PowerVRSeries6
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China's Allwinner also has an octa-core chip, touts powerful graphics
Samsung, MediaTek, Huawei and even Qualcomm are now in the octa-core SoC game, but there's always space for more. The latest member is China's Allwinner Technology, who's best known for making the chipsets inside many low-end devices. Like most of its competitors, Allwinner's UltraOcta A80 silicon (pictured above on a development board) uses ARM's big.LITTLE heterogeneous multi-processing design, meaning it can simultaneously run on all eight cores -- four low-power Cortex-A7 and four high-end Cortex-A15. The chip also features Imagination Technologies' 64-core PowerVR G6230 GPU, which promises to deliver "a twofold increase in graphics" performance when compared to Allwinner's previous flagship SoC, the A31 series. We'll spare you from all the nitty-gritty, but you can learn more in the source links below. Expect to see the UltraOcta A80 in affordable devices "in the next few months."
PowerVR Series6 mobile GPUs are almost here, we go eyes-on with a test chip (video)
Imagination Technologies is on a high right now. Throughout 2012, the company's PowerVR graphics processors continued to monopolize the iPhone and iPad as well as appearing in (late 2011) Android flagships, the PlayStation Vita and even the first Clover Trail-powered Windows 8 tablets. But you know what? That's old news, because all those devices run current-gen PowerVR Series5 silicon. Most new top-end devices in 2013 and 2014 will either contain the latest Mali GPUs from rival ARM, or they'll pack PowerVR Series6, aka Rogue. This latter chip is currently being developed by at least eight different smartphone and tablet manufacturers and is expected to make a good bit of noise at CES next week. But who's going to wait that long if they don't absolutely have to? To get a fuller understanding of what awaits us in the coming weeks and months, we scoped out a Rogue test chip at Imagination's sparkly new HQ just outside of London, UK. The test silicon doesn't represent the true power of Series6 because it's running on an FPGA board that severely limits its bandwidth, but it's still able to show off one crucial advantage: namely the ability to run OpenGL ES 3.0 games and apps. This API is all about improving mobile graphics through making smarter use of GPU compute, without annoying the battery, and the three demos after the break show just how it pulls that off. Follow all the latest CES 2013 news at our event hub.
Imagination Technologies unveils G6200 and G6400, first two GPUs based on PowerVR Series6
First announced in February of last year, Imagination Technologies has officially announced the licensing availability of its first two GPUs based on the Series6 platform. The PowerVR G6200 and G6400 each promise to bring low power graphics to unprecedented levels and are said to deliver up to 20 times more horsepower than the current generation while also being five times more efficient. In tangible terms, the Series6 GPU cores are capable of exceeding 100 gigaflops and are said to approach the teraflop range. All chipsets based on Series6 are backward compatible with Series5 and fully support OpenGL 3.x, 4.x and ES, along with OpenCL 1.x and DirectX 10. Further, specific models will also support DirectX 11.1 with full WHQL compliance. Poised to shake up the mobile gaming ecosystem, Imagination has already lined up partners that include ST-Ericsson, Texas Instruments, Renesas Electronics and MediaTek. The full PR, complete with all the bragging, can be found after the break.
Imagination Technologies unveils Series 6 PowerVR GPUs -- promises desktop caliber graphics in mobile devices (update)
Imagination Technologies may not be a household name, but they created the PowerVR GPUs that are the gold standard in mobile graphics, and are a part of the ARM SoCs you find in mobile devices like the iPhone 4, Galaxy S, and the Droid 2. Not one to rest on its laurels, the company unveiled its new Series 6 PowerVR chips -- affectionately known as "Rogue" -- that are 20 to 100 times more powerful than its previous handheld offerings. That's right, these GPUs will have the same horsepower as today's desktop computers while needing only a milliwatt of juice to deliver face-melting graphics -- the catch is that this bit of black magic won't be showing up in devices for a few years. Guess we'll just have to settle for the Series 5 chips -- like the quad core beast found in the Sony NGP and the upcoming OMAP 5 platform -- which the company promises will make their way into select smartphones "within three months." Be still, our gaming hearts. Update: Three months? Hardly, ST-Ericsson has announced a series of new SoC processors, including the Nova 9600 that has "Rogue" baked in. The chip delivers HD video at 120 frames per second and can pull off pro-quality 3D video recording as well. Press release is after the break. [Thanks, Rich]
