MediaTek Joins ARM’s 64-Bit Club

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MediaTek Joins ARM’s 64-Bit Club.




MediaTek, a leading designer of mobile application processors, has announced plans to develop its new breed of system-on-chips based on ARMv8 64-bit architecture. The new chips will aim next generation multimedia and mobile devices. MediaTek is the first designer of inexpensive SoCs who has licensed ARM Cortex-A50 technology.
“MediaTek has taken the leadership position with the MT8135 mobile SoC being the first application processor to employ ARM’s Big.Little architecture in a heterogeneous multiprocessing (HMP) configuration. ARM is pleased to build upon this partnership for innovative mobile consumer products. The Cortex-A50 series of processors, alongside the Mali GPU products, help MediaTek to continue its position as an industry leader,” said Tom Cronk, executive vice president and general manager of processor division at ARM.
ARM is in the unique position of providing an optimized compute platform that uses ARM Cortex processors, Mali GPU and ARM CoreLink CCI-400 technologies. Alongside technologies such as Big.Little and MediaTek’s SoC and system expertise, this heterogeneous approach means that the broad range of applications needed in mobile devices can be processed faster and more efficiently when divided between the CPUs and the GPUs. This arrangement makes full use of the inherent capabilities of each system component to achieve the best possible balance of power and performance.
“MediaTek is delighted to be working closely with ARM to bring the benefits of cutting-edge CPU and GPU solutions to manufacturers and consumers worldwide. Together with ARM, we are setting the pace for low power, high performance products that give users the benefits of next-generation processing speed, security and graphics,” said Johan Lodenius, chief marketing officer of MediaTek.

ARM Cortex-A50 processor series is fully compatible with ARMv8 architecture introduced this year and currently includes Cortex-A57 and A53 cores. The family features AMBA system coherency to extend to many-core coherence with ARM CoreLink cache coherent fabric components, including the CCI-400 and CCN-504. The new cores are also compatible with ARM Mali graphics processor family for GPU compute applications as well as ARM’s cryptographic acceleration. ARMv8 architecture is fully compatible with programs designed for ARMv7, which will simplify transition to 64-bit computing in the ARM world.

ARM Cortex-A57 processor core is the most advanced, highest single-thread performance ARM application processor that delivers the three times higher performance than today’s leading-edge mobile SoC with the same power consumption. The Cortex-A57 also sports extended reliability and scalability features for high-performance enterprise applications.
ARM Cortex-A53 processor core is the most efficient ARM application processor ever, delivering today’s superphone performance while using a quarter of the power, thus enabling low-cost advanced smartphones of tomorrow. The core also incorporates reliability features that enable scalable dataplane applications to maximize performance per mm2 and performance per mW. The Cortex-A53 is optimized for throughput processing for modest per thread compute applications.

Source: X-bit labs: PC Hardware News, Reviews and Benchmarks
By: Anton Shilov