TI OMAP 5 chips to pack dual 2GHz cores, 1080p 3D video
updated 01:30 pm EST, Mon February 7, 2011
TI details OMAP 5 processors with ARM Cortex-A15
TI today detailed what could be one of the fastest phone or tablet processors to date in the OMAP 5. The design will be one of the first to use ARM's new Cortex-A15 with dual 2GHz cores and also has a pair of low-power Cortex M4s to juggle low-demand tasks. The approach not only leads to about a 50 percent leap in speed over even the new two-core Cortex-A9 but uses 60 percent less power than the single-core OMAP 4.
The hardware promises the expected improvement performance but makes possible video that hadn't been available before. With five times faster graphics, the chip can play 1080p video either in stereoscopic 3D or at a smooth 60 frames per second, either on the device or over HDMI. It can similarly handle up to four separate displays and has direct camera processsing of its own, such as image stabilization and face detection.
The first processors to sample, the OMAP5430 with low-power DDR2 memory and the OMAP5432 with regular and low-power DDR3 memory, should get into the production sample phase in the second half of 2011. Production phones and tablets should be ready roughly a year later. Customers haven't been named but are likely to include HP/Palm and Motorola, both of whom use OMAP chips often.
