Google TV Is Officially Ditching Intel for ARM

The rumors regarding Google’s plans to ditch Intel’s processors in favor of ARM-based chips for its Google TV platform have turned out to be true as the search giant has just sent out a press release to announce this change.

For its next generation Google TV devices, the Menlo Park, California company has chosen to go with Marvell’s Foresight platform that is powered by the Marvell Armada 1500 HD Media System-on-a-Chip (SoC).

This particular solution was chosen since the dual-core Marvell ARM chip promises to deliver PC-like performance with cellphone-like power management while also supporting advanced features such as Blu-ray 3D playback.

In addition, the SoC also brings to the party video encoding/decoding and upscaling support, while also being able to deliver a full Web browsing experience thanks to its Flash content support.

"The Google and Marvell teams have been working closely together to bring our combined software and chipset technologies to market to grow the Google TV ecosystem of manufacturers and devices,” said Mario Queiroz, VP, Product Management Google TV.

“Marvell-powered Google TV solutions will enable powerful products to be brought to market at attractive prices," concluded the company’s rep.

Since its introduction, Google TV has encountered all sort of problems, from less than positive reviews, to Hollywood studios blocking its access to their websites.

All these issues have affected sales, and Google (together with its partners) really needed to bring the cost of the platform down in order to make it more appealing to consumers, as buyers interest in the (discounted) $99 Logitech Revue has shown.

The move to ARM will definitely help Google TV in this regard, but it remains to be seen if this will be enough for it to become popular among consumers.

So far, neither Google, nor Marvell, have said when we should expect the first devices based on the Foresight platform will make its appearance, but they have showcased a fanless demo box that is running this SOC.