MIPS Strikes Back: 64-bit Warrior I6400 Arrives
by Stephen Barrett on September 2, 2014 10:00 AM ESTFinal Words
When it comes to processors, enthusiasts and laymen alike can identify the three largest players: Intel, AMD and ARM. Those names are also not mutually exclusive: AMD utilizes ARM designs for consumer security coprocessors and in its Opteron A1100 server processor. There are other processors out there (e.g. IBM's POWER CPUs), but they're generally not as well known. That's also the case with MIPS.
Not everyone knows the name MIPS, but Imagination hopes to change that by offering a viable alternative to the embedded market dominated by ARM. MIPS already has a large presence in networking and embedded devices. Introducing the I6400 keeps MIPS relevant and places additional pressure on ARM. According to the provided numbers (admittedly from MIPS) and feature descriptions, the I6400 appears to compete with and even surpass the highly anticipated ARM Cortex-A53. Imagination projects general availability of the I6400 to SoC designers by December 2014. We can estimate end-user availability at least 6 to 9 months after that.
Consumers will most likely directly experience the MIPS I6400 CPU in low cost Android tablets and handsets. Due to Android's Java heritage, some applications will work out-of-the-box. Other applications using the Android Native Development Kit (NDK) targeting Intel or ARM ISAs will unfortunately be incompatible. Until MIPS achieves enough volume to convince application developers to code to the MIPS3264 ISA or stick with Java, MIPS Android devices will be second class citizens. This is something to keep in mind if you're purchasing a phone for yourself or a tech savvy friend. Of course, basic operating system features like email, phone, text, web browsing, and chatting should all work fine.
Intel has enjoyed dominance of its performance leading processors in non-handset settings for the better part of a decade. ARMs embedded low power heritage has emerged as Intel’s biggest threat as mobile devices have exploded and now dominate the computing landscape. As Intel and ARM continue to battle for the high end embedded market, Imagination and MIPS hope to erode away ARM’s mid-range and low-end core competency. As a consumer, we can lean back and enjoy the competition that will force each company to work harder each and every year.
The I6400’s revised MIPS3264 Release 6 ISA, instruction bonding, and SMT execution pipeline bring a refreshing set of new innovations to the small-core market. In our A53 coverage we noted ARM was pushing in-order CPU performance about as far as it could possibly go. I’m always happy to see we might have been wrong.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
84 Comments
View All Comments
Wilco1 - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
I think name99 is a bit harsh but he has valid points. For example the MIPS CoreMark results use a special plugin that adds a CoreMark specific optimization. So it is misleading to claim a great CoreMark result.Now if this optimization was added to mainline and also enabled when benchmarking the "competitor" then it would be a fair comparion.
mthrondson - Sunday, September 7, 2014 - link
I'm not familiar with this special plug in. Can you elaborate?Samus - Wednesday, September 3, 2014 - link
MIPS has always been superior to ARM in regards to "performance per watt" even dating back to the PocketPC day's (1997) but its success has always suffered because of architecture complexity. You might as well port machine code before you recompile an app from ARM to MIPS.The success of MIPS lies with the quality of the development kits, compilers, and price (which they will apparently be aggressively targeting)
jjj - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
Interesting but will be hard for them to get big wins in mobile (the main SoC anyway). Even if they try to be cheaper , how much cheaper do they need to be to justify the compatibility issues.A note here, you look at the competition between ISAs but don't forget that we got a bunch of custom ARM cores too so for consumers it's even more fun.
Also the Meizu MX4 launched today ,first device with the quad A17 Mediatek so a notable event.Haven't really seen any proper benchmarks for A17 yet ,hopefully soon.
alexvoica - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
The compatibility issue is going away fast. MIPS64 is a proven architecture that has a full ecosystem built around it, while others are still catching up. Additionally, 64-bit is an inflection point where a lot of software will need to be recompiled so a lot of people are actually starting from scratch.evolucion8 - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
While I am in love with ARM, I look forward for MIPS too!Notmyusualid - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
The more competition, the better...Wilco1 - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
There is no requirement to recompile anything but the OS - existing apps continue to run in 32-bit without a penalty.alexvoica - Wednesday, September 3, 2014 - link
There is a requirement if you want your software to take advantage of the latest architectural improvements. If you don't, it will still run, yes - but not as fast/efficiently as it could.bleh0 - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
I have to say from a feature standpoint this seems far more interesting then A53. I just doubt that by this time next year we will actually see it in devices.