MWC 2017: MediaTek Helio X30 detailed; features CorePilot 4.0, ClearZoom and more

By tech2 News Staff /  28 Feb 2017 , 12:17

At the ongoing Mobile World Congress 2017 (MWC) in Barcelona, MediaTek made an announcement about its top-of-the-line chipset called the Helio X30. While the MediaTek Helio X30 was announced last year in August, the Taiwanese chipmaker announced some additional details about the chipset including availability of the same in handsets.

The Helio X30 is built by TSMC on 10nm FinFET process, which is down from the 20nm process that was used for the Helio X20. This should bring with it significant power savings as the current Android flagships are still on the 14nm / 16nm process whereas the Apple iPhone is expected to come with a 10nm chipset next year.

As you may already know by now, it is a deca-core chipset. You get a 64-bit deca-core CPU featuring a 64-bit deca-core Tri-Cluster setup which is something new for both the company and its clients.

Assisting all those cores is CorePilot 4.0, which delivers 25 percent more power saving than the previous version.

The chipset also packs in a 14-bit ISP that supports two 16MP camera. There’s ClearZoom and Total Noise Reduction, new technologies that are said to deliver superior image quality.

There’s also a new Vision Processing Unit (VPU) that will be present to ease the load from the CPU and GPU.

You get support for UFS 2.1 storage, and the chip can handle up to 8GB of LPDDR4x RAM clocked at 1,866MHz.

“Just like your heart automatically reacts to numerous tasks your body is doing, CorePilot 4.0 automatically directs power where and when it’s needed to maintain efficiency. Consumers today demand extreme performance from their smartphones, on top of a long battery life. CorePilot 4.0 perfectly balances power and efficiency, and adapts to users’ computing patterns to manage power consumption,” Jeffrey Ju, executive vice president and Co-COO of MediaTek said in a statement.

The new chipset will ship in handsets starting from the second half of this year, which is around June and July.

Complete coverage of the Mobile World Congress 2017 can be found here.

MediaTek to foray into making chipsets for the automative industry

Image Credit: REUTERS

By tech2 News Staff /  30 Nov 2016 , 14:45

MediaTek is known for making chipsets for smartphones, connectivity, home entertainment and IoT devices. The company has today announced its new plan to foray into the automotive industry in the beginning of Q1 2017.

According to the company, the market for connected and autonomous vehicles is growing rapidly and there is need for advanced technologies that offer a blend of power-efficiency, processing power and affordability. MediaTek believes that with its technology expertise in chipset design. It positions the company well to bring innovative multimedia, connectivity and sensor solutions to the automotive industry.

MediaTek solutions for automobile manufacturers will cover four key areas, including:

• Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (Vision-based ADAS): Reimagined from the ground up, MediaTek’s ADAS system will feature cutting-edge, decentralised Vision Processing Unit (VPU) solutions to optimally handle large amounts of real-time visual streaming data. MediaTek employs Machine Learning to increase the accuracy and speed of detection, recognition and tracking, making it more comparable to human decision-making performance.
• Precision Millimeter Wave (mmWave) Radar: MediaTek is drawing on its technology expertise and heritage in high frequency RF and connectivity, bringing the automotive industry mmWave radar solutions that use higher frequencies to gain better object resolution and more precise detection. Residing in the high frequency band, mmWave radar can recognise targets more accurately and is more resistant to fog, rain, snow and other weather conditions than current types of radar.
• Superior In-Vehicle Infotainment: MediaTek has developed powerful 2D and 3D processing technologies to ensure its application processors perform at the highest levels of efficiency and speed. MediaTek in-car entertainment solutions offer a high level of integration of navigational and multimedia features and connectivity options.
• Enhanced Telematics: MediaTek Telematics is a robust solution to handle a variety of high-bandwidth information transfers and can support a wide variety of connectivity standards (Cellular 4G/3G/2G, Wi-Fi, BT/BLE ) and map-based applications. MediaTek Telematics offerings align with the company’s core strengths: power-efficiency, highly integrated system-in-packages, broad networking and connectivity support.

“The demands of connected and autonomous vehicles require a unique portfolio of technologies. MediaTek’s core competencies create a natural progression for us to design for the future of driving,” said JC Hsu, Corporate Vice President and General Manager of the New Business Department Business Unit at MediaTek.

“We have a strong technology portfolio generated from $10 billion in research and development investment over the past 12 years from modem and RF advancements, computing technologies and connectivity to intelligent algorithms. We are developing semiconductor solutions to make an impact in the automotive industry and are focused on core areas of in-vehicle Infotainment, Telematics and safety ADAS to further the evolution toward autonomous driving. The complicated systems of tomorrow’s high-tech cars will require a high degree of integration, innovative power management and improved functionality to support both the highest level of safety demands and driving experiences consumers need. MediaTek will bring one integrated package of semiconductors to the market – a holistic solution that is now lacking in the auto industry.”

MediaTek announces MT2511 and MT2523 SoC for wearables

  13 Oct 2016 , 19:16

Taiwanese semiconductor company MediaTek on Thursday announced two new system-on-chips (SoCs) specifically targeted towards the health, fitness and wearables market in the country.

The MT2511 is MediaTek’s first bio-sensing analog front-end (AFE) chipset that is in-built with an exclusive heart beat interval technology and 4KB SRAM that optimises the overall system power consumption for sleep heart rate monitoring.

The MT2523 is designed for active and fitness smart watches, consists of micro controller unit and helps deliver high-efficiency signal processing functionality at low power and low cost with ease-of-use benefits.

“MediaTek has always focused on combining power with efficiency and we are leading the charge in bringing this know-how to IoT products in India,” said Kuldeep Malik, Country Head, Corporate Sales International, MediaTek India, in a statement.

The MT2523 is also embedded with a GPS, dual-mode Bluetooth, and a MIPI-supported high-resolution mobile screen.

End products powered by MT2511 and MT2523 are expected to land in the country by early 2017.

Karbonn Quattro L52 VR Review: Don’t bother buying this

• By Rehan Hooda /  05 Oct 2016 , 15:13

Karbonn Quattro L52 VR is one of seven phones launched by Karbonn Mobiles in this year and the third phone from the Quattro series. The company launched this phone back in April and wanted to target budget users with the bundled VR headset for its VR content. Not many companies have gone this way in targeting budget segment with VR offering, except Lenovo with Vibe K4 Note. You sure can use third party VR headsets to consume the VR content but bundled VR headset along with the name of the device itself and bundled VR apps go a long way in showing that this isn’t a trial run.

Karbonn Quattro L52 VR is one in a sea of mobile devices made by the company, trying to capitalise on being one of the first to target the low-end smartphones with VR content, driving the price lower than Lenovo Vibe K4 Note. Let’s see how it fares.

Build Quality: 7.5/10

The build quality of Karbonn Quattro L52 VR is surprisingly good. I was not expecting a metal frame body and curved glass on the front with

Karbonn launches Titanium Vista and Titanium 3-D Plex for Rs 5,499 and Rs 3,890

Representational Image

By tech2 News Staff /  04 Oct 2016 , 12:03

Ahead of the festive season, domestic smartphone maker Karbonn Mobiles on Monday launched two new smartphones in India. Karbonn Titanium Vista (priced at Rs 5,499) comes with a 5-inch screen, 1.3MHz quad-core processor that runs on a MediaTek MT6580 chipset along with 2,300mAh Li-ion battery. The smartphone has 8GB of internal storage that can be expanded up to 32GB. It sports 3.2MP front camera with flash and an 8MP rear camera.

Another smartphone, Karbonn Titanium 3-D Plex (priced at Rs 3,890) comes with 3D glasses apparatus for cinematic 3D video viewing along with 3.2MP rear camera and has the same storage capacity as Titanium Vista. Karbonn Titanium Vista is available at retail stores only while Karbonn Titanium 3-D Plex is available across retail stores as