The NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet Review
by Joshua Ho on July 29, 2014 9:00 AM ESTCPU Performance
As the first Tegra K1 device the Shield tablet is especially interesting. For those unfamiliar with the Tegra K1, NVIDIA integrated four ARM Cortex A15r3 variant cores along with a fifth companion A15r3. While on the surface it seems the CPU configuration it’s largely similar to the Tegra 4, there are some substantial differences. On the process tech side, the move to 28HPm adds SiGe source and drains for PMOS transistors, which dramatically improves drive current and makes it possible to bump clocks up to 2.2GHz for the CPU cores. The new revision of Cortex A15 also means that there’s better power management which should help with power efficiency (and thus battery life). The result is that peak CPU voltage drops from 1.4 volts in Tegra 4 to 1.2V in Tegra K1, and peak clocks are higher in the K1 as well.
Of course, the truly interesting aspect are benchmarks, as those will really show the differences between Tegra 4 and Tegra K1. It will also help to establish how Tegra K1 fares against the competition.
Despite the largely similar clock speeds compared to the Snapdragon 800 we see that the Tegra K1 is generally a step above in performance. Outside of Apple’s A7 SoC and x86 SoCs, NVIDIA is generally solidly ahead of the competition. Of course, as a gaming tablet there’s a strong need for GPU performance, so we'll look at that next.
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name99 - Tuesday, July 29, 2014 - link
OK. I guess there are situations where that makes sense. Thx.6cef - Tuesday, July 29, 2014 - link
if "closer to 6504k is better", then you should order the graph by the absolute magnitude of the difference between each devices white point and that ideal value.duh.
kyuu - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
+1kae - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
I'll echo the question of a few previous comments... What is the compatibility of the controller with other Android Devices and PC's supporting WiFi Direct? I'm still rocking the Xbox360 Wireless, but if I can ditch the stupid USB dongle and go direct, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Double the function if it also communicates with my N5, and I'm sold.Anyone know? The documentation only talks about how fast WiFi direct is, but not if NVidia is using some proprietary drivers, or if it will work with any device. My hope is the latter.
wintermute000 - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
it always beats me why the big two don't write decent cross platform drivers. Why on earth did Sony not write a good windows and/or android driver for dualshock for example. Easy money (how much can it possibly cost to write a joypad driver) to instantly create a new market.TheJian - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
proprietary, but nvidia is working with google to get it into AndroidL, so should start to work elsewhere soon, if not at least everything shield that comes along and K1 devices etc. A sale is a sale and you're not giving up a lot here, but mapping software (& community profile uploads for mapping to certain games) goes with it so maybe it would be giving away too much.victorson - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
"Although there are some compelling reasons to go with smaller color gamut." Could someone please help out and say what could those reasons be? I'm really curious, always thought there were no such reasons.UpSpin - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
Take a look at the color gamut of white LEDs. You'll see they're blue ones with a phosphor film to produce 'white' light:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light-emitting_diode#...
However the color reproduction is lacking, especially on cheap white LEDs (the ones you can buy on eBay for example) The more accurate colors you want (high CRI) the more difficult it becomes, they become more expensive and also less efficient. To reproduce all visible colors the best method is to use three separate LEDs, a blue, green and red one. Such a setup is highly inefficient however.
So all NVidia did was using cheap white LEDs to cut costs but also to enhance battery life at the cost of a poor CRI.
theNiZer - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
Great review, very helpfull !cashnmillions - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
Ok so the display isn't phenomenal. Like anyone can really tell the difference between a few pixels. It's an 8" tablet, it doesn't need resolution above 720p to look good. The GPU capabilities are phenomenal, I remember when the Snapdragon and Adreno destroyed the competition about a year ago, this destroys that. I think it's an awesome piece of hardware, I plan to get one, just kind of sucks that the controller is $60. I wonder if I can use an XBOX 360 controller with it like I can on my Nexus 7.