The 2X is somewhat of a dichotomy. On one side, you've got moderately aesthetically pleasing hardware, class-leading performance from Tegra 2 that doesn't sacrifice battery life at the stake, and a bunch of notable and useful extras like HDMI mirroring. On the other, you've got some serious experience-killing instability issues (which need to be fixed by launch), a relatively mundane baseband launching at a time when we're on the cusp of 4G, and perhaps most notably a host of even better-specced Tegra 2 based smartphones with more RAM, better screens, and 4G slated to arrive very soon.
It's really frustrating for me to have to make all those qualifications before talking about how much I like the 2X, because the 2X is without a doubt the best Android phone I've used to date. Android is finally fast enough that for a lot of the tasks I care about (especially web browsing) it's appreciably faster than the iPhone 4. At the same time, battery doesn't take a gigantic hit, and the IPS display is awesome. The software instability issues (which are admittedly pre-launch bugs) are the only thing holding me back from using it 24/7. How the 2X fares when Gingerbread gets ported to it will also make a huge difference, one we're going to cover when that time comes.
The other part of the story is Tegra 2.
Google clearly chose NVIDIA’s Tegra 2 as the Honeycomb platform of choice for a reason. It is a well executed piece of hardware that beat both Qualcomm and TI’s dual-core solutions to market. The original Tegra was severely underpowered in the CPU department, which NVIDIA promptly fixed with Tegra 2. The pair of Cortex A9s in the AP20H make it the fastest general purpose SoC in an Android phone today.
NVIDIA’s GeForce ULV performance also looks pretty good. In GLBenchmark 2.0 NVIDIA manages to hold a 20% performance advantage over the PowerVR SGX 540, our previous king of the hill.
Power efficiency also appears to be competitive both in our GPU and general use battery life tests. Our initial concern about Tegra 2 battery life was unnecessary.
It’s the rest of the Tegra 2 SoC that we’re not completely sure about. Video encode quality on the LG Optimus 2X isn’t very good, and despite NVIDIA’s beefy ISP we’re only able to capture stills at 6 fps if the camera is set to a 2MP resolution.
Then there’s the forthcoming competition. TI’s OMAP 4 will add the missing MPE to the Cortex A9s and feed them via a wider memory bus. Qualcomm’s QSD8660 will retain its NEON performance advantages and perhaps make up for its architectural deficits with a higher clock speed, at least initially. Let’s not forget that the QSD8660 will bring a new GPU core to the table as well (Adreno 220).
Tegra 2 is a great first step for NVIDIA, however the competition is not only experienced but also well equipped. It will be months before we can truly crown an overall winner, and then another year before we get to do this all over again with Qualcomm’s QSD8960. How well NVIDIA executes Tegra 3 and 4 will determine how strong of a competitor it will be in the SoC space.
Between the performance we’re seeing and the design wins (both announced and rumored) NVIDIA is off to a great start. I will say that I’m pleasantly surprised.
According to Carlson and El-Ouazzane, OMAP 5 will allow mobile computers to run multiple operating systems much more easily than they do today. TI is targeting Android, Chrome OS, and Microsoft Windows, the executives said. According to a demo video and to El-Ouazzane, OMAP 5 devices could act as an Android-based smartphone when on the go and as a Windows-based desktop PC while in a dock, for instance.
"We are engaging with Microsoft for next-generation Windows," El-Ouazzane said.
The big wow here, though, will be the interfaces. TI seems to be heavily focused on gesture-based interfaces like the Microsoft Kinect. The company will provide a special API to enable full-body and multi-body gesture interfaces. You'll wave your hand near your smartphone to manipulate objects in virtual 3D; naturally, glasses-free 3D display and capture technologies are also included.
"The gesturing world is going to explode," El-Ouazzane said. "There is absolutely no reason why it will not fall into the mobile space quicker than expected."
OMAP 5 isn't just dual-core, the executives said. With its dedicated processor cores for 2D graphics and 3D graphics, two ARM Cortex-M4 cores for general-purpose assistance, along with dedicated imaging, security, and video cores, you could think of this as a 12-core system.
The OMAP 5 will offer three times the processing power of current cutting-edge processors, but it will also have longer battery life, Carlson said. New "Smart Reflex 3" power management technology lets TI tune its many cores to bring energy use down by 60 percent in some situations over OMAP 4, he said.
Other hot new features in OMAP 5 include USB 3.0, SATA 2, SDXC high-capacity Flash memory support, coprocessor support, a camera interface supporting 24-megapixel images, and 1080p 3D video capture at 60 frames per second. All this fits into two packages: a smaller, more expensive OMAP5430 which is only 14mm square, and a less expensive OMAP5432 which measures 17mm on a side.
If this sounds like a teeny, tiny, desktop PC, well, yeah.
OMAP5 will go to manufacturers in the second half of 2011, with devices appearing on shelves in the second half of 2012, Carlson said.
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