in the hopes that they'll learn how to buck that trend -- both with current and future hardware. Building upon lessons learned with projects including Midori and Singularity, Barrelfish eschews share memory schemes in favor of message passing and a kind of database that shuttles information between cores. Heady stuff, for sure -- but just the kind of thing that sets off our Geek Alarms. If you can't wait to check this one out for yourself, hit the read link for the first release snapshot, in all its Open Source glory. The rest of us will probably remain content waiting to see how this new-found knowledge will trickle down to Windows 7 users in the future. [Via DailyTech]
GeeXboX 1.2.2 LiveCD media player adds multi-core video decoding, now 1080p is possible
Just a few months removed from its 1.2 update, the latest version of the GeeXBoX LiveCD has added multi threaded video decoding for MPEG-1/2/4 and h.264, which should finally let all users decode even 1080p video on dual- and quad-core systems running Linux. Otherwise there's some additional DVD CSS tweaks, updated MPlayer and codec support, so why not burn a copy and take a tour? Load it RAM, pop out the CD and run whatever discs and hard drive stored media your heart desires.[Via Softpedia]
ARM promises dual-core Cortex A9-based smartphones next year
The world's two most visually engaging smartphones -- the iPhone and the Pre -- share very similar cores based on ARM's Cortex A8 architecture, and with the newer, more advanced Cortex A9 in the pipeline, you can't help but let your mind wander a bit as you envision what twice as much computational power could bring to a handset. The A9 employs more advanced instruction pipelining than its predecessor, but the biggest news has to be the fact that it can pack two or more cores -- and ARM fully expects dual-core A9-based phones to hit in 2010. Of course, power consumption is the biggest constraint when it comes to this category of device, and while the company says that peak drain will exceed that on today's crop of devices, average consumption will actually drop thanks largely to a move from 65nm to 45nm manufacturing processes. Add in 1080p video promised by TI's next-gen OMAP4 silicon wrapped around an A9 core, and you've basically got a home theater in your pocket that's ready to rock for a few hours on a charge. That and Snoop Dogg, of course.
AMD adds triple-core Phenom processor to desktop roadmap
We'd heard rumblings about this newfangled three-core approach just two days ago, and now it looks like AMD has gone and gotten all official on us. According to the chip maker, the forthcoming Phenom is "expected to be the world's first PC processor to integrate three computational cores on a single die of silicon." Additionally, it was noted that this design was "a response to demand for increased performance delivered by multi-core processors when running state-of-the-art applications," and AMD apparently hopes to grab the market that isn't quite ready for quad-core CPUs but could use a bit more oomph than their single or dual-core chip is delivering. The devices are set to land sometime in Q1 of next year, and if you're interested in digging around a bit more in the marketing buzz surrounding these bad boys, be our guest.[Thanks, Dave and Jason]
Tilera debuts its sixty-four core processor, melts faces
Chipmaker Tilera, clearly bored with the peasant-like core counts of two or four as offered by such pedestrian competition like Intel and AMD, has decided to turn the game up a notch with their latest diabolical creation: the 64-core processor. That's right folks, Tilera's TILE64 is a new RISC CPU aimed at integrated systems like routers, switches, video conferencing, and set-top boxes that can best Intel's finest by a factor of 30, and casually rocks a bandwidth of something like 32TB per second. The new chip circumvents bottleneck problems that can plague CPUs like Intel's multi-core processors by utilizing a unique "mesh" architecture which allows each core to be decentralized and thus able to communicate more freely with any partner in the grid. Tilera believes the technology might open the door to hundreds or even thousands of cores using the new system. Of course, this is a RISC CPU, so clearly the applications in which it will be used differ somewhat from Intel's offerings, but nevertheless, it remains a tantalizing development in the world of multi-core R&D.[Via TG Daily]
Intel demonstrates 80-core processor
Now that the Megahertz race has faded into the distance (we hear it was a myth), Intel is well and truly kicking off the start of a multi-core war with the demonstration of an 80-core research processor in San Francisco last week. It's not the first multi-core processor to reach double figures -- a company called ClearSpeed put 96 cores onto one of its CPUs -- but it's the first to be accompanied by the aim of making it generally available; an aim that Intel hopes to realize within a five year timeframe. The long time frame is required because current operating systems and software don't take full advantage of the benefits of multi-core processors. In order for Intel to successfully market processors with CPUs that have more than say, 4 cores, there needs to be an equal effort from software programmers, which is why producing an 80-core processor is only half the battle. On paper, 80-cores sounds impressive, but when the software isn't doing anything imaginative with them it's actually rather disappointing: during a demonstration, Intel could only manage to get 1 Teraflop out of the chip, a figure which many medium- to high-end graphics cards are easily capable of. The multi-core war may have begun, but the battle will be fought with software, although that's not to say that the hardware side has already been won: apparently the test chip is much larger than equivalent chips -- 275 mm squared, versus a typical Core 2 Duo's 143 mm squared -- and Intel currently has no way to hook up memory to the chip. Hopefully half a decade should be long enough to sort out these "issues."[Thanks, Michael]
Intel goes multi-core crazy for "Keifer" server line
We've been seeing the multi-core trend oncoming for a while now, but it seems Intel isn't just kidding around with the idea. The word on the street is that they have plans for a 32 core chip line named "Keifer" in the next few years to bust on those server tasks, which will no doubt be as boring and onerous as the processes of today. The good news is that while those chips will be fairly low on GHz -- about one third of the fastest Xeon CPU currently available -- but they'll manage 15x the performance with all those cores working in parallel, running a total of 128 threads. Based on a 32nm process, each Keifer should have eight processing nodes holding four cores, with a total of 24MB of cache between them. It appears Intel is most worried about keeping up with the multi-core efforts of Sun's Ultra Sparc chips, with little fear for AMD's Opteron roadmap, but with these Keifer chips being due around 2010, we're wondering how long it'll take for all this crazy multi-core action to trickle down into laptop chips for 32x (or 15x, as it were) the portable fun. The biggest hurdle of all, however, could be a consumer Microsoft OS that can fully help software take advantage of multiple cores, a task which Vista isn't quite up to.
Intel renames next-gen dual-core chips "Core 2 Duo," unveils quad-core Tukwila
Intel's been busy in the realm of multi-core processors lately, first unveiling their quad-core replacement for the Itanium Montecito, named Tukwila, and today -- taking a page out of MC "2 Legit 2 Quit" Hammer's book -- renaming the next-gen mobile Merom and desktop Conroe dual-core chips "Core 2 Duo." What's more, the company announced that another version of the processor will be released for performance junkies, called, not surprisingly, "Core 2 Extreme." As for Tukwila, the deets on this server-targeted chip came to light thanks thanks to a little digging by Real World Technologies, who found a set of slides that Intel recently presented on the topic at a conference in Asia. According to RWT, Tukwila will run at an estimated 40 gigaflops, sport 6MB of L3 cache for each core, and feature other additions that IT-types will likely be into, including an on-die FB-DIMM memory controller and Common Systems Interconnect (CSI) router. First called "Tanglewood" and scheduled for a 2007 rollout, Tukwila will now be released in 2008 and go head-to-head with other enterprise offerings from Intel and Sun, probably making it an exciting year for those aforementioned IT-types.Read- Core 2 Duo [Thanks, Dave Z.]Read- Tukwila [Via The Register]
