Freescale, now NXP, i.MX 8 processors have been a long time coming, but finally the company has now unveiled a Multisensory Enablement Kit based on i.MX 8 hexa core ARMv8 processor combined with a Vulkan-ready & OpenCL capable GPU.
Key features of the development kit:
- Multisensory Processor Board
- Multisensory Expansion Board
- Isolation and separation of secure, safe and open domains
- Rich compute (6x ARMv8 64-bit main CPUs, OpenCL GPU)
- Vulkan-ready GPU with HW tessellation and geometry shading
- Efficient, multi-screen (4x) support via HW virtualization
- Failover-ready display path
- Up to 8x camera input for 360 degree vision
- Integrated vision processing
- HDR enhanced video
- Multi-sensor fusion and expansion
- Multi-core audio and speech processing
- NXP radio solution integration
However, at the time of writing, there’s very little information about i.MX8 processors themselves, but I’m confident much more info should soon surface as NXP FTF 2016 is taking place now until May 19, 2016. The press release about i.MX8 MEK does mention 4K video and graphics, and some security features. The company expects the processor to be used for for intuitive gesture control, voice recognition, natural speech recognition and audio acceleration, as well as healthcare and industrial applications such as connected vehicles.
NXP i.MX 8 MEK is said to be available now, together with the BSPs and middleware. More details should eventually be posted on i.MX8 MEK page.
[Update: I found a slide about i.MX8 with some details. Source: NXP Forums.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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That is good news. How about they license the i.MX 8 manufacturers in Shenzen to scale it and get it price competitive? Lot’s of design houses license their IP and still make money.
@Jean Dassi Fongang
NXP seems to be more interested in actually supporting their i.MX chips and publishing documentation…
maybe too pricey for most applications, imx6 itself it expensive already.
meanwhile, imx8 will likely have a range of options for the new family, similar to imx6l to imx6q
that depicted at the photo thing looks as hell. xD Ok, seriously it’s all cool, finally they move forward and getting themselves to do something else than cortex-a9, but how much it will cost? freescale was used to overpricing their products. and will NXP be making ppc? (i don’t follow the “news”)
A72 on 28nm is basically insane.
@DX
They do have a heatsink and fan on their development platform.
@xxiao
I think they’ll go into more expensive products like cars, healthcare or military, where you don’t care that much using a $20 or $100+ part.
Not entirely related, but NXP released a timeline for autonomous cars and trucks (which may use i.MX 8) -> http://www.recode.net/2016/5/16/11635628/self-driving-autonomous-cars-timeline
A72 does fine (as in better than A57) on 28nm, as long as you’re ok with the clock penalty.
http://www.gsmarena.com/snapdragon_652_benchmarked_cortexa72_is_fast_even_on_28nm-blog-16681.php
Yay for Freescale getting on the A72 bandwagon – Freescale have the best documentation in the business.