Nvidia Reveals Secret 5th Core in Kal-El Phone Chip

Nvidia’s new Kal-El chipset won’t be the first quad-core chip for phones and tablets: it’ll be the first quint-core.
In a white paper today, Nvidia revealed that Kal-El will include a surprise fifth core, a “companion core” built using a different process which will keep Kal-El devices running at very low power when in standby mode.
Nvidia calls its approach “variable symmetric multiprocessing” and says it lets Kal-El devices use the minimum amount of power necessary for all tasks, conserving battery life.
The trick is based on the four main cores and the “companion” core being based on different silicon processes, Nvidia says. CPUs based on low-power process technologies run very efficientl... »read more

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