Welcome to second day of ARM Technology Conference (ARM Techcon) 2010. Today I’ve seen queues everywhere of people waiting to get into keynotes, technical sessions from industry leaders, theatre performances and of course the lunch queue, which just goes to show how successful this years’ event is turning out to be.In today’s roundup video you’ll get to see snippets of the keynotes from Tudor Brown President, ARM and Ron Jocoby, Chief Architect o... [read more]

So I can’t turn down a challenge. How was I going to improve the speed of the solver? Lights, camera, action! Yes I did it. I improved the Rubik Speedcuber from 25 to 15 seconds. And it only took travel, lights, camera, image analysis, native Android coding, a new phone and food. Intrigued? Check out the new demo at the ARM Technology Conference (ARM Techcon) in Santa Clara, California on Thursday Nov 11.Challenge: How much faster can you make ... [read more]

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 FutureFirst looking back, the Cortex-A15 launch event itself was eye-opening in terms of the level of interest i... [read more]

In case you missed the start of this discussion, my blog CPUs Have Been Doing GPU Computing Badly for Years started a dialog with Gary Smith who responded with Sub-Optimal Processing. Here is my response.****er’s Law (name changed to protect the guilty)It used to be said that the embedded space was about 7 years behind the desktop in the sense that technological changes tended to appear in (what was then) mainstream computing seven years before t... [read more]

While ARM Technology Conference (ARM Techcon) 2010 has been a great show thus far the Mali-T604 graphics processor is a key announcement from ARM and ARM Partners, I wanted to highlight some of the fun ways that engineers are demonstrating ARM technology at the show. From the challenging mbed Robot Racing, to the famous Rubik’s Cube Speedcuber (now improved!) to the Android Embedded Meetup, engineers are using their creativity to expand our min... [read more]

Today we announced the ARM® Mali™-T604 GPU, the first implementation of ARM’s new Midgard architecture. The increase in screen resolutions and the demand for better-looking and more intuitive displays needs a huge increase in graphics capability. These demands for the highest levels of performance and flexibility, support for new APIs such as Khronos™ OpenCL™ and Microsoft® DirectX®, all in an energy-efficient way called for a new emb... [read more]

All of the above! The Chumby is one of those devices that you probably think you don’t need – but when you’ve got one you can’t imagine living with out it!Chumby is basically your window to the always on Internet world. Its designers took the humble electric alarm clock and gave it a high-tech twist. It is basically an embedded computer which provides internet access via Wi-Fi connection. Through this connection users can access the internet, str... [read more]

Hello from the ARM Technology Conference 2010 (Techcon) in Santa Clara, California. In its sixth year of consistent growth, Techcon’s registrations are up over 50% from last year. The buzz from Day One included:highlights from Marvell keynote on always-on connected devices IBM’s keynote on how Moore’s Law is continuing to scale for smaller processes ARM’s Artisan Physical IP process optimization packages and the recent NXP, Fujitsu and Energy Mi... [read more]

I will be talking at ARM® Technology Conference (Techcon) this week about our latest Cortex-A9 implementation project, which I am pretty excited about. Cortex-A9 is a scalable high-performance, low-power multiprocessor from ARM. It is ideally suited for applications which require high levels of performance, where the power-budget or battery life is critical. ARM implementation teams have been pushing the frequency achievable on the Cortex-A9 on ... [read more]

3D has been the buzz word in graphics for the past year. What most people associate with 3D is hi-tech expensive equipment, be it a high-end television or games console owned only by the most advanced of gadget geeks.At ARM we questioned why 3D should be limited to cinemas or the most powerful of high end gaming consoles? Along comes the ARM® Mali™-400 MP GPU - a very powerful graphics processor capable of some impressive feats but with energy... [read more]

Just in time for the ARM® Technology Conference (Techcon) - last week Oracle released Java SE Embedded 6u21 with support for ARM. Java SE 6u21e syncs with the latest release of Java SE 6u21 for desktop and servers allowing developers to deploy on their ARM embedded device the same full Java SE version as found on their PC.One of the key, new features of this release is multi-core support for ARMv7. The multi-core functionality of Java SE such as... [read more]

The CoreSight™ System Trace Macrocell (STM) is a breakthrough in hardware assisted trace for application developers. Although many embedded platforms have dedicated debug and trace logic available for some time, these aren’t always available or useful when an operating system is running on the platform.Application developers have had to rely on using standard I/O channels to try to obtain debug and trace information from their systems. Things h... [read more]

I’ve been in embedded development for many years and by default I guess I’m an old UNIX system programmer too. Because I saw some benefit in an OS for Embedded systems I did some investigating into several commercial offerings and the early open source alternatives. I quickly became intrigued by Linux and its application in embedded systems. Embedded Linux has exploded, and today Linux finds itself in many things we use every day, from our sm... [read more]

The 2010 ARM Technology Conference (Techcon) is taking place in Santa Clara next week. A large number of companies will be presenting their solutions to support development and optimization of products based on ARM technology, and open source will be discussed in many of these with projects like Linux, Android and development tools. For instance, many of these solutions are using open source to leverage earlier work that ARM has done with the ope... [read more]

I needed to clean out some of my old files the other day and I’m talking about the paper type that actually take up space in my garage, not the kind that are on my hard disk. Going through them I started reminiscing back to when I got started in embedded design (more years ago than I care to admit). One of the first microcontrollers I programmed was the RCA ELF1802. If you don’t remember or know about the RCA ELF1802, Rockwell 6502, the Motorola ... [read more]

Recently I went to visit a winery, where I learned two interesting things: First, the California “Meritage” appellation for Bordeaux-style wines is pronounced to rhyme with “heritage” and not (Bordeaux style) with “mirage”. Second, aging wines in wooden barrels necessarily involves loss. Wines lose both water and alcohol to evaporation, known as the angels’ share of the wine. Keeping the barrels in a cellar with 100% humidity elimin... [read more]

My final review of the Netbook, will be on the sound and visual quality this smart mobile device presents. As well as its capabilities to navigate through the exciting world of social media!Sound and VisionPhotographs are supported via F-Spot which helps you organize photographs. It surprised me by recognizing my Canon G9 when I plugged it in and downloaded RAW format photographs. Like iPhoto, it includes integration with Flickr. It doesn't allow... [read more]

It has been exactly one year to the day since I held the first production-ready Android handset the HTC G1. Now one year of good fortune presented me with the chance to use the Acer Liquid (Qualcomm’s ARM-powered SnapDragon), well for a few days at least. Not having used an Android handset in the period in between I was very surprised to see how far the bar had been raised by the combination of the physical attributes, thousands of apps availab... [read more]

So it’s called a netbook, but can it handle a day at the office? Email and calendar are provided by Evolution. It is nicely integrated with Google mail, including contacts and calendar. Microsoft Outlook is catered for so long as Outlook Web Access is enabled (which it is in ARM). Like Outlook it can cache e-mails for offline use.In order to get your mail, you need to be connected into ARM's network. When you're on the road, that usually means ... [read more]

Everyone loves the iPhone. Everyone loves the App Store. But why should Apple have all the fun? Or rather, why should they have all the apps, and all the app developers? What if there was a single SDK that allows you to write a rich mobile app in vanilla C++, compile it to native ARM CPU instructions, then click a single button to generate standard app installer packages for the iPhone, Android, Symbian, Windows Mobile and BREW?Actually, many of ... [read more]

Friday, October 23rd marked the wrap up of the last day of ARM TechCon3, ending with many informative conference sessions and powerful discussions. Here are some links to the ARM Cortex-A5, Mali and Mali Developer Center, ST-Ericsson, STMicroelectronics, TI Stellaris, Xilinx and AMBA highlights over the three days on ARM and the ARM Community.For additional news coverage please review these posts as well:ARM TechCon3 Day 1 - Cortex-A5, Mali Devel... [read more]

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 d... [read more]

Another great day at ARM TechCon3, the ARM Partnership model was in full display! As many partners & Connected Community members attended conference sessions and showed off their ARM collaborations. Listed below are some of the great media coverage around ARM TechCon3 over the past two days.ARM CTO: Power Surge Could Create 'Dark Silicon'By Rick Merritt, EE Times, October 22, 2009Without fresh innovations, designers could find themselves by 2020 ... [read more]

You ever have those projects when you just need to do something quick and simple (or you at least think it will be simple)? A few years back, we had a popular model of a machine that had been out in the field for many years and due some advances in technology the electric motor on the machine wasn’t able to keep up. Long story short we just need to monitor the speed of the motor and if it slowed down we need to reduce a PWM feed. Simple right? Oh... [read more]

Wednesday October 21st marked day one of ARM TechCon3 2009. Starting off the morning with the Cortex-A5 and Mali Developer Center announcements, the buzz and energy on the show floor seemed to exude to the enthusiasm and excitement around ARM technology. Below are some highlighted media from these two announcements.The Cortex-A5 processor is raising the bar for energy efficient design and connectivity. This ARM processor will not only enable high... [read more]

Just this morning ARM has released two big announcements; the launch of the new Mali Developer Center and the evolutionary Cortex-A5 processor. To find out more about this dynamic software community and the new ultra-compatible ARM processor, check out the blogs below.Boosting future multimedia devices: Mali Developer Center Srinivas Gattamneni gives insight into the changes in the software development ecosystem and how the Mali Developer Center ... [read more]

Just this morning ARM has released two big announcements; the launch of the new Mali Developer Center and the evolutionary Cortex-A5 processor. To find out more about this dynamic software community and the new ultra-compatible ARM processor, check out the blogs below.Boosting future multimedia devices: Mali Developer Center Srinivas Gattamneni gives insight into the changes in the software development ecosystem and how the Mali Developer Center ... [read more]

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... [read more]

My wife thinks my job is to breed worms and develop environmental habitats. While this is obviously not true, there are some parallels to be drawn between her thinking and my real job of enabling a robust graphics ecosystem. For example my job does involve helping develop efficient interdependencies between partners (organisms) who share a common technology culture (habitat). The partners in this case include almost everybody in the software crea... [read more]

Make sure to put these events on your schedule for while you are at ARM TechCon3, Oct 21-23rd.Don't Miss the Networking Reception! - Entering a New Era of InnovationSponsored by Common Platform, ARM & SynopsysWednesday, October 21 5:00pm - 7:00pmExhibit Hall, SoC PavilionThroughout history major advancements in consumer lifestyles have been launched from technology "tipping points." Join us as we usher in a new era of consumer electronics fueled ... [read more]

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 exc... [read more]