Nvidia announce Tegra X1 superchip with 8 CPU cores and 256 GPU cores

The world’s is yet to see a competitor to Nvidia’s K1 chip (for smartphones and tablets) and Nvidia has upped the game by announcing the Tegra X1 super chip. Based on Nvidia Maxwell GPU architecture, The X1 is indeed a super chip that offers twice the performance offered by Tegra K1. With Tegra X1, Nvidia is eyeing deeper penetration into embedded, mobile, autonomous machine and automotive application markets. Tegra X1 will start shipping to OEMs in first half of the year 2015. Tegra X1 has an 8 core CPU (4x ARM Cortex A57 + 4x ARM Cortex A53), 256 core Maxwell GPU.

Sheer numbers may not give you a clear indication of the power packed in Tegra X1. As a comparison, Tegra X1 is faster than the best supercomputer ASCI Red (worlds first teraflop super computer) released 15 years ago. Tegra X1 is the size of a thumbnail and consumes 10 watt power while ASCI Red consumed 500,00 watts of power and occupied 1600 square feet space. Tegra K1 will be part of new NVIDIA Drive car computers that offer auto-pilot, 360 degree view around the car, auto-valet true self parking, next gen infotainment, HUD, virtual mirrors and rear-seat entertainment.

“Tegra K1 set a new bar for GPU compute performance, and now just a year later Tegra X1 delivers twice that,” said Linley Gwennap, founder and principal analyst of the Linley Group. “This impressive technical achievement benefits both 3D graphics, particularly on devices with high-resolution screens, as well as GPGPU software that is becoming more prevalent, particularly in automotive applications.”

“We see a future of autonomous cars, robots and drones that see and learn, with seeming intelligence that is hard to imagine,” said Jen-Hsun Huang, CEO and co-founder, NVIDIA. “They will make possible safer driving, more secure cities and great conveniences for all of us.   To achieve this dream, enormous advances in visual and parallel computing are required. The Tegra X1 mobile super chip, with its one teraflops of processing power, is a giant step into this revolution.”

Tegra X1’s technical specifications include:

--  256-core Maxwell GPU

--  8 CPU cores (4x ARM Cortex A57 + 4x ARM Cortex A53)

--  60 fps 4K video (H.265, H.264, VP9)

--  1.3 gigapixel of camera throughput

--  20nm process