With Samsung also in the chipset business, it was probably expected that they would develop their own GPU (graphics processing unit) for mobile devices, despite a number of options available from other suppliers. In fact, it was these other manufacturers that probably caused the delay on this development, as Samsung started to use ARM’s GPU chips in its Exynos processors. Now, Samsung just might be ready to make its own GPUs.
Reports from insiders at Samsung say that this new GPU being developed for Samsung’s own mobile devices is tentatively called the “S-GPU”. More interesting is the fact that this GPU is expected to replace the ARM graphics chips in the Exynos processors starting next year, sources say that this would be happening after the said new chips have been fully tested.
Once Samsung does this, its Exynos chips will be fully custom-made in that it would contain custom CPU cores (albeit based on ARM designs and licenses) and custom GPU cores. This will make the Exynos core at par with Qualcomm chips – fully custom made.
Industry pundits say that these first-generation Samsung GPU cores need to be more powerful than current-generation solutions from ARM, PowerVR, and Qualcomm – if the Korean giant is hoping to make a big splash in the cutthroat chipset market. They say that this new GPU also needs to support Vulkan and have a strong performance when used in VR apps and games.
VIA: SamMobile
