Samsung announces Exynos 7420: Octa-core and 64-bit on the high end
The new Exynos SoC is the first Korean to 14 nm expressly designed for the category of smartphones: promises 20% more performance than the 20 nm technology currently used with lower power consumption by 35%.
Exynos 7420 is officially entered the final stage of production. It is a SoC designed for the high-end of mobile devices, the first to land on the market with a manufacturing process FinFET to 14 nm. Compared with the Samsung 20 nm technologies currently widespread, the new model promises significant improvements in terms of performance and energy efficiency.
The processor makes use of a total of eight cores divided into two big CPU in the configuration. These are two quite different units to each other, as often happens on the mobile: the most powerful Cortex-A57 is a quad-core, while a Cortex-A53 will be delegated to take care of tasks less onerous terms computational. Both are of course compatible with the instruction set ARMv8 64-bit and probably can cooperate simultaneously with each other.
On Samsung official statement about a performance boost of 20% in combination with a reduced energy consumption by 35% when compared with SoC variant of Galaxy Note and Galaxy Edge 4 processor Exynos. These devices have built-in support 64-bit instructions are produced with a planar structure to 20nm, unlike technology in three dimensions of Exynos 7420.
As FinFET, Samsung indicates a setting that we have already seen with the tri-gate transistors, Intel. These use of microscopic silicon fins to increase the surface of the chip and to prevent as much as possible the dispersion of energy. The problem remains alive with the progressive refinement of manufacturing processes. It is clear that the strongest candidate to use the new SoC will own Galaxy S6, the South Korean top of the range that will be made official on March 1 at Mobile World Congress.
On the choice of CPU Galaxy S6 has been discussed for a long time: according to unofficial rumors, Samsung could have chosen to produce one version of Galaxy S6 for all markets, differently from what happens for some time with its top of the range. It is unlikely that the company is able by itself to produce SoC in sufficient quantities to meet the entire demand of the public, an element that could disprove the same rumors.
Samsung Exynos 7420 emphasizes that it will not be the only product of the company to use the new production process to 14nm FinFET, which will be expanded to other categories of the market by the end of 2015.
