Interview With Arm Re: Cortex Chips (pandora)

[bigtruck]

IIRC 900-925 is the maximum clock speed the developers were able to achieve without stability issues. I know 600 was at least at one point the default clock speed, but I remember reading about the possibility of having 500 as the default to conserve energy.

I'm curious as to how far down the CPU can clock. I also wonder how much of a difference underclocking will even make, as the A8 is supposed to have very little energy waste when the CPU is idle. Can we have some new battery tests please?

 

[mali]

IIRC 900-925 is the maximum clock speed the developers were able to achieve without stability issues. I know 600 was at least at one point the default clock speed, but I remember reading about the possibility of having 500 as the default to conserve energy.

I'm curious as to how far down the CPU can clock. I also wonder how much of a difference underclocking will even make, as the A8 is supposed to have very little energy waste when the CPU is idle. Can we have some new battery tests please?

I'm more interested in changing FSB and SGX clock. Usually mem speed has greater influence on overall speed than CPU speed. Actually it might be possible to underclock the CPU and yet have a faster system.

 

[Squidge]

Wait, so none of the OMAP3 SoC's use the GP Cortex A8 design? If not where the heck would you go to buy a SoC that uses it? I mean OMAP3 is their high-performance design...

Last I heard, the Cortex-A8 design is offered in 600 MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1 Ghz, and 1.1Ghz. Obviously the higher speed versions cost more money, and some of the 600 Mhz versions may be failed 1.1 Ghz (or less) silicon. The OMAP3 uses the 600 Mhz version, which is otherwise known as the "low power" version.

If you want to run the chip at 800 or 900Mhz, it will require you to increase the voltage to the core (which is quite easy to do in software).