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How the US Embassy made me read a paper book!

It’s only when preparing for my US Visa interview that I realised how much technology I was using and abusing daily
With a look back on my experience, you might see that you too are nearly as much of a geek as I am Posted Image

First, I needed to submit my application online (DS-160) so I used the ARM Cortex-A8 based Toshiba AC-100Posted Image to fill-in the form (of course). The webcam came in handy to submit the picture and an ARM Powered® HP Photosmart C309n Posted Image gave me all printouts needed for the interview.
Having to go to London, I thought the train journey would be a great occasion to organise emails and catch up...

MWC 2012: Cutting Edge Smartphones & Secure Payment Technology

Now that Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2012 has wound down, here are a few more videos and insights I captured from a few of the ARM Partners: Texas Instruments, ST-Ericsson, ZTE and last but not least Proxama.

Texas Instruments
At the Texas Instruments (TI) stand I got to demo the recently released ARM Cortex-A9 based Samsung Galaxy Beam smartphone which features the built in TI DLP Pico Projector technology. This gives you the ability to project the screen of your smartphone onto the wall which could come in handy for displaying slides in an impromptu meeting or a college student who wants to show off their ga...

基于ARM平板电脑方案继续领跑市场(一)

在即将过去的2011年里,平板电脑,智能手机,智能电视等大放异彩。从半导体产业来看,ARM®推出了ARMv8第八代架构,一系列全新的64位处理器,同时发布大小核(big.LITTLE)处理架构,业界对此充满期待。更为可喜的是多家ARM中国的合作伙伴推出的基于ARM CortexTM-A8Cortex-A9SoC产品, 在平板电脑和网络电视等领域都取得了骄人的业绩。其中90%以上平板电脑产品均采用基于ARM架构的内核,不论在市场规模,技术方案还是应用的丰富程度上,基于ARM的平板电脑方案继续领跑全球市场。

在移动互联网时代,人们的生活习惯和...

Smart Glasses, Bionic Birds and GPS Goggles at ARM TechCon

Strolling into the ARM Powered Lounge at this year’s ARM TechCon gives one a real insight into the breadth of devices ARM appears in – and the prototypes on the horizon that will quite literally change the way people live.
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First up, a prototype of smart glasses’ that have been developed by Australian neuroscientist Dr. Stephen Hicks, Department of Clinical Neurology at Oxford University, and his team, to help people with visual impairment regain their independence. If all goes according to plan they will be commercially available by 2014.

Hicks and his team have used a Texas Instruments (TI) OMAP 3530 system-on-a-chip for the original prototype, featuring an ...

台北国际电脑展[第一天]:最新的ARM产品,Windows Embedded Compact 7应用及最新Linaro开发板

北京时间20115月31日上午,台北国际电脑展(Computex2011)在台北南港展览馆盛大举行,ARM第一次有幸作为VIP贵宾受邀参加了这次盛会。ARM总裁Tudor Brown参加了此次Computex的开幕式,并受邀与台湾地区领导人马英九,台湾对外贸易发展协会董事长王志刚,台北市电脑公会主席王振堂,台北市电脑商业同业公会监事召集人 宣明智,及其他IT公司的代表一道为今年的台北国际电脑展拉开了帷幕。

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基于ARM架构的产品在今年的Computex上大放异彩
计算机领域的变化从未像今年Computex展示出的如此迅速、明显——毫无疑问,...

Computex Day 1: ARM Powered Products, Windows Embedded and Linaro Hardware

For the first time, ARM is honored to be invited to join the opening ceremony of COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2011 as the VIP guest. ARM’s president, Tudor Brown attended the opening ceremony in TWTC of Nangang and together with Taiwan’s President Dr. Ying-Jeou Ma, TAITRA’s Chairman Dr. Chih-Kang Wang, TCA’s Chairman Mr. J.T Wang, TCA’s Convener of the Board of Supervisors Mr. John Hsuan, government officials from Taipei City Hall and Ministry of Economic Affairs, and other IT companies’ representatives to slide the tablets and kick-off this year’s COMPUTEX Show.

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ARM Powered Products took center stage at this year’s Computex.
The changing face of computing was never so obvious than at this year’s Computex – no doubt that this is the 3rd era of computing. Our roving correspondent ...

Living the mobile dream... sans laptop... in Barcelona

Last year when I attended MWC, I blogged about feeling like a teenager because of the social media explosion that I saw.

Perhaps this year I should have titled my blog..”Feeling like a kindergartner”, due to me attending the event without my laptop, my presentation security blanket. Let me explain. At every trade show, being the consummate marketing professional I have felt compelled to carry my laptop with me to have all my presentations at my disposal and the ability to edit them on the fly. But thanks to my handy iPhone I would spend most of my time on that device to stay connected on email etc. and my back and shoulders would feel the brunt of carrying around the heavy laptop, not to mention the anxiety of making sure it was charged, just in case I needed to whip out a presentation.

This MWC, I thought that I would a take a leap and live the mobile dream by living on the road with my iPad alone.

With the aid and advice of our two IT guys at the office, I set up a remote client on my iPad that would allow me to log in to my laptop connected to our work network and modify presentations and access data when needed, then downloaded ...

Smart Appliances - Low Power Connectivity Becomes a Competitive Advantage

At first glance I had to wonder why one of Bloomberg Businessweek’s mobile beat reporters, Olga Kharif, was writing an article on household appliances. But after reading the first sentence it all made sense. Kharif’s piece explores the new world of smart, connected appliances and how traditional manufacturers like Whirlpool will now have to slug it out with new entrants hailing from the mobile / telco world, like Samsung and LG.

These upstarts from the land of smartphones, apps and mobile web browsers bring a different take to the world of white goods – and the potential for profit is huge. According to Kharif’s article, the market for connected appliances may reach $6.2 billion by 2015 – that is a big pie. Ironically, the key to success in this market will be similar to what makes companies competitive in the cell phone and ...

Your 2010 Guide to a Gadget-filled, ARM Powered Holiday: Part 3

If you haven’t seen my last 2 blogs, check out Part 1 and Part 2. I’ve put together a holiday gift list of some of the coolest ARM Powered gadgets on the market right now. So this year, avoid having your not-so-fun gifts regifted and try some of these awesome ARM Powered products that your friends and family will love.

Part 3: Gifts for Friends, Family & Around the Home
Bosch Tassimo Hot Beverage System – This fully automatic, energy efficient Cortex-M3 powered coffee maker (on display at ARM Techcon) quickly brews coffee, espresso, tea and mor...

Your 2010 Guide to a Gadget-filled, ARM Powered Holiday: Part 2

Whether for business or leisure, traveling has become a significant part of many of our lives. Do you remember the pre-smart mobile device days when the only thing you brought to travel with was… a book? If you know any frequent travelers, or are one yourself, here are my suggestions for 2010-ing your travel routine – it’s the second installment of my ultimate ARM Powered Gadget Guide! If you missed Part 1, you can find it here.

Great Gifts for Traveling
Barnes & Noble Nook Color – Although “people-watching” is arguably one of my favorite pastimes, the Nook is a much better way to kill time in the airport. The Nook is a fresh take on the eReader form factor with its 7-inch LCD color touchscreen and over 2 million book and magazine titles to choose from, built in WiFi, games and...

Your 2010 Guide to a Gadget-filled, ARM Powered Holiday: Part 1

Another holiday season is upon us. As I look back over the years, there are certain holiday gifts I’ve received that really stand out in my mind: my first CD player, cell phone, mp3 player, digital camera, laptop… Are you sensing a theme here? :) Gadgets make for fun, memorable gifts that everyone enjoys and most of the time make our lives easier.

I’ve put together a holiday gift list, divided into 3 categories, of some of my favorite ARM Powered Gadgets. Let’s kick it off with Part 1:

Fun Gifts for Kids, Teens & College Students
Air Hogs Hawk Eye – Keep your kids entertained for hours with this Cortex-A8-based remote controlled helicopter. It has a camera mounted on the front that allows in-flight video recordin...

How the US Embassy made me read a paper book!

It’s only when preparing for my US Visa interview that I realised how much technology I was using and abusing daily
With a look back on my experience, you might see that you too are nearly as much of a geek as I am Posted Image

First, I needed to submit my application online (DS-160) so I used the ARM Cortex-A8 based Toshiba AC-100Posted Image to fill-in the form (of course). The webcam came in handy to submit the picture and an ARM Powered® HP Photosmart C309n Posted Image gave me all printouts needed for the interview.
Having to go to London, I thought the train journey would be a great occasion to organise emails and catch up...

Why Cortex-A15 makes for Smarter, Lightning-Quick Mobile Devices in the Future

It’s been an interesting few weeks since the launch of the Cortex-A15. But since I’m here at ARM Technology Conference (ARM Techcon) to share some additional technical insight on the Cortex-A15 with our Partners, I thought I would share a detail or two on what Cortex-A15 will offer mobile devices of the future.

Looking Back to the Future
First looking back, the Cortex-A15 launch event itself was eye-opening in terms of the level of interest in ARM’s low-power technology and the variety of discussions that have ensued on what’s possible with upcoming ARM Products. It more than validated the conclusion of my previous blog that the on...

ARM-Powered Corvette by QNX Redefines Connected Driving at Techcon

How will tomorrow’s cars change the driving experience? To find the answer, here’s what you need to do: First, book your trip to ARM Technology Conference 2010 (Techcon). When you arrive, go straight to the exhibit hall and look for a silver Chevrolet Corvette. Found it? Good. Slip into the driver’s seat, where you will immediately notice that this is no ordinary Corvette. Within seconds, you’ll experience two ARM Powered® systems that show how driving is about to become more informative, more convenient, and, above all, more connected.

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The two demo systems, a digital instrument cluster and a multimedia head unit, are the creations of QNX Software Systems . Techcon is still weeks away, so let's take a quick virtual tour to see what these systems can do.

Simplify your driving with smart instrument cluster
QNX’s digital instrument cluster demonstrates how automakers can replace physical speedometers and gauges wit...

The Smartphone of 2013 with Cortex™-A15

A few weeks ago I was on the way to the Airport and the limo driver was talking about his Smartphone and all the great things that he did with it day to day. He then mused about what a Smartphone will be capable off in 2-3 years time; even though I have spent hours talking on this topic, I could not respond at the time the, as the Cortex™-A15 was still under embargo . Now working on the principle of better late than never, I can now answer his question.

More Performance In Your Pocket

The Cortex-A15 is ARM’s next generation application processor core aimed at highend Smartphones (and many other devices) coming to the market in 2013. If you want more details on the Cortex-A15 please read Nandan Nayampally’s blog or look up Cortex-A15 specs at http://www.arm.com.

The Cortex-A15 will continue the trend of increasing performance in your Smartphone, driven by enhanced usag...

Watt’s the Limit for Smart Mobile Devices? Meet the Cortex™-A15

This year has been an exciting and transformative year in mobile. I can’t believe it was just a few years ago when we first introduced the Cortex-A8 and this year the Cortex-A8 has been featured from some of the most innovative smartphones, tablets, and connected DTVs. Software and hardware have come together to deliver a fully connected experience across multiple device platforms. The Cortex-A9 is already headed mainstream into mobile and smart connected devices, enabling multicore performance and flexibility. So here we are today celebrating the arrival of the Cortex-A15 MPcore processor. So ...

Product Scalability – Archos leverages the ARM ecosystem to enable choice

While the tech blogs over the last few months have been filled all sorts of tablet devices covering a range of sizes, capabilities, and price points from numerous manufacturers, Archos stands alone this week by launching 5, yes FIVE, different tablet devices, simultaneously, all centered around different levels of tablet experiences. All include great multimedia, connectivity, web browsing (including Flash 10), and touch interfaces each in their own form factor. Their tag line is “Entertainment your way” and they seem to be delivering on offering choice within their new product line. With 2.8” devices for less than $100 to 10” tablets starting at less than $300 and 3 models in between, Archos is asking “How do you Tablet”?

You can read their press release and check out their website to see the detailed features and specifica...

China leads the mobile internet development

Nielsen has claimed that China has passed US on mobile internet usage, according to China Passes U.S. in Mobile Web by James Kendrick from jkOnThe Run. I really believe this is happening, just by seeing the market change in the past 5 years in China.

It is reported that the number of internet users in China is 420 million as of June 2010, of which 277 million are mobile internet users at the same time. 11.7% of the mobile internet users only use a mobile phone to access to the internet. (Source: China Internet Network Information Center) This number has grown very fast in the past 3 years, from 44 million in June 2007 to 277 million in 2010. Mobile phones and new kinds of smart mobile devices are becoming the primary intern...

China leads the mobile internet development

根据中国在移动 Web 领域已赶超美国(作者:James Kendrick;来源:jkOnThe Run)一文提供的信息,Nielsen 称,中国移动互联网使用已超过美国。仅仅从过去 5 年来中国发生的市场变化来看,我便对此深信不疑。

据报道,截至 2010 年 6 月,中国互联网用户已达 4.2 亿,其中 2.77 亿为移动互联网用户。11.7% 的移动互联网用户使用移动电话上网。(信息来源:中国互联网络信息中心)这一数字在过去三年内得到飞速增长,由 2007 年 6月的 4400 万增至 2010 年 的 2.77 亿。移动电话及新型智能移动设备逐渐成为中国网民的主要上网设备。以下图表显示了市场的快速...

TV At Your Fingertips: How to Never Miss an Episode of Glee Again

It’s no surprise that consumers have fallen in love with tablet computing. Thanks to devices like the iPad and upcoming Android tablets, users have come to learn that mobile computing is more than just looking up directions on GoogleMaps or finding the nearest lunch spot on Yelp. New mobile computing trends have created a shift in the way that we’re connecting and consuming information on a daily basis. One of the hottest trends we’re seeing more of these days has been the convergence of entertainment and computing, which will increasingly become more of a design focus for device makers in the near future. Last week, there was a lot of chatter surrounding a slew of TV tablets that will soon be hitting the market, including the rumored Motorola Verizon TV tablet . TV tablets coming soon, this is an exciting prospect.

While enjoying TV content on ...

How I Created the ARM Powered Android LEGO 7x7x7 Cube Solving Robot



From 3x3x3 to 4x4x4 LEGO Rubik’s Cube Solver
About 18 months ago I was inspired to design and build my first LEGO robot (video) controlled by a Nokia N95 mobile phone that could solve a regular 3x3x3 Rubik's Cube. While demonstrating this robot to a few colleagues at ARM, I had some other puzzles lying on the desk including 4x4x4 and 5x5x5 Rubik's Cubes. A number of...

Motorola Droid X: Feature Rich Without Sacrificing Batteries or Usability!

I love this industry. Day in and day out you hear about the next great device that is going to hit the market. Handset, tablet, eReader or something in between, there is always innovation on the horizon. And then when all the speculation is over and the actual launch occurs, we rarely seem to be disappointed. This week it was Motorola and Verizon’s turn with the unveiling of the Droid X and they did not let us down.

As the official press release says, this is a “Pocket Sized Home Theater” and more apparently. Not only do you get the HDMI connectivity and 720P video encode you might expect in the top of the line devices these days, but you also get access to Verizon’s new Blockbuster On Demand presented by V CAST and NFL Mobile for all your TV, Movie, and football viewing. They have even added DLNA support so you can access all of your personal content.

The great innovation continues in the communicati...

Smarter longer-lasting devices with 32/28nm – Collaboration strikes again

Here I sit in the midst of Design Automation Conference (DAC), just weeks after Computex and the announcement of Linaro (a software initiative I covered recently) awaiting the next set of innovations that will make our smart mobile devices even smarter. When clear across the technology spectrum from Linaro and software we have a major announcement on collaboration that will enable chips to move to a new generation process technology. This week at DAC, ARM together with IBM, Samsung, GLOBALFOUNDRIES, and Synopsys announced the availability of 32/28nm HKMG Vertically Optimized Design Platform. A lot of technical words but what does this really mean for smart devices?

Today most smart devices powered by ...

Will Netbooks join UMPCs and MIDs in the technology graveyard?

I have to admit that with the launch of the iPad tablet this month and the momentum we are seeing on tablet development in Taiwan, I am now wondering if Netbooks are destined to the archive of technology mishaps – just like the UMPCs and MIDs of the past? Fudzilla seems to be asking a similar question in their post here.

Let’s go back to 2007 when the industry was in just giving up on UMPCs moving onto MIDs. Behind this industry fever was a number of companies that were intent to bring PC technology down to a mobile device. At that same time of course the mobile industry was moving quickly to bring the internet and other PC like features to an increasing capable set of smartphones.

...

CTIA 2010: 1GHz ARM SmartPhones and Beyond Part 2

This is part 2 of my CTIA blog looking at the network challenges, and the unexpected gadgets of CTIA 2010. Part 1 covered the best Smartphones, Android from 2G to 4G, multimedia capabilities in phones and screen sizes.

It’s All About The Network
At CTIA there was a lot of talk of how the “data crunch” is going to be addressed over the coming years and how the rollout of Wimax and LTE will help address this issue. Technical note in defense of AT&T; their HSPA+ network will have the spectral efficiency almost equal to LTE. However before you think the data capacity challenge is solved, here are some interesting data points from the Femtocell forum:Increased spectrum will give a 2x increase in data capacityLTE/Wimax will give you 3-5x increase in data capacity.Combined these two improvements will give a 10x increase in data capacity over the next four years, which sounds rather go...

CTIA 2010: 1GHz ARM SmartPhones and Beyond


Smartphone that I Wanted to Take Home
Though there were some great devices at CTIA, but the one device that I wanted to slip into my pocket was the Samsung ...

Mobile World Congress – The computer show of the new decade?

In preparing for my very first MWC, I was thinking: is this just going to be a mini CES? I started by looking into the number of attendees and who the exhibitors are and saw that this is a much more targeted show focused on mobile phones. Then I really started to dig and realized I couldn’t have been more wrong, there is so much more to it than the term “mobile phones.” Looking at session topics and the news in the mobile space today, it became clear that maybe we should be thinking of MWC as the up and coming computer show of the new decade. Yesterday’s mobile phone ecosystem is tomorrow’s computer ecosystem.

Today, the fastest growing segment of the mobile phone market is the smartphone. What seems to be some of the most compelling features to consumers are the instant access to their email, the ability to get to the web wherever they are, and the huge availability of applications addressing specific individual needs. Aren’t these the things we used to do on our PCs? Essentially today’s smartphones are small computers in our pockets or purses. While they are not our historic PCs, these smart mobile devices do most of what we used to do on our PCs but they do it anywhere and anytime, they are always on and always connected, they have int...

CES …catalyst for well placed bets…ARM everywhere

CES has always been where future ideas are tested and the impact of well placed bets becoming a reality. At 2006, people starting talking about HDTVs connected to the internet, ARM realized that to become a leader in these devices we must support the internet. This kicked-off internal discussions that were initially focused on getting ARM into computing, but very quickly it boiled down to “it’s the internet stupid” and that the internet would be critical for ARM’s success in the future. This initiated engineering efforts by ARM and our Partners to make this a reality. Fast forward four years and I can say the bet paid off in spades and in ways, we did not imagine. Let me show you what impressed me …

eBooks/Readers explosion … this was the year of the eBook/eReader at CES, they were everywhere and a couple received best of show in their categories. The Barnes and Noble nook, Alex by Spring Design, and Entourage edge; all integrated a second screen and Google’s ...

First Axiom of Low Power Design – Think Size

As a student of physics, I have always been drawn to the fundamental truths. However, after a career of marketing it took a true scientist to remind me to go back to my roots and look for the simple truths that hide within complex problems.

It happened when I was giving a recent talk to a large group of ARM engineers and technical fellows at our internal global engineering conference. The subject of my talk was an inside look at the much talked about ARM vs X86 battle. I naturally highlighted many of the power differences between two very different approaches to processor design including the fact that the ARM architecture was designed from the start for mobile.

After my talk I was approached by one of the most famous (internal to ARM) original architects of the ARM instruction set. As a marketer at an engineering conference, it was an honor to finally meet him in person and I was surprised that he took the time to talk to me. He complimented me on my talk but then very gently pointed out that I had a bit of the ARM history wrong – ugh!

You see, the original ARM instruction set was designed f...

Lookout - Prepay smartphones for under £100 ($165)

I was looking for a Christmas present for my teenage daughter last week and was looking to buy her a low cost “Pay as you go” phone. Pre-pay feature phones usually cost less than £100 in the UK and offer a functional, if limited, user experience. Some of the more popular styles have been low cost touch screens that imitate the look of more expensive smartphones, but without the slick user experience (rich graphics, vast app stores, snappy response). So I found myself in Car Phone Warehouse looking at the phones from the big 6 OEMs (Apple, LG, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson) and was amazed to see that a £99 Nokia touch screen cell phone (Nokia 5530) was a S60 device – a full blown smartphone running on a fast ARM11. I checked the price on Amazon and in the USA it is available unlocked for $199. These are impressively low price points and make smartphones, without contract, available to a much wider audience. The smartphone market is expected to grow to beyond 500M pcs per annum by 2012 and a good percentage, maybe half, of th...

Chrome OS – Leveling the playing field



For ARM this is very exciting news, here is how we see the impact:

It levels the playing field. Fo...

TechCon3: Advancing mobile computing & graphics interfaces

At ARM TechCon3 last week, we had a chance to catch up with Brian Carlson of TI and Bill Galione of ST-Ericsson.

Brian Carlson took us through some of the emerging ARM based mobile computing devices using TI’s OMAP 3 technology. The highly responsive Palm Pre which is powered by the ARM Cortex-A8 which supports multiple applications at a time. The Archos internet tablet is the first OMAP 3 Android product that runs at 800 MHz. This very fast device can open multiple windows at one time and has a handy touch magnifying tool for close up reading. Carlson says there is much to look forward to from the OMAP 4 and the ARM Cortex-...

Cortex-A5 in Mobile...This little core is going to be BIG

In the mind boggling large mobile market a lot of time is spent talking about the smartphones which represent less than 20% of the market today. It is a market which is in transition from ARM11 to Cortex-A8 processors and will move to dual core Cortex-A9 processors next year. These SoCs typically have a GPU such as a Mali400 for impressive user interfaces and accelerating Flash10.1 graphics and a video block for DVC functions that can push out to an HD display. There is a lot of software being optimised for these Cortex-A family cores (If you are a software engineer you will know this as our v7A architecture). Backwards compatibility comes as standard with these application processors, you can run code from an ARM7 or ...

ARM @ TechCon3, See what everyone is talking about.

Follow the new ARM-Events blog, featuring ARM TechCon3 for the latest updates from ARM & the ARM Community on the show floor.

Software Sessions: Free Pegatron Nettop-while supplies last!
A Pegatron Nettop will be given to the first 80 pre-registered attendees who attend the ARM Software Sessions at ARM TechCon3 on Thursday, Oct 22 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM.

The Latest Mali Graphics Demos – Eye Candy or Reality?
Saoud Moco gives a sneak peak of the exciting Mali demos to be show at ARM TechCon3, Oct 21-23, 2009.

ARM TechCon3: Workshops and Seminar at Techmart
Ken Haven's talks about some of the great workshops and seminars to be held at ARM TechCon3.

ARM TechCon3: Design to the Power of Three
ARM TechCon3 features three critical areas of design, energy efficiency and design, internet everywhere, and MCU and tools.

ARM Software Sessions at ARM TechCon3
Don’t miss out on the ARM Software seminar series presented by ARM software experts are on Cortex-A software devel...

Dell Latitude ON – Right ON



Dell videos showing the merging of the smartphone and business laptop


Bringing an ARM based subsystem into a PC notebook to deliver a hybrid that benefited from the best of both worlds. This week Dell formally (finally) an...

One Size Does Not Fit All – How ARM Enables Phone Diversity

One question that is continually asked of me since I have been at ARM is if product X, operating system Y, or form factor Z is going to “win” the handset market. My response to this is always no, and then I provide the following explanation. The mobile phone market is around 1.3 billion units a year, and there are over 3 billion mobile individual subscribers. No one handset, form factor, or operating system can dominate a market that size. Also, the mobile phone is the most personal electronic device that allows people to reflect their individuality (or not).

What does this phone say about its owner?

Different Needs, Different Devices
Originally, when mobile phones were just phones the diversity in the form factor and capabilities were quite small. The big differentiators were color of the case, talk time and whether it was a flip or candy bar phone.

Did you want your phone in Candybar or Flip?

Today mobile phones have morphed into so many form factors and capabilities depending on the needs of the individual co...

NetBooks: Fad or Trend?

NetBooks, the new breed of low power, cut down laptops have gained significant popularity over the last twelve months. They seem to be being used as cheap laptops (for students) and second PCs, perhaps being used for traveling and conferences. Microsoft has given WindowsXP a reprieve in order to support them and is promoting support for them in the upcoming Windows 7 release. Apple remains aloof and mysterious.

Meanwhile, Linux based versions of NetBooks are available now. Often these have tailored distributions of Linux, aimed at ease of use, particularly for those unfamiliar with Linux.

Curious about how this will play out I took an Atom based Acer Aspire One and installed Ubuntu Remix onto it. This is Canonical's approach to making Ubuntu user friendly on a 9” or less screen. What I want to know, is could I use this machine in my day to day work and home life? What improvements would I make, if I could? What does this mean fo...

Gray market, 1000 RMB mobile computing?

ARM processor-based mobile computing platforms have been drawing more eyes in China in the past several months. Many companies both in the handset industry and the PC industry are interested in this “new” market. Moreover, the chipset vendors have become key partners in this market because they have the chips and reference designs. High-performance ARM mobile computing platforms, such as Cortex-A8 based platforms, are more intricate than previous platforms. So direct support from the chipset vendors is very important to the ODM/OEMs so that they can finish their first design. I have had several calls each week from these companies asking for an update on this market, including any partners whom they can work with. Some of the calls are very interesting because they are from some companies which I never heard of in Shenzhen area where the most gray market players are located. Gray market refers to the small manufacturers in China spinning out devices with little to no branding or marketing. They say they want to do ARM based smart mobile devices....

China has a huge gray market now..hundreds of small and medium-sized companies who are struggling in this market. They are very flexible and want to do any device that...

灰色市场,千元移动计算?

过去几个月来,基于 ARM 处理器的移动计算平台在中国一直备受关注。手机行业和 PC 行业的众多企业均对此“新兴”市场兴趣满满。此外,芯片集供应商已成为该市场中的关键合作伙伴,因为他们拥有芯片和公板设计。高性能 ARM 移动计算平台(如基于 Cortex-A8 的平台)比以往的平台更加复杂。因此,来自芯片集供应商的直接支持对于 ODM/OEM 完成初步设计非常重要。每周我都会接到来自这些公司的几通电话,询问有关该市场的更新信息(包括他们可以并肩合作的任何合作伙伴的信息)。有些电话非常有趣,因为是从深圳地区(多数灰色市场厂商聚集的地方)我从未听说过的某些公司打来的。灰色市场是指制售品牌非常小甚至无品牌或营销活动的设备的中国小型制造商。他们说希望做基于 ARM 的智能移动设备....

中国现在拥有巨大的灰色市场..数百家中小型公司正在这个市场中拼搏挣扎。他们非常灵活变通,只要是可以赚钱的设备,他们都愿意做。他们...

Nokia N900 shows the power of ARM Cortex-A8

Having seen the ads on YouTube and read the PR I’m looking forward to getting my hands on a N900.


The jump to our latest Cortex-A8 processor in the form of TI’s OMAP3 chip means that users can enjoy greater responsiveness for widgets, browsing and everyday use. A second important feature of the N900 that you will see widely adopted over the next year or two is the take up of OpenGL ES 2.0and the accelerated graphics that lies beneath. This combination of Cortex-A8 or dual core Cortex-A9 together with capable GPU’s like our Mali400 will become the mainstream solution for handheld computing over the next couple of years. OEMs are demand...

Sharp’s NetWalker Smart Mobile Device Powered By ARM Cortex A-8

We are nearly 2/3rds of the way through 2009, the year in which the ARM CortexTM-A8 processor emerged in announced products. Smartphones lead the way, with the Palm Pre going public right at the start of the year followed by most of the other mobile OEMs. Now eight months later the first laptop from Sharp has been announced built on the same Cortex-A8 CPU. The Sharp PC-Z1 with a 5 inch 1024 x600 TFT LCD touchscreen display is powered by the Freescale iMX51 running Ubuntu. The intention to make this popular desktop distribution of ‘Linux available on the ARM’ architecture was only announced towards the end of 2008, before this time it was exclusively associated with PCs.

The high performance and efficiency of the Cortex-A8 has made it a magnet for software developers wanting to create new innovative battery powered devi...

China, at the center of Mobile Computing evolution

China, one of the largest PC, mobile phone and consumer electronic markets in the world, is at the center where all companies in the industry are competing with each other. And now, it’s one of the critical markets for ARM based mobile computing devices. We are working with our partners including Silicon vendors, OS vendors, software service companies as well as OEM/ODMs to enable the market in China.

Convergence is happening everywhere in the industry: fixed line and wireless; embedded and PC, especially mobile and internet. Everyone is talking about mobile internet in China such as the operators, internet companies, wireless service providers etc. There were 298 million internet users in China by the end of 2008, among which 117.6 million users also accessed internet through mobile phone; growth of 133% more than 2007, according to CNNIC (China Internet Network Information Center). I am expecting the next 100 million internet users in China will access the internet through mobile devices rather than PCs.

Chinese people are one of the craziest and most endurable users I have ever seen. Many young generation people will spend 2-3 months’ salary just for a latest “cool” Nokia phone, and then change to another one in half-year time. They like to try new devices and services, and they ar...

中国,在移动计算进化的中心

中国是全球最大的 PC、移动电话和消费性电子产品市场之一,同时也是业界所有公司展开竞争的战场前沿。目前,这里也是基于 ARM 的移动计算设备的重要市场之一。我们正与合作伙伴(包括芯片供应商、操作系统供应商、软件服务公司以及 OEM/ODM)携手,共同推动在华市场发展。

业界的融合现象随处可见:固定线路与无线、嵌入式与 PC,特别是移动与互联网。在中国,人人都在谈论移动互联网(如运营商、互联网公司、无线服务提供商等)。截止到 2008 年底,中国互联网用户已达 2.98 亿,其中 1.176 亿用户同时还通过移动电话上网;与 2007 年相比,增加了 133%(信息来源:中国互联网络信息中心 (CNNIC))。我预测,中国接下来的 1 亿互联网用户将通过移动设备而不是 PC 访问互联网。

中国人是我见过的最狂热、最能忍耐的用户群之一。很多年轻人会花费 2 到 3 个月的薪水,只是为了购买一款最新的“酷炫”Nokia 手机,而后会在半年的时间内再更换为另一款。他们喜欢尝试新的设备和服务,同时也是互联网用户...

Smart Mobile Devices Press Tour Update

ARM Powered Smart Mobile Devices Press Tour took place from coast to coast in the US and then on to the UK. From this two week tour the articles listed below are some the of the news coming from the various media.

Windows to run on ARM processors by 2013

ARM has legs

ARM Outlines Next-gen Netbooks and Smartbooks*

Can ARM Come Between Microsoft and Intel?

ARM hopes to lure Microsoft away from Intel

ARM-Based Pegatron Netbook Protoype

ARM-Powered Pegatron Netbook Showcased

Pegatron shows netbook with Palm Pre's CPU

...

First taste of an ARM Powered Netbook … and it’s good!

We just took a delivery of 15 netbooks and distributed them around ARM; I am excited to take mine on the road with me this week to show the press and here is a little about my experience with this smart mobile device so far.

A little about the device … it is 10.1 “netbook” powered by two cell battery and an ARM Cortex-A8 running about 800MHz. They are extremely light and are made thin because they don’t generate much heat. These are not production units and are considered engineer samples; cases are “soft tooled” so the fit is not solid like production units but it gives a good a feeling on where the products are going. Electronics wise the device is close to full function complete, but from software prospective more work is needed … but too not much. What’s missing is from the software side includes power management, 2D/3D driver optimization, and some video codecs.

That said, this device rocks and I can definitely see a bright future. The installed OS is Canonical’s Ubuntu 9.04. WiFi...

Android Shipping on ARM Smart Mobile Devices Now

Android is an excellent example of the great OpenSource initiatives that are happening around the ARM architecture. Android and the Symbian Foundation are unique in the OpenSource community in that they are both complete mobile phone stacks, which allow OEMs and Silicon Partners (SiPs) to develop their own handsets. Allowing them to focus on differentiation, rather than the rewriting yet another SMS client. However it is critical that anyone who is takes advantage of the Android codebase does it in such a way that they can take full advantage of future versions, optimizations and bug fixes.


It is easy to build a toy Android on another architecture, but can you make it production worthy?

With OpenSource Freedom Comes Responsibility

The Android codebase is 2+GByte of source code, and the many man years of effort t...

The ARM Cortex-A8 Allows You to Multitask on the Palm Pre

Why do you need the performance of the Cortex-A8 in a smartphone, what is the “killer application”? I always responded to this question by explaining that there was no one killer application, but rather consumers need to do many things well. The Palm Pre is an excellent demonstration of the multitasking smart mobile device.

A Multitasking Phone for Multitasking Consumers

Traditionally phones have really had a “singletasking” UI, in that you would have just one application displayed on the screen, such as an email application. To change from one application to another you would go back to a display that allows you select the next application and the Palm Pre has this traditional view.


However the Palm Pre has broken this paradigm by offering a UI that is more OSX / Windows 7 rather than Windows 3.1.

The Palm Pre achieves this “multitasking” UI in a number ways. The first being that an application can just shrink to allow relevant information to be displayed, for example email, voicemail, or the media player controller application screen prese...

Playing with the Cortex-A8 based Palm Pre

Today I received a Palm Pre to evaluate as one of the first phones to employ the ARM Cortex-A8 processor core (Breakdown showing the Cortex-A8 based TI OMAP3430 in the Palm Pre). The Pre is a very exciting device for a number of reasons, including its WebOS and also because it is Cortex-A8 based.

ARM Cortex-A8 delivering performance never seen in your hand before.

So why is the Cortex-A8 such a leap forward for the mobile handset? If you want full details, you can refer to in-depth technical manuals for the Cortex-A8 and the TI OMAP3430. But in one simple sentence the Cortex-A8 delivers over 2x the performance that you have seen in a cell phone before, while not sacrificing battery life. When designing the Cortex-A8 we had to adhere to the Golden design rule of not exceeding 300mW, almost 10x lower than what you see from other mainstream processor architectures t...

ARM Community at Computex: Wrap-up

ARM Community at Computex

Don’t Supersize My Processor….Consider ARM Smart Mobile Devices
Kerry McGuire reflects on the excitement around Computex 2009. She describes her ideal smart mobile device and the technology needed for it.

ARM in the News

Pegatron Netbook: Freescale CPU, 8hr battery, super-slim & 3G [Video]
By Chris Davies, Slashgear.com, June 4, 2009

Wistron N900z Smartbook*: sub-$200 ARM netbook [Video]
By Chris Davies, Slash Gear, June 3, 2009

ARM's East Interview on Semiconductor Industry [Video]
Bloomberg TV, June 2, 2009

COMPUTEX 2009: the year of the low power chip
by Scott Bicheno, Hexus.channel, June 3, 2009

...

Smart Mobile Devices - what to expect from your next Smartphone

The immediate future of mobile devices is visible at industry shows like CES, MWC and CTIA. I want to share my pick of the smart mobile device technology that is going to revolutionise the user experience of Smartphones over the next year. As it happens, on the last day of Mobile World Congress my mobile phone disappeared which means I’m back using my battered and bruised old cell phone for a while and on the lookout for something new and shiny.

If you looked carefully at some of the devices on show at CES in Las Vegas and MWC in Barcelona you would have witnessed the start of what will turn out to be a profound change for the mobile industry. In the thousands of devices on show there were a handful that represented the next generation, with high-performance processors, high-definition video capability and stunning screens. They were generally slim, cool, high-performance, web-centric mobile devices powered by the ARM Cortex-A8 processor or Qualcomm Snapdragon (both ARM v7 architecture). The applications processor represents the brains of the Smartphone, MID or netbook and having a Cortex-A8 typically provides a 3- to 5x jump...

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