Nvidia Tegra 2 officially announced; 4x the power of its predecessor

Nvidia has formally announced the 40nm Tegra 2 chipset. The new chip combines a dual-core ARM Cortex A9 processor (running up to 1GHz speeds) with Nvidia graphics to create a platform expected to be used in a number of HD tablets, smartbooks and smartphones launching this year.

As you would expect, Tegra 2 can stream 1080p video, has HDMI-out and benefits from Flash Player 10.1 hardware acceleration. It does all this with an all day battery life. According to Nvidia, Tegra can deliver over 16 hours of HD video (140 hours of music) on a single charge – astonishing if true.

The chipset combines eight independent processors (including Cortex A9) to optimise power usage at all times. It also means it can easily handle mobile 3D gaming, web browsing as well as HD video encoding. Nvidia claims that it is 10x faster than the CPUs found in current smartphones, whilst delivering 4x the performance of the first Tegra chip.

Supported operating systems include Windows CE, Windows Mobile and Android (Chrome OS is a possibility later down the road). Tegra 2 is expected to find itself in tablets ranging from 5 to 15-inches and there may even be some surprise smartphone announcements later this year too. Tegra 2 is now in production so hopefully it won’t be too long before we see this in portable devices. Anandtech’s take on Tegra 2 is an interesting read if you’re looking for more information.

Tegra 250 Specifications:

Processor and Memory Subsystem
Dual ARM® Cortex-A9 MPCore processors, Up to 1.0 GHz
32-bit LP-DDR2, DDR2

Ultra Low Power NVIDIA Graphics
OpenGL ES 2.0
Programmable pixel shader
Programmable vertex and lighting
2x 3D graphics performance of previous generation Tegra

Full High Definition Multimedia
1080p H.264/VC-1/MPEG-4 Video Decode
1080p H.264 Video Encode
Supports multi-standard audio formats, including AAC, AMR, WMA, and MP3
Upgraded JPEG encode and decode acceleration

Integrated Image Signal Processing
Up to 12 megapixel camera sensor support
Advanced imaging features (AWB, AF, AE, etc.)

Display Subsystem
True dual-display support
Maximum display resolutions supported:
1080p (1920×1080) HDMI 1.3
WSXGA+ (1680×1050) LCD
UXGA (1600×1200) CRT
NTSC/PAL TV output