Date: 10/09/2010

Samsung demos its application processor made using 32nm HKMG process at a forum

Samsung has highlighted an engineering sample of its application processor using its 32 nanometer (nm) low power High-K Metal Gate (HKMG) logic process in a demonstration at the seventh annual Samsung Mobile Solutions Forum held in Taiwan at the Westin Taipei Hotel. This new application-processor named Saratoga is designed for consumer electronic (CE) products such as personal navigation devices (PND), electronics dictionaries, and e-book readers.

"We announced, in June this year, the successful qualification of our 32nm HKMG low power logic process and design ecosystem," said Dr. Kwang-hyun Kim, senior vice president of System LSI Sales and Marketing, Samsung Electronics. "Saratoga is the world's first application processor that is implemented in this 32nm process which offers lower leakage current, higher performance, and higher gate density. We are excited to demonstrate such capability through this chip."

The S5P6440, the 32nm Saratoga application processor is based on an ARM1176 CPU core. It features 2D graphics acceleration hardware that supports the OpenVG application programming interface (API) standard.

Saratoga is equiped with a mobile industry processor interface (MIPI) display serial interface (DSI), thus minimizing EMI and reducing the number of pins needed to connect with the display panel.