ARM reveals the Mali-450 graphics chip

Posted on Tuesday, June 12 2012 @ 16:49 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
EE Times reports ARM shared details about the Mali-450, a new graphics processor based on the company's Utgard architecture. The Mali-450 promises twice the performance of the Mali-400 and can be scaled up to eight cores (also twice as much).
The Mali-450, which is offered as synthesizable RTL, is intended for use in entry-level and mid-range smartphones. The core, codenamed Tyr, has a common software platform with Mali-400 and provides market-leading OpenGL ES2.0 performance.

Steve Steele, senior product manager in the media processing division, said that the Mali-450 was not simply a doubling of the multicore scalability of the Mali-400. He said that tweaks had been done to the internal graphics engines "You would get better performance from the Mali-450 but it occupies slightly more area," he said.

ARM's recommendation is that for lower graphics burdens the Mali-400 with one to four cores is used while for higher performance the Mali-450 with five to eight cores is used.

There are close links between the GPU and Cortex-based CPUs playing to ARM's strength and allowing minimum transistor count in the interface, thereby further saving energy and easing time to market.


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Thomas De Maesschalck

Thomas has been messing with computer since early childhood and firmly believes the Internet is the best thing since sliced bread. Enjoys playing with new tech, is fascinated by science, and passionate about financial markets. When not behind a computer, he can be found with running shoes on or lifting heavy weights in the weight room.



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