Foxconn’s Tegra 2-powered Android Tablet
In the interim of Product Teardown’s, Dr.Wreck has decided to call on his vast experience with taking apart and creating consumer electronics. Today we’d like to briefly discuss Foxconn’s new platform featuring Tegra 2 and Android.
Nvidia has done fantastic things with it’s Tegra platform – recently engadget got a chance to play with the latest creation via Foxconn. The device looks great – it’s widescreen, it’s simple, it get’s covered in smudges, it’s looks are not what we want to talk about. What’s inside this device? What about Tegra 2 makes this package so interesting?
Well for starter’s the Tegra 2 is a 1GHz ARM Cortex 9 CPU which is capable of Symmetric Multi-Processing – kind of like your PC. Not only does this thing crunch math like nobody’s business, it includes a low power GPU (details are scarce) that we can only assume takes influence from the lightweight and popular ION/ION2 platform. What is means is that Tegra 2 is effectively an MCP capable of pantsing your netbook in fixed function applications. It’s capable of encoding and decoding 1080p h.264. It’s really hard to put this device in perspective – considering it combines the PC hardware of ~2006 into a single chip package smaller than an after-8 chocolate. Nvidia even claims it’s capable of 140 hours of audio and 16 hours of HD video playback! What size battery would that be?
If you ever find yourself at a trade show and see Nvidia’s booth, make sure and take Tegra 2 for a spin. Then ask yourself why this device isn’t integrated into every facet of your mobile computing life. Is it price? Is it IC politics? Probably a combination of the 2 – our guess is a similar situation as to why we don’t see ION in more netbooks – Intel supremacy.
One thing is for certain, Tegra 2 packs alot of punch. It’s combined architecture means your PCB requires less. Mobility enabling Semiconductor’s are becoming heavily integrated platforms which can both reduce cost and design effort.
The future is exciting. We can’t wait to grab one of these devices!
@DrWreck