News - Apple launches its own chip for the iPad

[Vadim]

I dont know more than you do know Scott, but its clear this is a well manipulated 'I'-style marketing campaign and media goes for it.

Is Tegra, therefore, not an NVIDIA chip?

hehe, thats a very good one

nvidia at least dont hide that the CPU is an ARM one - http://www.nvidia.com/object/io_1212391368499.html

The rest of the SoC design is theirs

I would say that Apple's IP in this chip is not sufficient to call it an Apple's own chip anyway, sorry

[Funkstar]

So the remaining question is how much other ARM IP is there in it?

I hate to reference Engadget all the time, but because of the sheer number of posts they make, they have most of the relevant info (especially on Apple gear)

For some of us, amid all the hubbub about revolutions and whatnot yesterday, the most significant announcement on hand was Apple's supposedly custom A4 CPU. Alas, in the cold and brutal light of the morning after, we're hearing that it is in fact a system-on-a-chip driven by a Cortex-A9 MPCore CPU "identical" to the one found inside NVIDIA's Tegra 2, while besting the iPhone 3GS significantly with its 1GHz speed and multicore architecture. The chip is composed of that Cortex barnburner, an integrated memory controller, and the Mali 50-series GPU, making it an all ARM affair -- though we still don't know how much Apple and PA Semi did in terms of arranging and integrating those components within the silicon. While still not 100 percent confirmed, it would seem there were no revolutions on the iPad's processing front -- just a rebranded bit of well engineered hardware.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/28/a...-a-la-tegra-2/

The chip apparently has an Apple logo, is that enough to make it an Apple chip?

[Scott B]

I hate to reference Engadget all the time, but because of the sheer number of posts they make, they have most of the relevant info (especially on Apple gear)

It looks like BSN deserves the credit, although it would've been nice to see a source.

None of that surprises me and I really don't think it matters how much IP Apple has licensed from ARM. There is still a lot of work to do integrating the various bits of IP into an SoC and turning that into viable silicon. Just look at how long NVIDIA has been working on Tegra. I wouldn't be surprised to see Apple develop more of the designs in-house in future, however.

The fact is, it's a unique Apple-branded SoC that will be compared to other SoCs - which license varying amounts of IP from ARM, but all (bar Intel) license its instruction set - for performance, etc.

[Funkstar]

The fact is, it's a unique Apple-branded SoC that will be compared to other SoCs - which license varying amounts of IP from ARM, but all (bar Intel) license its instruction set - for performance, etc.

Don't worry, i'm with you on that one Scott