14 DAY TRIAL // Even as NVIDIA’s latest Tegra K1 chip has been announced for quite some time, it managed to make an appearance into only one device, the Xiaomi MiPad, which we find quite surprising.
The chip has been shown to be capable of delivering improved performance, so why are manufacturers so skittish about adopting it? Well, it appears not everyone is.
At the Google I/O Keynote, NVIDIA has a central role to play, and as it turns out, the company’s Tegra K1 will be the powerhouse fueling Google’s recent endeavors.
This announcement might not have come as a big surprise to everyone. After all, Google’s developer Project Tango kit for tablets takes advantage of the Tegra K1 chip, and if we’re to believe the rumor mill, the hotly debated Nexus 8 will also employ the same chip technology.
During the keynote, it became clear that Google and NVIDIA have formed a tight bond, which will hopefully bring about a fruitful collaboration.
In its official blog posts, NVIDIA goes as far as to claim that, wherever you turned at the Google conference, you were bound to stumble upon the Tegra K1.
For starters, Android L was showed running on a K1-powered reference design and the Android TV devkit is also enjoying the perks of NVIDIA’s mighty architecture. On top of that, the Open Auto Alliance’s Android Auto makes use of – you guessed it – the Tegra K1.
The chipmaker says they are already advancing towards developing Android L for Tegra K1 64-bit version processors.
NVIDIA makes quite a fuss about this aspect on its blog. The 64-bit version has been announced back at CES 2014, when it was said it would arrive with a custom-designed dual-core 64-bit CPU and 192 programmable GPGPU cores to send performance levels through the roof.
As a matter of fact, Epic Games was there to show us the new Android Extension Pack and Android L with Unreal Engine 4 demo, all powered by the (64-bit) Tegra K1. And it turned out that the demo was running on Android TV.
Android is apparently targeting the gaming ecosystem, and by taking advantage of what NVIDIA has to offer, it will be able to deliver “PC gaming graphics in your pocket.”
The Tegra K1 makes use of Kepler GPU (the same as the TITAN graphics cards) so its latest processor should handle pixels like a star.
Maybe Tegra K1 devices have been slow to show up because NVIDIA was planning something quite grand, which is exactly what happened a few hours ago.