Transformer Prime gets benchmarked

[Aikouka]

Except the iPad 2.

I don't think we can make this statement right now. Unless there's been some released information that I haven't seen, we don't know much about the GPU other than that it can handle some game with some creepy clowns and a rolling ball. 😛 I don't think nVidia would make the same mistake again and release a SoC with a GPU that only barely beats (+15%) the current competitors. It's also interesting to consider that the PS Vita will be out in December with a more accessible GPU (being in a console) that (theoretically) has 2x the power of the MP2 (given it's the MP4 😛).

Although, I don't think a powerful GPU is all that you need at this point. I think that nVidia needs to go into collusion with some fairly iOS-dedicated companies like Epic Games and get them to support Tegra Zone. It seems that Epic's only qualm is that there's simply too many hardware options, and becoming specific to Tegra would work to stop that.

Unfortunately, it also segregates the Android market. :|

 

[MagickMan]

I don't think we can make this statement right now. Unless there's been some released information that I haven't seen, we don't know much about the GPU other than that it can handle some game with some creepy clowns and a rolling ball. 😛 I don't think nVidia would make the same mistake again and release a SoC with a GPU that only barely beats (+15%) the current competitors. It's also interesting to consider that the PS Vita will be out in December with a more accessible GPU (being in a console) that (theoretically) has 2x the power of the MP2 (given it's the MP4 😛).

Although, I don't think a powerful GPU is all that you need at this point. I think that nVidia needs to go into collusion with some fairly iOS-dedicated companies like Epic Games and get them to support Tegra Zone. It seems that Epic's only qualm is that there's simply too many hardware options, and becoming specific to Tegra would work to stop that.

Unfortunately, it also segregates the Android market. :|

I think it's quite reasonable to make the assumption. I don't think Tegra 3 will "smash anything current in 3D". It may be faster than a dual core SGX543, but "smash it"? I seriously doubt that. The iPad2 destroys everything in the tablet market right now, so it's a safe bet that it will at least be competitive with NV's newest offering.

 

[Aikouka]

I think it's quite reasonable to make the assumption. I don't think Tegra 3 will "smash anything current in 3D". It may be faster than a dual core SGX543, but "smash it"? I seriously doubt that. The iPad2 destroys everything in the tablet market right now, so it's a safe bet that it will at least be competitive with NV's newest offering.

The problem with me saying it's unreasonable is that the only thing to counter it with is the fact that the GeForce ULP in the original Tegra 2 was fairly lackluster. It's not a terrible GPU, but it never had much of a lead on its opponents, and it didn't spend that long in the lead. I would hope that given nVidia's decent amount of experience in graphic processing that we would see something a bit more potent, but the desktop (we have infinite power!) market and the ultra-portable market are quite a bit different.

Do I expect it to crush the SGX543MP2? I think it's a possibility, but I have my reservations. However, even if it does, the MP4 will be available in the PS Vita (available in December in Japan). While it isn't the same type of mobile device, it'd be interesting to see if we could test it to see how fast it is.

 

[sontin]

I think the problem is not to design a very powerful mobile GPU. It should be very easy look at Apple and PowerVR. But this comes not for free. ATM there are no real numbers of power comsuption. I think Anand did the first test to show the impact of the (much) better GPU of A5: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4971/apple-iphone-4s-review-att-verizon/15

So it's great to have much more power but when it's decrease the battery time by 25% it's maybe not the best thing. I can play win-up knight for android for nearly 10h on my Transformer. That's great because i can do much more things without reloading the battery.

 

[Fire&Blood]

From a consumer standpoint, I would like to see Tegra3 beat everything out there and accelerate the arrival of next gen. As of today, A5 is the chip to beat. While Tegra3 "appears" to be newer, it went through several delays, the last one moved it from August to end of year. A5 and Tegra3 share the same A9 Cortex cores and the same 40nm die so Tegra3 doesn't have the benefit of adopting newer architecture like A15 or the die shrink to 28nm.
If it had both, or at least either one as edge over the A5, I would be more optimistic about it spanking the A5. Nvidia's GPU expertise could help them beat the A5 but to dominate it, they would need at least one of the aforementioned advantages. As it stands, both chips share the same architecture, within same power constraints so similar or slightly better performance ought to be expected. Multi threaded bench results are nice but it will take a whole suite of tests to gouge it vs. current chips.

 

[soccerballtux]

Tegra3 uses single channel and when Anand asked them about it they said they can't saturate the single channel yet.

I didn't expect a benchmark to already be optimized to test a unreleased, 1st quad core chip of it's kind. It won't take long before we get more results.

I did see a ZTE tablet's Quadrant test on youtube a while ago, Tegra3 had a disappointing score in that one.

didn't see this (anand) can you share link?

 

[Fire&Blood]

didn't see this (anand) can you share link?

Tegra3 Quadrant benchmark (clocked at 1.3GHz)

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4181/...-a9s-coming-to-smartphonestablets-this-year/2

Surprisingly enough, the memory controller is still a single 32-bit wide LPDDR2 controller. NVIDIA believes that even a pair of Cortex A9s can not fully saturate a single 32-bit LPDDR2 channel and anything wider is a waste of power at this point. NVIDIA also said that effective/usable memory bandwidth will nearly double with Kal-El vs. Tegra 2.

 

[poofyhairguy]

From a consumer standpoint, I would like to see Tegra3 beat everything out there and accelerate the arrival of next gen. As of today, A5 is the chip to beat. While Tegra3 "appears" to be newer, it went through several delays, the last one moved it from August to end of year. A5 and Tegra3 share the same A9 Cortex cores and the same 40nm die so Tegra3 doesn't have the benefit of adopting newer architecture like A15 or the die shrink to 28nm.
If it had both, or at least either one as edge over the A5, I would be more optimistic about it spanking the A5. Nvidia's GPU expertise could help them beat the A5 but to dominate it, they would need at least one of the aforementioned advantages. As it stands, both chips share the same architecture, within same power constraints so similar or slightly better performance ought to be expected. Multi threaded bench results are nice but it will take a whole suite of tests to gouge it vs. current chips.

Tegra 2 was the low-end of dual-cores this year. I expect Tegra 3 to be the low-end for next year.

 

[lothar]

I don't think we can make this statement right now. Unless there's been some released information that I haven't seen, we don't know much about the GPU other than that it can handle some game with some creepy clowns and a rolling ball. 😛 I don't think nVidia would make the same mistake again and release a SoC with a GPU that only barely beats (+15%) the current competitors. It's also interesting to consider that the PS Vita will be out in December with a more accessible GPU (being in a console) that (theoretically) has 2x the power of the MP2 (given it's the MP4 😛).

Although, I don't think a powerful GPU is all that you need at this point. I think that nVidia needs to go into collusion with some fairly iOS-dedicated companies like Epic Games and get them to support Tegra Zone. It seems that Epic's only qualm is that there's simply too many hardware options, and becoming specific to Tegra would work to stop that.

Unfortunately, it also segregates the Android market. :|

If the discreet desktop market is any indication, I expect nVidia to over promise and under deliver.
They almost always do.

 

[Hardcore]

Looks like my next tablet.

 

[Aikouka]

If the discreet desktop market is any indication, I expect nVidia to over promise and under deliver.
They almost always do.

Based off of this part mentioned in the article linked above:

On the GPU side, Kal-El implements a larger/faster version of the ULP GeForce GPU used in Tegra 2. It's still not a unified shader architecture, but NVIDIA has upped the core count from 8 to 12. Note that in Tegra 2 the 8 cores refer to 4 vertex shaders and 4 pixel shaders. It's not clear how the 12 will be divided in Kal-El but it may not be an equal scaling to 6+6.

Chances are you may be right. If they go with a 6+6 distribution, we'll probably only see a 50% increase. Any other distribution would possibly depend on the graphical application in question, but overall, a 50% increase is probably what we'll see on average. Looking at the benchmark image inlined in a prior post, there's no way the GPU should even stand a chance.

Wow... now I'm just really bummed out about it in general. :\

 

[poofyhairguy]

Wow... now I'm just really bummed out about it in general. :\

I'm not:

NVIDIA's video decoder gets an upgrade in Kal-El to support H.264 at 40Mbps sustained (60Mbps peak) at a resolution of 2560 x 1440. This meets the bandwidth requirements for full Blu-ray disc playback. NVIDIA didn't just make the claim however, it showed us a 50Mbps 1440p H.264 stream decoded and output to two screens simultaneously: a 2560 x 1600 30" desktop PC monitor and a 1366 x 768 tablet display.

The GPU seems like it will be strong enough to play almost all available games at acceptable frame-rates at a normal tablet resolution (unlike Tegra 2), combined with Blu Ray level decoding power.

I am sold.

 

[Mopetar]

The GPU seems like it will be strong enough to play almost all available games at acceptable frame-rates at a normal tablet resolution (unlike Tegra 2), combined with Blu Ray level decoding power.

I'm assuming that the decoder is almost entirely dedicated hardware and doesn't use the general GPU hardware. If this is the case, we don't get a good indication of the actual GPU performance.

I'm guessing that this hardware capability was added to make the Tegra 3 more appealing for use in set top boxes.

 

[poofyhairguy]

I'm guessing that this hardware capability was added to make the Tegra 3 more appealing for use in set top boxes.

And to keep up with the Joneses. Exynos can play Blu Rays.

 

[Aikouka]

The GPU seems like it will be strong enough to play almost all available games at acceptable frame-rates at a normal tablet resolution (unlike Tegra 2), combined with Blu Ray level decoding power.

I am sold.

I was still most likely going to buy one anyway. What can I say, I'm a technophile. 😛 Fixing the video decoding issues is probably the best thing they could have done with it anyway.

 

[Patranus]

This all reminds me of Wintel back in the late 90s.
Just increase the CPU to makeup for lack of software optimization.
Instead of optimizing Andriod they are simply thawing in more cores.

 

[Aikouka]

I heard some rumors that the Prime is getting pushed back to December, but will supposedly release with ICS. 🙁

 

[Genx87]

The decoding capabilities of Kal-El will be nice. Wayne is the next big upgrade for the tegra line and should be out in less than 12 months.

Transfomer Prime will be on my christmas list. Be so nice to be able to output high profile H.264 from a tablet without issue.

 

[s44]

Did you see the new size?

It's smaller, thinner, lighter (thinner than even the Samsung, lighter than iPad2 but not Samsung), comes with 32gb instead of 16, and of course the two extra cores and all the media playback you need. Oh yeah, claimed 12+6 hour battery life and built-in console controller support.

Sold. I want the bluish one.

 

[Mopetar]

Anand posted a little bit of information about the Transformer Prime in his recent article on the Tegra 3. It's more than than both the iPad 2 and Galaxy Tab 10.1. At $500, it matches the price of both devices but has them both beat spec wise.

The price might be a little disappointing to those expecting them to come in at $400 again, but ASUS will have the only quad-core tablet out there right now and can command a premium price for it. Also, I expect that they'll continue to sell the Transformer, which still looks good at $400.

I imagine that Samsung probably isn't too happy. Even if Apple doesn't completely bar them from selling the Galaxy Tab 10.1, who would want one compared to the Transformer Prime? 😛