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Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

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Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#21

Post by Steko »

Symmetry wrote: post #15
nextparadigms wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not (much) more than a Tegra 2 running at 75% utilization. Each Tegra 3 core should run at 50-60% power consumption of each Tegra 2 core, if history is any guide. When every chip maker works on a new ARM chip generation, they try to increase performance while maintaining the same overall power consumption of the whole chip. You won't see an ARM chip with 1W TDP in one year, and 1.5-2W the next year, when the new gene…

History is partly based on moving to moving to new process nodes to allow you to do more stuff with less power. Unfortunately Kal-El will be running on the same 40nm process that current Tegra processors are running on. To the extent that the device can quickly wake up, get stuff done more quickly than a Tegra 2, then go back to sleep it might be more power efficient than last generation, but not with something like…

Even worse for Tegra 3, it looks like it's going to start shipping around the same time as Qualcomm's Krait which is 28 nm process. Nvidia needs to ride herd on their supply chain, they keep missing their ideal launch window by a few months.

Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#24

Post by superppl »

ebiester wrote: post #18
nextparadigms wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not (much) more than a Tegra 2 running at 75% utilization. Each Tegra 3 core should run at 50-60% power consumption of each Tegra 2 core, if history is any guide. When every chip maker works on a new ARM chip generation, they try to increase performance while maintaining the same overall power consumption of the whole chip. You won't see an ARM chip with 1W TDP in one year, and 1.5-2W the next year, when the new gene…

Sorry... must... resist... can't! Moore's law has nothing to do with speed, only transistor count in the same space. While the speed increases are impressive, they're still picking off the low hanging fruit, as people haven't fully figured out how to optimize for the space yet. Kal-El will reportedly be using 40nm transistors, compared to the 22nm process Intel is able to do. Which means there's more room for the ama…

Intel is still in the mobile game? Sorry this is kind of news to me, I haven't been keeping up.

I wonder if they would use Android or MeeGo...

Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#25

Post by yhlasx »

Fester wrote: post #22

I really hope that somewhen soon someone will introduce next-gen quad core batteries to provide enough energy to power mobile beasts like this one.

Exactly. Almost everything got better at least by factor of 2, while batteries haven't seen any major improvements.

Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#27

Post by Unseelie »

daimyoyo wrote: post #23

My concern with this is heat. If you have 75% utilization in a mobile device, most turn into briquettes. They're impossible to hold. I wonder how NVIDIA plans to address that.

I wonder about the comparison of a tablet to a phone sized device. Kal-el being a tablet, which is rather a lot larger than a phone, the heat dispersal allows for a lot more area, and also you can pack in fans and such..

So while both my laptop and my phone heat up, the laptop heats up a lot less than the phone, while burning far more power...and a lot of that just has to do with having more surface to diffuse off of. Will a tablet half the size of my laptop and four times the size of my phone have the phone's heat dispersal problem?

Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#28

Post by pistoriusp »

daimyoyo wrote: post #23

My concern with this is heat. If you have 75% utilization in a mobile device, most turn into briquettes. They're impossible to hold. I wonder how NVIDIA plans to address that.

It's a feature in colder climates.

Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#29

Post by blauwbilgorgel »

gvb wrote: post #3

That means the simulations we're watching require a full quartet of processing cores on top of the 12-core GPU NVIDIA has in Kal-El. Mind-boggling stuff. Mind boggling indeed, but totally absent in the text and demo was any mention of power usage. Four cores running at 75% utilization plus 12 GPU cores is going to suck down a tablet battery in a hurry.

According to a salesmen at a Nokia booth after being asked the question: How about battery life?

Battery life should increase. Because we have 4 cores, we can run them on lower voltages. So overall, our plans are, and we expect to have better battery life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhDmQCOyXrU

The power consumption and battery life should be akin to the Tegra 2.

Re: Nvidia's quad-core Kal-El demos next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (w/ video)

#30

Post by nextparadigms »

Steko wrote: post #21
Symmetry wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

History is partly based on moving to moving to new process nodes to allow you to do more stuff with less power. Unfortunately Kal-El will be running on the same 40nm process that current Tegra processors are running on. To the extent that the device can quickly wake up, get stuff done more quickly than a Tegra 2, then go back to sleep it might be more power efficient than last generation, but not with something like…

Even worse for Tegra 3, it looks like it's going to start shipping around the same time as Qualcomm's Krait which is 28 nm process. Nvidia needs to ride herd on their supply chain, they keep missing their ideal launch window by a few months.

Qualcomm won't have quad core Krait chips until a year later (mid 2012), so it won't compete with Tegra 3 in performance by far. By mid 2012, Tegra 4 will come out at 28nm as well.

But yes, I agree it would've been nice if they could've moved to 28 nm now, too. But I think Qualcomm will really remain behind performance in the next few years. Their custom Scorpion cores are weaker than Cortex A9 now, and I assume Krait will also be weaker than Cortex A15 which Nvidia, Apple and others will use. It's probably the reason why they could go to 28nm so fast, too.

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