NVIDIA Talks Next-Gen Tegra

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While most of you couldn't give a hoot about NVIDIA's mobile tech, I know there are at least a few of you that will be interested in these two white papers.

The first whitepaper outlines the patented fifth core. This extra core – which we call the “companion core” – runs at a lower frequency and operates at exceptionally low power. The second whitepaper discusses the benefits of quad-core across different types of use cases – web, games, apps, multitasking and more. We also highlight examples of how quad-core Kal-El uses less power than dual-core processors across all performance points.
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"patented fifth core" next week apple will receive a patent for this technology and sue nvidia in further attempts to shut down android :p
 
Kejan said:
"patented fifth core" next week apple will receive a patent for this technology and sue nvidia in further attempts to shut down android :p
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Well clearly it is in violation, because the premise of a core would ultimately be too simple to a rotten apple core.
 
It's not that I don't care about Nvidia's mobile tech, it's just that it isn't nearly as accessible as PC tech. I can go out and buy a Geforce card for $100, but I have to wait 2 years for my cell phone contract to be over before I even think about getting a new cell phone. Even then I still gotta pay over $200 for the phone with a 2 year extended contract.

It'll be a long time before I can get my hands on anything Tegra related.
 
AT has a nice overview of the architecture and plan as well. Nvidia is really pushing them selves to be a leader in this market and they seem to be on the right track. I think they are creative enough to really move the ARM market in a much faster fashion than any other company out there right now.
 
Ashbringer said:
It's not that I don't care about Nvidia's mobile tech, it's just that it isn't nearly as accessible as PC tech. I can go out and buy a Geforce card for $100, but I have to wait 2 years for my cell phone contract to be over before I even think about getting a new cell phone. Even then I still gotta pay over $200 for the phone with a 2 year extended contract.

It'll be a long time before I can get my hands on anything Tegra related.
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the most prevalent Tegra 2 devices are Wifi only Android Tablets and even my wifes Zune HD has an original Tegra in it if i am not mistaken. So I own two Tegra devices, neither are phones, neither have contracts, both are very nice. .....not sure where you got that from
 
Talk is nice but they haven't brought anything to market that's really interesting. When that happens I can reevaluate. Even doubling of their current GPU would not make it as fast as the Mali 400 which already came out at the beginning of the year and I'm sure they haven't stopped trying to create a faster GPU also. Since they are already late with their offers again I doubt any lead if they do achieve it will last any significant amount of time.
 
I actually believe in Tegra now. I got a Motorola Photon 4G which has a Tegra 2 processor and the power of the device is amazing. I have been playing this game a lot lately:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXoFlSYakuo
It looks as good as any game on my 3DS.

Now, soon this other game optimized for Tegra 2 devices will be released:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aVttB25oPo
It looks a step beyond 3DS.

Also, my phone has an HDMI cable and I am able to play the games on a monitor if I ever feel like. Mobile gaming devices, specifically those powered by Tegra are going eat the lunch of portable systems like the PSVita and N3DS. Moreover, as amazing as Tegra 2 is, Tegra 3 will be 5 times faster. The future is bright for this platform. In 2 years (Tegra 3's successor), I will be carrying a phone that can play current Source games at a decent clip, and that is a wet dream IMHO.
 
godhandiscen said:
Also, my phone has an HDMI cable and I am able to play the games on a monitor if I ever feel like. Mobile gaming devices, specifically those powered by Tegra are going eat the lunch of portable systems like the PSVita and N3DS. Moreover, as amazing as Tegra 2 is, Tegra 3 will be 5 times faster. The future is bright for this platform. In 2 years (Tegra 3's successor), I will be carrying a phone that can play current Source games at a decent clip, and that is a wet dream IMHO.
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You do release don’t you that Tegra is slow as mobile tech goes? Just look at how poor Tegra 2 is. x3 to x9 slower than everyone else. Tegra 3 is a 2012 chip giving early 2011 performance. Just like Tegra 2 was a 2011 chip giving 2010 performance.
The graphically chip in the PSPVita with 2 cores is faster than Tegra 3. Only the Vita has 4 cores so far faster.

The future is not bright for Tegra, its very dark, more and more are dropping it due to the slow performance of Tegra 1, 2 an now 3. NVidia are a good year behind everyone else in this market. Tegra 3 according to recent benchmarks is only x2.5 faster then Tegra 2. Considering Tegra 2 is more than x3 slower than everyone else it’s not looking good for Tegra. I really don’t understand why so many people are excited about Tegra.
 
I was thinking more tablets which is where Tegra really lags behind but even in phones Tegra is behind but not as much as in tablets. Look at anything with a Mali-400 or SGX543 or better and Tegra is half the speed or worse. Even the old chips like the SGX540 often beat Tegra.

If Tegra 3 is only just matching Mali-400 and SGX543 how on earth is it going to compete against the next generation due shortly?
 
Pottsey said:
I was thinking more tablets which is where Tegra really lags behind but even in phones Tegra is behind but not as much as in tablets. Look at anything with a Mali-400 or SGX543 or better and Tegra is half the speed or worse. Even the old chips like the SGX540 often beat Tegra.

If Tegra 3 is only just matching Mali-400 and SGX543 how on earth is it going to compete against the next generation due shortly?
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Maybe with Tegra 3+?
Do you guys really think that the other players will have 28nm chips out anytime soon? Where do they get their chips made anyway? TSMC? Or does qualcam/TI/Samsung,etc have their own 28nm fabs for making the chips?
 
NVidia own projected speeds for Tegra 3+ are noticeably slower than the competition. Assuming everyone hits their own roadmaps which I guess is a big if.
 
Pottsey said:
I was thinking more tablets which is where Tegra really lags behind but even in phones Tegra is behind but not as much as in tablets. Look at anything with a Mali-400 or SGX543 or better and Tegra is half the speed or worse. Even the old chips like the SGX540 often beat Tegra.

If Tegra 3 is only just matching Mali-400 and SGX543 how on earth is it going to compete against the next generation due shortly?
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Could you point me to tests that show Tegra is half the speed of Mali-400? The ones I've seen put it at least on par if not slightly faster.
 
Got to reading about the SGX543, nifty, pretty much it is a quad core SGX540 with 84% scaling efficiency for those that wondered, seems that if Nvidia doesn't offer a different version with higher core count on the graphic end with power gating then yeah it would be an inferior product.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4686/samsung-galaxy-s-2-international-review-the-best-redefined/17

All in all tho just seeing the variance on the same powervr sgx540 scores i would currently take the scores with a grain of salt and instead look for tests on the specific phone//tablet of interest.
 
They are rushing another product into the market that we dont need, and they have failed to even provide Linux drivers/Andriod updated past Froyo for the already current Harmony platforms. (Viewsonic Gtab etc)
 
Nvidia does seem to having a lot more troubles with Tegra than most people anticipated. Tegra 3 is apparntly slower per clock than they were anticipating aswell.
 
I have no info to back this up, but i thought tegra phones were still faster for games?
 
You euthanised your faithful companion core more quickly than any test subject
on record. Congratulations.
 
You guys crack me up, Nvidia doesn't want to be the fastest, they want to be the cheapest. Look how well its worked out for them too!
 
Trimlock said:
You guys crack me up, Nvidia doesn't want to be the fastest, they want to be the cheapest. Look how well its worked out for them too!
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Not very well they have almost the smallest market share at the peak and now out of the few useing them they have lost almost all the big deals with most big names swaping to other peoples chip.

refraxion for now Ipad2 is still the fastest tablet.
 
Pottsey said:
Not very well they have almost the smallest market share at the peak and now out of the few useing them they have lost almost all the big deals with most big names swaping to other peoples chip.

refraxion for now Ipad2 is still the fastest tablet.
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who dropped them? the Asus Transformer is still carrying them which is proving to be a very popular device.
 
Trimlock said:
who dropped them? the Asus Transformer is still carrying them which is proving to be a very popular device.
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LG, Motrorla, Samsung I believe all switched over to others (mostly OMAP) for next gen in 2012. Apparently the Amazon Kindel dropped Tegra as well and has gone with OMAP but I want to see more confirmation on that. Asus Transformer is the only semi big name I am aware of who plan to keep using Tegra.

That's not to say there are no others just I have yet to find any. In a way Google dropped them as they are no longer part of the reference platform which is what got most of their sales last time around.

Tegra market share is around 3% if you exclude Apple and much lower if you add Apple. It looks like Tegra market share will drop well below 1% if it isn't already.
 
That number is including cell phones. While the Tegra2 had a phone in mind it only really took off with tablets. The only phone I know of that has used the Tegra2 is the Atrix, which honestly makes it a flop in the phone market which is dissapointing. I would have to say samsung using the Tegra as its SOC in any device shocked the hell out of me, but motorola won't drop them completely, they had a stable device with the Tegra and have proved in the past they have a hard time jumping to a different platform while staying stable.

To tell you the truth they should be happy with their market penetration right now, they are really late (again) with this idea, but they are actually getting their product used. I think what will hurt them in the long run is their strong arm tactics with their contracts.

Tegra3 will be fine, but again people shouldn't get worked up over it not being the fastest, that was never Nvidia's goal, it was supposed to be ultra cheap (got that) and easily integrated (got that too). You don't need to have the fastest GPU inside a SOC, thats just for flashy games that no one will really care about in the long run.
 
Trimlock said:
I was excited about this until I noticed the battery size ... next?
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More interested in media capabilities than battery at the moment. Consider organization preview unit of what the transformer 2 may be able to do later. It's what's going to decide whether to wait for a premium tegra 3 or get the Archos 1.2ghz.
 
Sly said:
More interested in media capabilities than battery at the moment. Consider organization preview unit of what the transformer 2 may be able to do later. It's what's going to decide whether to wait for a premium tegra 3 or get the Archos 1.2ghz.
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As is the major point of the devices, but so is portability, when phones have better batteries it could be a big limiting factor to have a 4000mah batterie...
 
jeremyshaw said:
My atrix has a 1900mAh bat. And its already considered massive...
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but is it a tablet?

i don't see a battery that size as a big problem for a tablet, much less some sort of pre-release chinese prototype tablet that will never make its way states-side. samsung and apple have already set the bar for tablet form factors, i doubt we'll be taking a step backward with nvidia's upcoming tech. i'm holding out on purchasing any android tablets until i see what they bring to the table (along with ice cream sandwich)
 
Also, IMO, since tegra 3 is going to be built on 40nm, nvidia's main angle is going to be cheap cost... Its main quad core competitors are going to be one node smaller.
 
Zinn said:
but is it a tablet?

i don't see a battery that size as a big problem for a tablet, much less some sort of pre-release chinese prototype tablet that will never make its way states-side. samsung and apple have already set the bar for tablet form factors, i doubt we'll be taking a step backward with nvidia's upcoming tech. i'm holding out on purchasing any android tablets until i see what they bring to the table (along with ice cream sandwich)
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ah, no.

Yeah, though iirc, my nook color bat. Isn't big by any means either, as the main power draw on a tablet should be the display, and not the SoC?

Edit: I'm sorry if my replies suck, I'm typing from my Sammy focus, lol (I bought it to replace my zunehd, now I have grow a liking for it).
 
I have the Moto Droid X2 which has the tegra 2 and with Gingerbread it's really buggy. The games are nice looking but really the phone needs more than games to keep it competitive. The only game I've looked forward to is Zen Pinball, which I play on the Ps3. They announced it back in July and we're still waiting for it. Needless to say, I don't think I'll choose another tegra device when the time comes. The X2 has just been disappointing.
 
dadi38 said:
I have the Moto Droid X2 which has the tegra 2 and with Gingerbread it's really buggy. The games are nice looking but really the phone needs more than games to keep it competitive. The only game I've looked forward to is Zen Pinball, which I play on the Ps3. They announced it back in July and we're still waiting for it. Needless to say, I don't think I'll choose another tegra device when the time comes. The X2 has just been disappointing.
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How is it Nvidia's fault that Motorola could not build and properly support their own hardware?
Do you also blame Nvidia for this economic situation, world hunger and unrest in the middle east?

The Terga 2 might not be bleeding edge now but it was one of the first dual core processors available for use in Android devices and it serves it purpose just fine where performance and battery life is concerned in the tablet I have used with it(Samsung Galaxy tab).
 
jeremyshaw said:
My atrix has a 1900mAh bat. And its already considered massive...
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Sorry I was using exagerations. But I do use the same phone and love it!

I had forgotten about the 40nm process, which really helps boost theirs claims on being cheap. They really are making GOOD SoC's available for just about anyone.
 
Is Tegra cheap? Never seen any price comparisons. If anything I would have thought they would be the most expensive with the way they work. I also do not see how its a good SoC. Slow and with no real benefits.
 
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Grazehell said:
How is it Nvidia's fault that Motorola could not build and properly support their own hardware?
Do you also blame Nvidia for this economic situation, world hunger and unrest in the middle east?

The Terga 2 might not be bleeding edge now but it was one of the first dual core processors available for use in Android devices and it serves it purpose just fine where performance and battery life is concerned in the tablet I have used with it(Samsung Galaxy tab).
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How was I blaming anyone? Nvidia fanboy much? Yes it was one of the first dual core phones there were.... that's why I jumped on it. It's just disappointing that it hasn't caught on like I thought it would. The X2 is nice once you root it.
 
dadi38 said:
How was I blaming anyone? Nvidia fanboy much? Yes it was one of the first dual core phones there were.... that's why I jumped on it. It's just disappointing that it hasn't caught on like I thought it would. The X2 is nice once you root it.
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I am actually a huge ATI/AMD fanboy but they dont make ARM chips do they?
I just recognize things for what they are and would not lambast Nvidia for providing the Android community with something its competitors simply could not offer while also trying to make it as cheaply as possible and therefore had to make some sacrifices.
 
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