The previous SGX545 is actually more advanced from a feature support since it is a DX10.1 part whereas the SGX544MP is a DX9L3 part. I'm guessing at this point though, Intel has no interest in releasing DX10.1 drivers for the SGX545.
When you say the SGX544 adds "DirectX 10 class texturing hardware" over the SGX543 is DX10 texturing hardware part of DX9L3 or just something incremental that Imagination is adding in excess of DX9L3 since the SGX544 is otherwise not fully DX10 compliant? I also didn't know the SGX544 doubled triangle setup performance over the SGX543. I thought the SGX544 just added DX9L3 features over the SGX543, but didn't directly improved performance.
Intel don't really care about supporting PowerVR hardware in Windows, this has been proven by GMA500/600/3600/3650 all be woefully supported and neglected in regards to DirectX drivers and feature support.
Unless there is an absolute miracle in their change of heart, this is yet another Intel chipset to avoid like the plague on Windows at least.
I think CloverTrail+ is going to be seen in Windows systems. It's described as being the successor to their last phone SoC which lacked lots of device infrastructure that the Windows kernel expected. Walling all of it off for ARM/WinRT was doable since they simultaneously locked out all legacy software from the platform. On a conventional Win8 system all those applications are back and some fraction would almost certainly die messily.
The K900 literally scorch past quad core Snapdragon in the common Antutu benchmark, considering it only dual core. Sunspider was another benchmark that K900 shows its strength. The Quadrant didn't favor the K900 but was very close to Samsung Galax SIII which also has a quad core ARM processor!
Crushes everything so far including ipad4 which scored 47 in glbench to T4's 57. So this chips is about 1/2 in egypt of T4? We'll have to wait for Octa, S800 etc to see if they can catch T4. Intel will need 14nm to be in this race (maybe a 22nm soc could be competitive but this isn't). T658 will be interesting too, who knows what that will go with. Exynos 5 octa will have issues in phones (as it got kicked out of Galaxy S4 due to heat if rumors are true). Let's not forget Rogue 6 gpu. NO matter how you slice this, Intel is behind. This is competitive with last years stuff (a5x?). So they finally caught Apples last gen? :)
The GPU is the most important thing in 2013/2014. Until they get that right, Intel is behind. IF your gpu sucks so does your gaming (so you're kind of DOA here). We can all wait on our webpage or email, it doesn't ruin the experience like a crappy gpu does.
Compute won't be important until 2014 (MAYBE, and that's a big maybe, on a phone or tablet? Nah...I have a PC) in mobile and I question even that, the same can be said for opengl es3 and dx11.1 and likely opencl. When you can name 10 things (or insert# here, 15? 20?) that either entertain you (games etc) or make you money using these technologies, I'll say it's finally coming to mobile. :) I don't ever see myself doing photo or video editing on a tablet (and a phone? Put the crackpipe down...LOL). Content creation on one? NOPE...Again, I have a PC. Even for someone crazy enough to try this, they are a ways off. Unreal 3 engine games are just starting to hit tablets etc. Compute is barely important on a PC at home (Games barely use it now). Win7 still doesn't fully support DX11.1 so how important is this in a phone/tablet? I could go on, but I think everybody gets the point already. Odd that Rogue6 brags about features instead of perf so far. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/... Look how many games they hit under 30fps with 7870 & 660TI here at just 1080p. Metro2033, sleeping dogs, crysis 2, sniper elite, borderlands 2 (didn't even work on any with 16x/4x on turned off they were all below 30fps) & hitman absolution. All under 30fps (some single digits) on 7870. We are a long ways from needing advanced features on phones when our PC's take a few hundred on the gpu just to do 1920x1080 with all details on. I'll say it again, anandtech needs to start using MINIMUMS in gpu reviews.
Intel needs to put a REAL gpu with their socs :) But that's why I say they need a die shrink. If they put a 554mp4 with this (ala A6x) it wouldn't have a shot at a phone at all. The problem here also is even a shrink might not help (22nm) in the soc as by then everyone else will be pitching their next rev. Intel needed this chip 6 months ago not for mid-end of the year. Merrifield looks like it's not going to show up on a shelf until mid2014 devices. All the others will be well established by then and they will be shipping new chips not long after merrifield hits shelves in a product. Again behind for xmas stuff. Since AMD is behind so far on PC's, I'd suggest Intel makes the first 14nm chips socs not pc chips. :) I'm not complaining though, if intel wasn't behind (dominating instead) can you imagine the stagnation that would happen if they ran not only PC's but phones/tablets without competition too? At the current rate we'll have a next gen console in our tablet or phone in about 3 yrs. If it was Intel alone, probably 10yrs. Look at sandy, ivy, haswell. With no AMD nipping at their heels this is what we get and no price drops on the top chips. They stay the same until their OWN replacement comes. :(
You are comparing the T4 numbers to clovertrail+, while the T4 numbers you are quoting are from a Tablet power enveloped, if you give clovertrail+ the same power enveloped, it is likely to punish the T4 pretty seriously ...
think about it, Clovertrail+ with its cellphone power envelope is fairly close to T4 for tablet. I would not claim victory soooooo fast in this case.
It is getting very fashionable to compare apple and banana, we are going to have to insure the same power level when we compare performance, it is critical to be objective in your comparaison.
So they still don't have LTE? How do they expect to get taken seriously, if they don't have a modem with the latest technology that users expect? Intel needs to pull their head out of that dark warm place they seem to have it in, before they become an also ran.
because at this point only the USA (at least not in europe) & Japan really care about LTE.
infact, here we finally(!) get unlimited data plans but limited by bandwidth. and cheap!
the flip side is that you have to pay $180/month (most expensive plan) to get the benefit of LTE... so less than 1‰ cares about LTE.
i think this is a goodsend, unlimited voice+data (1mbit) for $60, but i wonder if that model can stand the test of time & really spread over all of europe...
One minor addition. The piece I linked is wrong in the sense that "Sweden doesn't have as much coverage as the U.S. have".
According to official government statistics, in 2011, two years ago, about 49% of the population had LTE coverage. In 2013, virtually 98% to 99% of the population will.
It doesn't matter if Intel can make a $25 chip that is better than the ARM guys...their cost structure simply can't make that happen. Besides the "good enough" mobile performance crown has long been claimed by ARM.
The TSMC has a margin of 40%, Qualcom of 50%. Therefore if they want to keep their current profit, they must together maintain a margin of 70% ( 1 - 60% * 50%). Which doesn't even include the money paid to ARM, which is another 2%. While the Intel only has a margin of about 60%.
So, what make you think that, by the same retail price, 60% of margin within one company (better communication and cooperation) is hard to achieve than 70% of margin across different company?
you are assuming that Intel is not competitive on price, and it is not accurate, The prices are very competitive, there are no x86 tax, and since Intel got into the Windows 8 market, the price of the other guys collapsed: 1) it is good for consumers 2) it shows that Clovertrail is very competitive.
so, you should care that Intel is coming in this markets, it is new strong competition, and it will make a difference. On the long term, it is be all about who can keep pricing the same way for long time. At launch of clovertrail, it was very much one or 2 $ away from Tegra.3 and Krait
What proof do you have that Intel is making sales at $25. Both surface and Nexus4 were 20-23 per soc chip. So you're saying Intel is selling these at $25?
I would trust pricing information from him more than a Wikipedia article that had no pricing information what so ever. And yes.......all the 'atom' products listed on that page do not count as they are VASTLY different in product segment, release date and capabilities from the one being discussed in this article.
"Medfield was the original 32nm Atom SoC for smartphones, while Clover Trail was the 32nm platform for Windows 8 tablets." Medfield is a name of a platform with Saltwell-based 32nm Atom SoC with Penwell codename. And Penwell SoC in Medfield integrated SGX540 core, not SGX545. There are three Penwell SKU: Z2480 (moto i, max freq - 1.3G, TB - 2,0G), Z2460 (ffrd-xolo, max freq - 1.3G, TB - 1,6G), and Z2420 (ffrd-yolo, max freq - 1.2G, no TB). There is doomed Z2000 with disabled HT, but I do not remember a single device, built on it.
We’ve updated our terms. By continuing to use the site and/or by logging into your account, you agree to the Site’s updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
18 Comments
Back to Article
ltcommanderdata - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
The previous SGX545 is actually more advanced from a feature support since it is a DX10.1 part whereas the SGX544MP is a DX9L3 part. I'm guessing at this point though, Intel has no interest in releasing DX10.1 drivers for the SGX545.When you say the SGX544 adds "DirectX 10 class texturing hardware" over the SGX543 is DX10 texturing hardware part of DX9L3 or just something incremental that Imagination is adding in excess of DX9L3 since the SGX544 is otherwise not fully DX10 compliant? I also didn't know the SGX544 doubled triangle setup performance over the SGX543. I thought the SGX544 just added DX9L3 features over the SGX543, but didn't directly improved performance.
powerarmour - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
Intel don't really care about supporting PowerVR hardware in Windows, this has been proven by GMA500/600/3600/3650 all be woefully supported and neglected in regards to DirectX drivers and feature support.Unless there is an absolute miracle in their change of heart, this is yet another Intel chipset to avoid like the plague on Windows at least.
DanNeely - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
I think CloverTrail+ is going to be seen in Windows systems. It's described as being the successor to their last phone SoC which lacked lots of device infrastructure that the Windows kernel expected. Walling all of it off for ARM/WinRT was doable since they simultaneously locked out all legacy software from the platform. On a conventional Win8 system all those applications are back and some fraction would almost certainly die messily.BlueBlazer - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
You can find new benchmarks herehttp://blog.gsmarena.com/lenovo-k900-hands-on-impr...
The K900 literally scorch past quad core Snapdragon in the common Antutu benchmark, considering it only dual core. Sunspider was another benchmark that K900 shows its strength. The Quadrant didn't favor the K900 but was very close to Samsung Galax SIII which also has a quad core ARM processor!
TheJian - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
T4 scored 36000+ in antutu:http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2415809,00.as...
Crushes everything so far including ipad4 which scored 47 in glbench to T4's 57. So this chips is about 1/2 in egypt of T4? We'll have to wait for Octa, S800 etc to see if they can catch T4. Intel will need 14nm to be in this race (maybe a 22nm soc could be competitive but this isn't). T658 will be interesting too, who knows what that will go with. Exynos 5 octa will have issues in phones (as it got kicked out of Galaxy S4 due to heat if rumors are true). Let's not forget Rogue 6 gpu. NO matter how you slice this, Intel is behind. This is competitive with last years stuff (a5x?). So they finally caught Apples last gen? :)
The GPU is the most important thing in 2013/2014. Until they get that right, Intel is behind. IF your gpu sucks so does your gaming (so you're kind of DOA here). We can all wait on our webpage or email, it doesn't ruin the experience like a crappy gpu does.
Compute won't be important until 2014 (MAYBE, and that's a big maybe, on a phone or tablet? Nah...I have a PC) in mobile and I question even that, the same can be said for opengl es3 and dx11.1 and likely opencl. When you can name 10 things (or insert# here, 15? 20?) that either entertain you (games etc) or make you money using these technologies, I'll say it's finally coming to mobile. :) I don't ever see myself doing photo or video editing on a tablet (and a phone? Put the crackpipe down...LOL). Content creation on one? NOPE...Again, I have a PC. Even for someone crazy enough to try this, they are a ways off. Unreal 3 engine games are just starting to hit tablets etc. Compute is barely important on a PC at home (Games barely use it now). Win7 still doesn't fully support DX11.1 so how important is this in a phone/tablet? I could go on, but I think everybody gets the point already. Odd that Rogue6 brags about features instead of perf so far.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/...
Look how many games they hit under 30fps with 7870 & 660TI here at just 1080p. Metro2033, sleeping dogs, crysis 2, sniper elite, borderlands 2 (didn't even work on any with 16x/4x on turned off they were all below 30fps) & hitman absolution. All under 30fps (some single digits) on 7870. We are a long ways from needing advanced features on phones when our PC's take a few hundred on the gpu just to do 1920x1080 with all details on. I'll say it again, anandtech needs to start using MINIMUMS in gpu reviews.
Intel needs to put a REAL gpu with their socs :) But that's why I say they need a die shrink. If they put a 554mp4 with this (ala A6x) it wouldn't have a shot at a phone at all. The problem here also is even a shrink might not help (22nm) in the soc as by then everyone else will be pitching their next rev. Intel needed this chip 6 months ago not for mid-end of the year. Merrifield looks like it's not going to show up on a shelf until mid2014 devices. All the others will be well established by then and they will be shipping new chips not long after merrifield hits shelves in a product. Again behind for xmas stuff. Since AMD is behind so far on PC's, I'd suggest Intel makes the first 14nm chips socs not pc chips. :) I'm not complaining though, if intel wasn't behind (dominating instead) can you imagine the stagnation that would happen if they ran not only PC's but phones/tablets without competition too? At the current rate we'll have a next gen console in our tablet or phone in about 3 yrs. If it was Intel alone, probably 10yrs. Look at sandy, ivy, haswell. With no AMD nipping at their heels this is what we get and no price drops on the top chips. They stay the same until their OWN replacement comes. :(
evangel76 - Friday, March 1, 2013 - link
You are comparing the T4 numbers to clovertrail+, while the T4 numbers you are quoting are from a Tablet power enveloped, if you give clovertrail+ the same power enveloped, it is likely to punish the T4 pretty seriously ...think about it, Clovertrail+ with its cellphone power envelope is fairly close to T4 for tablet. I would not claim victory soooooo fast in this case.
It is getting very fashionable to compare apple and banana, we are going to have to insure the same power level when we compare performance, it is critical to be objective in your comparaison.
Francois Piednoel
evangel76 - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jMfR5TLsi8 (Batman for android)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jtp-LilABDs (Max Payne)
Have fun!
Francois Piednoel
danjw - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
So they still don't have LTE? How do they expect to get taken seriously, if they don't have a modem with the latest technology that users expect? Intel needs to pull their head out of that dark warm place they seem to have it in, before they become an also ran.bernstein - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
because at this point only the USA (at least not in europe) & Japan really care about LTE.infact, here we finally(!) get unlimited data plans but limited by bandwidth. and cheap!
the flip side is that you have to pay $180/month (most expensive plan) to get the benefit of LTE... so less than 1‰ cares about LTE.
i think this is a goodsend, unlimited voice+data (1mbit) for $60, but i wonder if that model can stand the test of time & really spread over all of europe...
Kalei - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
Your ignorance is stunning.Europe doesn't care about LTE?
http://www.androidauthority.com/sweden-has-the-wor...
USA and Japan are at the bottom. Sweden, Denmark, Germany are all ahead of them. So is Australia and Canada.
Here in Sweden, we have way cheaper LTE than you have. We get 3 gigabyte per person(no shared plans) costing me about 18 dollars per month.
You're a sad caricature of a 'stupid American'.
Luckily, most Americans are not like you.
And thank Heavens for that.
Kalei - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
One minor addition. The piece I linked is wrong in the sense that "Sweden doesn't have as much coverage as the U.S. have".According to official government statistics, in 2011, two years ago, about 49% of the population had LTE coverage. In 2013, virtually 98% to 99% of the population will.
The source is the Swedish equivalent of the FCC(hint: the report is only in Swedish, but google translate can help you).
http://www.pts.se/upload/Rapporter/Tele/2012/forst...
See page: 8.
This is just a sidenote, but facts are important, generally. Maybe I'm old-fashioned that way.
phoenix_rizzen - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
Nexus 4 doesn't support LTE (at least not officially, and the unofficial hacks only work on one LTE band), yet it's flying off the shelves.StrangerGuy - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
It doesn't matter if Intel can make a $25 chip that is better than the ARM guys...their cost structure simply can't make that happen. Besides the "good enough" mobile performance crown has long been claimed by ARM.wsw1982 - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
The TSMC has a margin of 40%, Qualcom of 50%. Therefore if they want to keep their current profit, they must together maintain a margin of 70% ( 1 - 60% * 50%). Which doesn't even include the money paid to ARM, which is another 2%. While the Intel only has a margin of about 60%.So, what make you think that, by the same retail price, 60% of margin within one company (better communication and cooperation) is hard to achieve than 70% of margin across different company?
evangel76 - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
you are assuming that Intel is not competitive on price, and it is not accurate, The prices are very competitive, there are no x86 tax, and since Intel got into the Windows 8 market, the price of the other guys collapsed:1) it is good for consumers
2) it shows that Clovertrail is very competitive.
so, you should care that Intel is coming in this markets, it is new strong competition, and it will make a difference. On the long term, it is be all about who can keep pricing the same way for long time.
At launch of clovertrail, it was very much one or 2 $ away from Tegra.3 and Krait
Francois Piednoel
TheJian - Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - link
What proof do you have that Intel is making sales at $25. Both surface and Nexus4 were 20-23 per soc chip. So you're saying Intel is selling these at $25?Link please.
I'm wondering where you're getting your prices based in info in this link etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_Atom_m...
magnimus1 - Saturday, March 2, 2013 - link
I would suggest you google his name first.I would trust pricing information from him more than a Wikipedia article that had no pricing information what so ever. And yes.......all the 'atom' products listed on that page do not count as they are VASTLY different in product segment, release date and capabilities from the one being discussed in this article.
En1gma - Monday, February 25, 2013 - link
"Medfield was the original 32nm Atom SoC for smartphones, while Clover Trail was the 32nm platform for Windows 8 tablets."Medfield is a name of a platform with Saltwell-based 32nm Atom SoC with Penwell codename.
And Penwell SoC in Medfield integrated SGX540 core, not SGX545.
There are three Penwell SKU: Z2480 (moto i, max freq - 1.3G, TB - 2,0G), Z2460 (ffrd-xolo, max freq - 1.3G, TB - 1,6G), and Z2420 (ffrd-yolo, max freq - 1.2G, no TB).
There is doomed Z2000 with disabled HT, but I do not remember a single device, built on it.