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Samsung Tapes Out 1 Gigahertz+ ARM Cortex-A15 SoC

By - Source: MarketWatch | B 22 comments

Samsung and Synopsis claim to have been first with a tape-out of an ARM processor based on the Cortex-A15 core.

Synopsis, a design automation company, said that the processor runs "at operating speeds in excess of a gigahertz" and was manufactured in a 32 nm process using high-K metal gate technology.

"Our mission is to deliver the highest frequency while minimizing power for high-end processor and graphics cores targeted to the mobile computing and digital home markets," said Keith Hawkins, vice president at Samsung's Austin Research Center. "Globally, this was the first production tapeout of a Cortex-A15 processor and we relied exclusively on IC Compiler and the Galaxy tool suite to predictably achieve our performance and power targets."

According to ARM, the Cortex-A15 architecture supports clock speeds of 1 to 1.5 GHz for smartphones in single- and dual-core configurations, while set-top boxes could be scaled to 2 GHz quad-core versions, servers to 2.5 GHz quad-core processors and wireless infrastructure devices could use eight "or more" cores down the road.

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  • 13 Hide
    ohim , May 1, 2012 12:04 PM
    Wonder when phones will start again to have 3-4 days between rechargers .. (not talking about 1 week +) for now most of the smart phones are totally useless if you plan to be away from a power outlet more than 24 hours.
Other Comments
  • 2 Hide
    saturnus , May 1, 2012 11:59 AM
    I thought there was a Cortex A15 in the Krait SoC? Guess not.

    Should be interesting. They promise 50% better performance than A9 and 20% lower power consumption even without the BIG.little heterogenous setup with A7 ultralow power idle aux cores.

    Also interesting to see that Tom's so far has completely missed the release of the Intel Medfield which didn't rock any boats as promised but was only able to par 2 year old top models like SGS2 and Iphone 4 (not 4S), and that's with a 33% overclock advantage on both CPU and GPU and much larger reference form factor, some would say clunky.
  • 13 Hide
    ohim , May 1, 2012 12:04 PM
    Wonder when phones will start again to have 3-4 days between rechargers .. (not talking about 1 week +) for now most of the smart phones are totally useless if you plan to be away from a power outlet more than 24 hours.
  • Display all 22 comments.
  • 5 Hide
    neuromancer2701 , May 1, 2012 12:19 PM
    TI announced OMAP5 in Feburary so this is basically the same thing for Samsung. What does "Tapes Out" mean in this context?
  • 8 Hide
    scook9 , May 1, 2012 12:22 PM
    saturnusI thought there was a Cortex A15 in the Krait SoC? Guess not.Should be interesting. They promise 50% better performance than A9 and 20% lower power consumption even without the BIG.little heterogenous setup with A7 ultralow power idle aux cores.Also interesting to see that Tom's so far has completely missed the release of the Intel Medfield which didn't rock any boats as promised but was only able to par 2 year old top models like SGS2 and Iphone 4 (not 4S), and that's with a 33% overclock advantage on both CPU and GPU and much larger reference form factor, some would say clunky.

    Krait is not based off the arm core, they only license the instruction set, not the cores. Just like AMD cpus are still x86 but not the same core design as Intel.

    And the SGS2 is almost 1 year old....and Intel did that well with a single core - dual core with improved architecture on the way.
  • -1 Hide
    saturnus , May 1, 2012 12:39 PM
    scook9Krait is not based off the arm core, they only license the instruction set, not the cores. Just like AMD cpus are still x86 but not the same core design as Intel.And the SGS2 is almost 1 year old....and Intel did that well with a single core - dual core with improved architecture on the way.


    True. February 2011. Seems like 2 years ago. My bad.

    I disagree on the Medfield performance though. It's hyperthreading enabled single core. That has always been Intels attempt to avoid having to go multicore. However, it does not consistently out-perform a dual Cortex 9 core even in single threaded workflows although being clocked 33% higher. CPU stress tests on other sites also show very poor battery performance when the CPU is heavily taxed but that might be an early issue that will be addressed.

    I won't hold my breath for Intel ever making a competetive SoC for the smartphone space, not in this or next generation. A viable tablet SoC perhaps for those few requering legacy x86 support for their Windows 8 tablet.
  • 2 Hide
    Anonymous , May 1, 2012 1:11 PM
    What is this???
    This was done long time ago .. dual core Exynos 5250 @ 2 GHz
    http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/Exynos/products5dual.html
  • 3 Hide
    Anonymous , May 1, 2012 2:04 PM
    @neuromancer

    it's a manufacturing term, it should be Tape-out without the s, it basically means the Photo mask has been finalised and ready for mass production
  • 5 Hide
    830hobbes , May 1, 2012 2:24 PM
    ohimWonder when phones will start again to have 3-4 days between rechargers .. (not talking about 1 week +) for now most of the smart phones are totally useless if you plan to be away from a power outlet more than 24 hours.

    That's not a technological challenge but an engineering design decision. It's easy to make a phone that lasts for 4 days, just add a big enough battery compared to the hardware. The constraint is that the engineers are told to make the smallest phone possible with a 6-hour or so battery life. If companies were convinced people would buy a thicker phone with a longer battery, they'd make it (RAZR MAXX?). It's a simple matter of market demand determining engineering constraints, as it should be. If people don't like it, they should let cell phone manufacturers know they'd buy thicker phones. If companies aren't listening and it really is a profitable market segment, a competitor should emerge that will support it.
  • 0 Hide
    shasheng , May 1, 2012 2:37 PM
    Etudions bien et faisons des progres chaque jour.
  • 3 Hide
    ojas , May 1, 2012 2:42 PM
    @saturnus

    What???!!! What review of the Medfield SoC have you read? Go read the xolo x900 review on AnandTech.

    This is a die shrink of the Core 2 architecture! That's a 4 year old architecture whipping A9 dual cores in most CPU benchmarks. It was standing toe to toe with phones running ICS while it was running gingerbread.

    Battery life was mid-range but not bad by any means, plus the X900 has a smallish battery anyway.
    The graphics chip is a non-intel component. Plus the X900 is based on intel's reference design.
    If they want to, all they need to do to is add a faster graphics chip and throw in a larger battery. It's a thick unit anyway.

    Add the 22nm Silvermont Atom and they've done it.

    I don't know about you ppl, but I'm downright excited about x86 SoCs
  • 1 Hide
    aicom , May 1, 2012 4:40 PM
    I don't expect Intel to be the ultimate epic solution to everything SoC related, but I do believe they'll be a viable competitor to ARM, if only due to their manufacturing advantage.
  • 2 Hide
    Anonymous , May 1, 2012 5:00 PM
    Medfield actually was the champ when you compare performance with battery life. It has the best performance per watt of anything out there right now. Intel most certainly is competitive. It won't be the fastest until they bring it down to 22nm and then go out of order in the instruction set, but they are VERY competitive. Intel can also do 64-bit which ARM cannot at the moment which kills ARM on the server side. No one wants a 32-bit server. That is a waste of space.
  • 1 Hide
    Cazalan , May 1, 2012 5:11 PM
    The 22nm Atoms will surpass ARM, and the 14nm Atoms will be unbeatable.

    ARM has a lot of work to do to maintain their lead if even possible.
  • 0 Hide
    noob2222 , May 1, 2012 6:18 PM
    ojas@saturnusWhat???!!! What review of the Medfield SoC have you read? Go read the xolo x900 review on AnandTech.This is a die shrink of the Core 2 architecture!

    .I don't know about you ppl, but I'm downright excited about x86 SoCs



    Sure, the 1.6 ghz Atom looks great compared to a 1.2 ghz A9, but throw the 1.5 ghz into the mix ... performance vanishes. The one s is a dual core.
  • 1 Hide
    blazorthon , May 1, 2012 7:20 PM
    saturnusI thought there was a Cortex A15 in the Krait SoC? Guess not.Should be interesting. They promise 50% better performance than A9 and 20% lower power consumption even without the BIG.little heterogenous setup with A7 ultralow power idle aux cores.Also interesting to see that Tom's so far has completely missed the release of the Intel Medfield which didn't rock any boats as promised but was only able to par 2 year old top models like SGS2 and Iphone 4 (not 4S), and that's with a 33% overclock advantage on both CPU and GPU and much larger reference form factor, some would say clunky.


    You people all do realize that Medfield is single core and you're comparing it to dual core A9s in order to say that it isn't great, right? If Intel made a dual core version, it would beat the A9s with ease.

    Not only is Medfield only a single core, but it's hardly even more than just a beta version for Medfield; a proof of concept. The 22nm and 14nm Atoms should come out with hue improvements within the next year (22nm) to two years (14nm). Even if the architecture wasn't better than ARM's architectures, it would have the process node advantage.

    noob2222Sure, the 1.6 ghz Atom looks great compared to a 1.2 ghz A9, but throw the 1.5 ghz into the mix ... performance vanishes. The one s is a dual core.


    Furthermore, the current Medfields were never supposed to be the top of the high end, just to get into the high end. That the One S is about twice as fast as the Medfield being tested shows us that the Medfield has near the performance per core as the One S has (only ~10% lower).
  • 1 Hide
    tuch92 , May 1, 2012 7:50 PM
    All of these phones are capable of much higher battery life.

    I got a Galaxy S 4G in November and with moderate use (games occasionally, texting all day, reading xkcd, googling) it got about 8 hours of battery life, maybe a bit more. Since then I have upgraded roms with a low voltage kernel, and after letting it charge completely I got 40 hours of battery life. Ri-diculous.

    So if you don't like your battery life head over to xda developers and find a low voltage kernel for your phone. It's a lifesaver.

    Note: I live on a campus where Wifi is always available, so wifi is turned on all the time, and 4G about half the time, GPS only when I'm driving.
  • 0 Hide
    blazorthon , May 1, 2012 8:21 PM
    tuch92All of these phones are capable of much higher battery life. I got a Galaxy S 4G in November and with moderate use (games occasionally, texting all day, reading xkcd, googling) it got about 8 hours of battery life, maybe a bit more. Since then I have upgraded roms with a low voltage kernel, and after letting it charge completely I got 40 hours of battery life. Ri-diculous. So if you don't like your battery life head over to xda developers and find a low voltage kernel for your phone. It's a lifesaver. Note: I live on a campus where Wifi is always available, so wifi is turned on all the time, and 4G about half the time, GPS only when I'm driving.


    Does it underclock/under-volt any parts of the phone to help get such high battery time? If so, then it might take a performance hit.
  • 1 Hide
    ojas , May 2, 2012 2:13 PM
    noob2222Sure, the 1.6 ghz Atom looks great compared to a 1.2 ghz A9, but throw the 1.5 ghz into the mix ... performance vanishes. The one s is a dual core.

    Lol. Think about it. That's a 4-year old arch and a single core proc running gingerbread. You're comparing it to the top-of-line ARM stuff running on ICS.

    Even still, there's a benchmark that looks like this:


    Just saying, there're both sides to everything. Wait for dual core medfield SoCs and the Ivy Bridge based stuff. That's what i'm waiting for, it'll be like classic AMD vs Intel just with ARM instead of AMD :D 
  • 1 Hide
    blazorthon , May 2, 2012 3:25 PM
    ojasLol. Think about it. That's a 4-year old arch and a single core proc running gingerbread. You're comparing it to the top-of-line ARM stuff running on ICS.Even still, there's a benchmark that looks like this:Just saying, there're both sides to everything. Wait for dual core medfield SoCs and the Ivy Bridge based stuff. That's what i'm waiting for, it'll be like classic AMD vs Intel just with ARM instead of AMD


    At that time, we might have A15 and similar competing against Medfield, so it might be a level playing field. Besides, AMD seems to be catching up.
  • -1 Hide
    noob2222 , May 2, 2012 5:15 PM
    ojasLol. Think about it. That's a 4-year old arch and a single core proc running gingerbread. You're comparing it to the top-of-line ARM stuff running on ICS.Even still, there's a benchmark that looks like this:Just saying, there're both sides to everything. Wait for dual core medfield SoCs and the Ivy Bridge based stuff. That's what i'm waiting for, it'll be like classic AMD vs Intel just with ARM instead of AMD

    One benchmark Intel was able to win, one.... Not sure how thats bragging rights or such a great thing. As far as claiming pure single core, your forgetting it still runs HT, so its single +. As for making a dual core, they need to make sure 22nm can actually use less power as its single core runs middle of the pack on battery life. Dual core would drain the battery in a matter of minutes if its anything like Ivy bridges power saving of 4%. Intel has a long way to go, and ARM isn't just sitting there waiting to be overtaken.
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