TSMC Hits 3GHz with a 28nm ARM Cortex-A9 Dual-Core Processor Just Because it Can

[dgstorm]

Although it will likely be a long time before running chips at this speed in a mobile device will be worthwhile, the mobile chipset foundry, TSMC, pushed a 28nm ARM Cortex-A9 dual-core chip to 3.1GHz, just because they could. Obviously, heat and battery consumption make this CPU speed impractical in an actual device, nevertheless, it is still impressive that they are already pushing clock speeds that far. Eventually, this will evolve into something useful as the die on these mobile chips continues to shrink. The "holy grail" of mobile computing will be a chip that operates at low power, produces almost no heat, yet still cranks out fast calculations at a high clock speed coupled with multiple cores to make things more efficient.

We may not see actual devices with clock speeds above 2GHz for quite a while, but it's good that they can do it already, because it points to a bright future.

Source: Liliputing

 

[johnomaz]

I think multi core is more important in mobile devices than processor speed. multi cores means better battery life by being able to not use all cores at once. high speed processors I am sure will be able run at slower speeds, but when they do kick up to speed, the frequency will kill the battery.

 

[dgstorm]

^^ Indeed.

 

[liftedplane]

^^ for now, I'm positive there is r&d out there for better batteries batteries that will last hundreds of times longer than our current ones

 

[kodiak799]

^^ for now, I'm positive there is r&d out there for better batteries batteries that will last hundreds of times longer than our current ones

Probably. The explosion of smartphones means the scale is there to start making it profitably. But there still is a bit of a chicken/egg thing in that, with many people/phones now capable of getting a full day, they won't pay much of a premium for more. It's really not that big of a deal to plug-in, but the opportunity is that people are buying multiple chargers (plus sometimes a car adapter) and multiple batteries. What battery tech really needs is a cranking up in the functioning, namely that these become true mini-computers that people plug into a monitor or tablet to do real computer work.

If they can make the heat issue work, there's a lot of potential for a true 3-in-1 device. Although for true computing use people won't be put out having to plug in. And there's your caveat - for all the hope and potential of these new processors and batteries, laptop battery life still stinks, so I'm not holding my breath for any huge advancements any time soon.