Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Multi-Core GPUs Announced from iPhone Chip Maker
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
That's really cool how they're able to make it 'transparent' so that all of the multi-core operations take place on the hardware and not that software side.
So the terminology doesn't follow? I was under the impression that a Core is a logical contained unit. GPU's (embedded or otherwise) only have one core, but can have multiple processing units (Stream Processing Units seems to be the new hotness). What I was asking is if each "Core" in this new arm is self contained, or if it is just fancy marketing speak for stream processing unit.
EDIT: Found my answer...
So it basically is marketing speak with a slight twist. It appears that this is the first use of dynamic pipeline scaling. But is seems to be done in groups of 4 (which to PowerVR is 1 Core).
Fcc?
So I take it any new phone would have to go through FCC approval? The chances of that happening in private is zero so we would no well in advance. If there is a new phone in June it is likely just to be more memory as that you might not have to do FCC approval for that.
Without major battery improvements I have my doubts over this. Are there any rumors of new batteries?
So I take it any new phone would have to go through FCC approval? The chances of that happening in private is zero so we would no well in advance. If there is a new phone in June it is likely just to be more memory as that you might not have to do FCC approval for that.
Without major battery improvements I have my doubts over this. Are there any rumors of new batteries?
I am a bit confused on what this statement actually means, "The SGX543 can have any number of cores from two to sixteen with no change in the driver software or the application."
Does this mean that when a program / application / game is written to use the graphics chip / card it is automatically optimized depending on how many cores the hardware has that is intending on using it? If this is true does this mean that when the new iPhone 3rd generation is realeased with a much more powerful graphics component, applications written for the first two generations of the iPhone can be optomized? I am a little confused on what this whole things means.
Or does it simply mean that applications written for the 3rd generation iPhone which uses for our purposes 2 cores, and a tablet mac which uses for our purposes 16 cores; then the applications/games don't have to change their programming to support it and possibly optomize itself? Or am I looking too far into this and does it simply mean that they use the same driver and thats it?
Does this mean that when a program / application / game is written to use the graphics chip / card it is automatically optimized depending on how many cores the hardware has that is intending on using it? If this is true does this mean that when the new iPhone 3rd generation is realeased with a much more powerful graphics component, applications written for the first two generations of the iPhone can be optomized? I am a little confused on what this whole things means.
Or does it simply mean that applications written for the 3rd generation iPhone which uses for our purposes 2 cores, and a tablet mac which uses for our purposes 16 cores; then the applications/games don't have to change their programming to support it and possibly optomize itself? Or am I looking too far into this and does it simply mean that they use the same driver and thats it?
This is what sucks about apple. They wont tell anyone what hardware is coming. Makes it impossible to plan purchases, which I guess is why Apple doesn't market to businesses.
I wonder if a new iPhone is coming out, do they need to register with the FCC or is that just if they change transmitters or something?
I wonder if a new iPhone is coming out, do they need to register with the FCC or is that just if they change transmitters or something?
My understanding of it is the driver/software has no control over how many cores are being used. That takes place in some hardware logic.
You guys are still stuck in your x86 Intel mindset. This is ARM that we're talking about. (edit: and they're getting better battery tech, too)
I disagree. The next iPhone has to be a big step forward otherwise there is little incentive for 2G owners to go back on contract. You have to assume the 2G owners that wanted 3G already upgraded last year. There are still a nice chunk of us 2Gers out there though that are happy and unmoved by the 3G but ready to upgrade to a truly better iPhone.
Also the 3G was mostly a baby step. If Apple doesn't do something to not just meet the Pre, but to exceed it then it loses some of its luster. If all Apple does is memory bump the 3G it's going to look like they are resting on their laurels. iPhone 3.0 looks great, but hardware matters too.
Apple has done a great job at keeping the FCC quite in the past, i wouldn't expect this to be any different... at what point did the FCC leak the 3g?
Yes and no. True they rarely give specific dates or roadmaps, but Apple execs have stated general time frames when new product will be announced, i.e., iPhones are June/July, consumer computers and iPods Sept/Oct. There is also usually a laptop update in the spring and fall. The Mac Pro and mini are probably the hardest to pin down since they are not regularly updated.
This is great
This is great news becuase this will make the iphone battery time longer or it will make the iphone faster .. I think it will be somewhere inbetween ...
More Cores means that the CPU can run slower and use less battery but still have the same performance as the older iphone models
.. but I think the performance will be incressed and the battery time will probely be a little bit better because there will be a better battery in the next iphone ...
so in outher words . more cores = less battery .. not neccesary more ...
seems that there are people that think that just because Apple is working on the iPhone 3.0 software there will be no new hardware ... thats wrong ..
Apple have seperate Hardware and Software iPhone Teams. Do you think the hardware team have done nothing ??? ..
Steve jobs will shorly be back when it is time to release the iPhone 3:rd gen together with the iPhone 3.0 .....
I have the first gen so i will probely get the 3:rd gen when its released ..
so what can Apple do to improve the iPhone hardware ...
- Front Side Camera
- Improved Back-Side camera
- Video-Recorder
- Multi-Core Arm CPU
- 32 GB version
- New design (its thinner!)
- Improved game performace (shaders and what the new arm cpu is bringing)
- OpenCL - Improved App perfornace thanks to the new hardware/software
- New Aceccories
It seems more then logic that Apple will release the 3:rd gen iphone as the Video iPhone with Mobile iChat Video and ofcourse a version of iChat for Windows ...
This is great news becuase this will make the iphone battery time longer or it will make the iphone faster .. I think it will be somewhere inbetween ...
More Cores means that the CPU can run slower and use less battery but still have the same performance as the older iphone models
.. but I think the performance will be incressed and the battery time will probely be a little bit better because there will be a better battery in the next iphone ...
so in outher words . more cores = less battery .. not neccesary more ...
seems that there are people that think that just because Apple is working on the iPhone 3.0 software there will be no new hardware ... thats wrong ..
Apple have seperate Hardware and Software iPhone Teams. Do you think the hardware team have done nothing ??? ..
Steve jobs will shorly be back when it is time to release the iPhone 3:rd gen together with the iPhone 3.0 .....
I have the first gen so i will probely get the 3:rd gen when its released ..
so what can Apple do to improve the iPhone hardware ...
- Front Side Camera
- Improved Back-Side camera
- Video-Recorder
- Multi-Core Arm CPU
- 32 GB version
- New design (its thinner!)
- Improved game performace (shaders and what the new arm cpu is bringing)
- OpenCL - Improved App perfornace thanks to the new hardware/software
- New Aceccories
It seems more then logic that Apple will release the 3:rd gen iphone as the Video iPhone with Mobile iChat Video and ofcourse a version of iChat for Windows ...
Yeah, but there are first gen iPhone owners, like myself, that have been holding off too. I don't know how many didn't make the just to 2nd Generation, but if the new 3.0 software isn't going to work 100% on my phone, then I will definitely need to make the plunge.
The whole GPS thing didn't really catch my attention last time since there was no turn by turn available. 3G really wasn't a big enough speed boost either. Some of these new features seem really nice though. If they work on my 1st Gen, then I will probably stay put.
As far as "not just meeting the pre" goes, I think the iTunes software and the App store far surpass what the pre can offer at launch. The pre is a slick looking phone, but music libraries and video libraries get pretty big. I don't see people going and converting their entire collection just so they can listen and watch on the PRE, unless there is an easy solution.
Multicore in 2010. Not before.
As others mentionned, the june revision won't be a huge step forward to the current model. Minor storage & memory increase to handle the push notifications + better battery life. No more, no less.
As others mentionned, the june revision won't be a huge step forward to the current model. Minor storage & memory increase to handle the push notifications + better battery life. No more, no less.
Well, and also the functionality. The Palm Pre (yes i know its not out) has much better functioinality over the iPhone OS. It's basically taken a lot of the irriitating things about the iPhone and fixed them.. at least for me.
For example, the way the Pre handles notifications are intrusion free (the iPhone stops whatever you're doing), and how the Pre handles conversations by automatically switching between IM and SMS depending on connectivity.
for those that are wondering yes they are single cores
thanks to its Tile-Based Deferred Rendering (As the polygon generating program feeds powerVR driver which stores them in memory in triangle strip format. Unlike other architectures, polygon rendering is not performed until all polygon information has been collated for the current frame hence rendering is deferred.
In order to render, the display is split into rectangular sections in a grid pattern. Each section is known as a tile. With each tile is associated a list of the triangles that visibly overlap that tile. Each tile is rendered in turn to produce the final image.)
so they can have tile send to a different cores without any performs penalty
to be rendered
the driver will pass data to an "MP code scheduler," which will in turn pass that data to one pipeline scheduler per core, which will then pass it to one thread scheduler per multi-threaded processing engine, which will then manage the threads through the engines as they process the graphics data
in other words, the SGX543 can have any number of cores from two to sixteen with no change in the driver software or the application."
also the 16 core version is to big for the iphone
to give you a hint how powerful 16 core version is
it has more than 2x the polygon throughput (and lots of fill-rate too) than the ps3
w
thanks to its Tile-Based Deferred Rendering (As the polygon generating program feeds powerVR driver which stores them in memory in triangle strip format. Unlike other architectures, polygon rendering is not performed until all polygon information has been collated for the current frame hence rendering is deferred.
In order to render, the display is split into rectangular sections in a grid pattern. Each section is known as a tile. With each tile is associated a list of the triangles that visibly overlap that tile. Each tile is rendered in turn to produce the final image.)
so they can have tile send to a different cores without any performs penalty
to be rendered
the driver will pass data to an "MP code scheduler," which will in turn pass that data to one pipeline scheduler per core, which will then pass it to one thread scheduler per multi-threaded processing engine, which will then manage the threads through the engines as they process the graphics data
in other words, the SGX543 can have any number of cores from two to sixteen with no change in the driver software or the application."
also the 16 core version is to big for the iphone
to give you a hint how powerful 16 core version is
it has more than 2x the polygon throughput (and lots of fill-rate too) than the ps3
w
Actually, multiple cores are useful to safe battery life. Power usage grows with the square of clock speed. If Apple is using a single core graphics chip right now, they could use four cores instead, running them at a fourth of the clock speed, each using 1/16th of the power of a full speed chip, and four of them using a quarter of the power that a single chip would use. And silicon is cheap.
i wonder if it will be powerful enough to allow editing on-the-go. say, in iMovie? That program seems very well-suited for multi-touch editing. this would make the iPhone really amazing.
The Apple iTablet must run the full Mac OS X (not the limited OS X of the iPhone and iPod touch) to run the full apple iWork (read Keynote) and the full Microsoft Office (read PowerPoint).
No more than 400 g, with true Firewire, Ethernet and at least two USB2 ports. If possible, pocketable like the OQO model 2+, but with a tablet form factor. It is not to work on it, It is just for Keynote and PowerPoint presentations via VGA-out port!
Can Apple deliver? We need thousands for our University.
No more than 400 g, with true Firewire, Ethernet and at least two USB2 ports. If possible, pocketable like the OQO model 2+, but with a tablet form factor. It is not to work on it, It is just for Keynote and PowerPoint presentations via VGA-out port!
Can Apple deliver? We need thousands for our University.
http://www.maclife.com/article/the_fcc_and_the_iphone
There is no point not announcing before you go to the FCC. Jobs said so himself for the 3G iphone.