Posted 10/21/09 at 09:16:03 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Chip designer ARM has announced a new version of its popular Cortex microprocessor. The new chip, called the Cortex-A5, will have the performance if the fastest current generation ARM11 cores, as well as reduced power consumption. ARM will be making the chip available for licensing later this year.

ARM designs microprocessors, then licenses the designs to manufacturing. Most cell phones currently use ARM chips, but ARM isn’t content with owning just that market. They hope the new chip will find its way into other products, possibly in direct competition with Intel. The Cortex-A5 is fast enough to run a laptop or netbook, though Windows does not currently run on ARM chips.

Cortex-A5 chips are expected to run at clock speeds in the gigahertz range, and draw only 80 milliwatts of power. This should provide better performance and power efficiency than upcoming Intel chips. The first products with the new design should begin showing up sometime in 2011.

Read More

Posted 10/20/09 at 09:42:29 AM by Pulkit Chandna

Santa Clara-based chip maker Marvell has launched a new range of CPUs called ARMADA. Based on the ARM instruction set, the new processors will power “smartphones, smartbooks, consumer and embedded devices, and displays.”

The largest producer of ARM chips in the world claims its ARMADA chips will enable mobile devices to deliver PC-like performance. Support for Adobe Flash and Blu-ray functionality should also enable ARMADA-toting mobile devices to deliver a rich multimedia experience.

Based on their intended device segment, the new application processors fall into four different series: the ARMADA 100, 500, 600 and 1000. "Launch of the ARMADA family represents a watershed event in mobile computing,” said Marvell’s co-founder and VP, Ms. Weili Dai.

Read More

Posted 10/06/09 at 09:17:32 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Any large technology company relies on their server infrastructure to serve their customers. The sort of power that runs Google or Facebook doesn’t come cheap. It's not so much the cost of the hardware, it’s the massive cost of powering that infrastructure that eats into the bank account. Two start-ups aim to change the server game with some new, low-power alternatives to conventional servers.

SeaMicro, from Santa Clara, is putting together servers based on the low power Atom chip seen most often in Netbooks. Those in the know have indicated that SeaMicro will be able to pack 80 Atom chips in a very small chassis. These Atom servers would offer massive reductions in energy costs, but still provide adequate processing power to serve up data. After all, how much power does it really take to push out some Google results?

In Austin, Texas, there’s an even more ambitious server project afoot. Smooth-Stone is working to integrate the ARM chips you’ve seen in smartphones, like the iPhone, into a new server architecture. Smooth-Stone CEO, Barry Evans, accumulated a great body of knowledge working for Intel’s mobile products group. This seems to jive nicely with the company’s apparent goals. Details on this one are scarce, but if the performance is sufficient, the energy savings could be staggering. Could it be that the era of companies running rack after rack of Xeon-based web servers is coming to a close?

Read More

Posted 10/06/09 at 08:42:29 PM by Ryan Whitwam

A newly announced partnership between ARM and GlobalFoundries could mean the next generation of mobile devices will be faster than anyone expected. The project will focus on the ARM Cortex-A9 chip. The current Cortex-A8 powers the iPhone 3GS and the Palm Pre. The new chip will be based on a 28nm process.

According to GlobalFoundries, the 28nm parts will take advantage of the manufacturer’s High-K Metal Gate semiconductor. The HKMG technology is known as “Gate First”, meaning that it should allow high performance with minimal leakage.

ARM CEO, Warren East, said of the collaboration, “This announcement reflects our business value and strategy of providing best in class processor implementation by marrying our own processor and physical IP with world class manufacturing semiconductor technology.” So get ready, the next round of ARM chips could blow your socks off.

Read More

Posted 10/02/09 at 11:00:00 PM by Will Kraft

These days, netbooks have become a very popular alternative to conventional notebooks for mobile computing. Netbooks are lightweight, have great battery life, and are relatively inexpensive compared to full-sized notebooks. This makes them ideal for students or people on a budget. Of course, the lower cost and extended battery life does not come without a trade-off—many netbooks have lower system specs as well, which means that they are not designed for heavy-computing applications.

Although many netbooks now run Windows XP because of Microsoft's hurried entry into that market, many earlier models were built to run Linux. (For instance, the Asus Eee 700 Series ran Xandros, and the current models are offered with either Linux or Windows) And although most current netbooks are x86-based (running the Intel Atom CPU), the usage of ARM-based CPU chips is likely to increase in the future since ARM offers far superior energy efficiency over x86 and battery life has always been a major factor in mobile computing. ARM chips have been used successfully for some time in smartphones and music players, including the newest Zune HD. Since ARM is a different CPU architecture than x86, Windows will not work on ARM. Earlier this year, Microsoft's Steve Guggenheim said that the company currently has no plans to port Windows 7 to the ARM architecture. Therefore, any new wave of ARM-based netbooks will run Linux once again. Unlike Windows, most Linux distros can be compiled for ARM if you have the requisite skills for doing so.

Linux is an ideal choice for netbooks for multiple reasons in addition to CPU architecture. Netbooks generally have lower specs than most full-size notebooks (not to mention desktops) so they are ideal for lightweight applications like web browsing, document preparation, etc. Linux does these tasks very well without the bloat that Windows systems have to deal with from anti-malware utilities. This primer will help you set up and optimize Linux for your netbook.

Read More

Posted 09/30/09 at 08:13:54 AM by Paul Lilly

The rumors are true - AMD spin off Global Foundries and ARM are in talks about joining forces to build chips together. According to Kevin Smith, ARM's vice president, his company plans to add manufacturing partners as it expands its business beyond mobile phones.

ARM also hopes to capture 15 percent of the mini-notebook market by the end of 2010, Smith added. The company is already working with Freescale Semiconductor, Sharp Corp., and Pegatron Technology, and adding Global Foundries to the mix would be a major boost.

It would also be a major win for Global Foundries, who is now reported to have over 150 customers, after starting off with just two (AMD and ST Microelectronics).

Read More

Posted 09/16/09 at 12:40:35 PM by Paul Lilly

ARM today said it has developed a pair of Cortex-A9 hard macro implementations which will enable devices to operate at 2GHz, and beyond. To achieve the additional speed without disregarding power consumption, the new design calls for a 40nm manufacturing process.

"The Cortex-A9 MPCore processor has already been widely accepted as the processor of choice for high-performance embedded applications across a broad spectrum of demanding consumer and enterprise devices," said Eric Schorn, VP marketing, Processor Division, ARM. "ARM’s parallel development of advanced, optimized physical IP components demonstrates a new level of collaborative differentiation while enabling our Partners to expand their penetration into high margin domains traditionally occupied by proprietary architectures."

According to ARM, chips built on the new design should consume just 0.25W per processor. TSMC will likely end up producing the bulk of the 40nm chips, though any company can start licensing the technology.

Where chips based on the new design ultimately end up is anyone's guess. The Archos 5 current uses the Cortex-A8 chip, as does Apple's iPhone 3GS.

Read More

Posted 08/26/09 at 09:53:28 AM by Pulkit Chandna

Asustek may have put its plans to develop an Android-based smartbook on the back burner but that is unlikely to deter other companies from dabbling in smartbooks. According to Digitimes, Taiwan’s leading technology rumormonger, Nokia is said to be working on an ARM-based smartbook. The news comes from Digitimes’ sources at Taiwanese handset makers.

The handset makers expect Nokia to launch the smartbook only after its maiden netbook, the Nokia Booklet 3G, hits the market sometime in early 2010. The smartbook, if it does materialize, would most likely run Symbian or Maemo QS. Windows does not currently support ARM processors and Microsoft has categorically vetoed any plans to make the two compatible.

Read More