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I don't think the iMX was ever targeted at smartphones or smartphone-ish tablets. And as far as I am aware it's still in things like digital photo frames, appli

I don't think the iMX was ever targeted at smartphones or smartphone-ish tablets. And as far as I am aware it's still in things like digital photo frames, appliances, automotive infotainment, and other applications where it's nice to have Linux driving a big color TFT, but there's not a big demand for processing power.

joezydeco 15y ago
The first Kindle, Sony Reader, and Microsoft Zune (AKA Toshiba Gigabeat) were i.MX designs. The i.MX5 series has the same ARM Cortex-A8 core as the OMAP3 and Apple A4. Processing power isn't the factor here, but OMAP definitely is easier to fit into a design with the stacked RAM.
- tesseract 15y ago
  Those aren't exactly comparable devices to the Kindle Fire. And the i.MX5 is a relatively new device as far as I know.
  - joezydeco 15y ago
    Is the Color Nook comparable? How about the Galaxy Tab 7? The i.MX5 and OMAP4 were both announced in early 2010. Here's someone showing a tablet reference design with the chip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUk296efZE8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUk296efZE8 As for running Linux, I've had a usuable mx51 reference board running Ubuntu on my desk for over a year now. It's driving a 21" HDMI monitor.
    - tesseract 15y ago
      Isn't the color Nook OMAP based? And as I recall, the Galaxy Tab has a Hummingbird. I think we're talking past each other a bit. I know that Freescale has some newish parts that they are marketing for tablets. I saw one of their reference designs at a conference recently too. But as far as I know, no one has shipped a device intended to directly compete with the iPad (which is what a "tablet" seems to be basically understood as these days) based on a Freescale SoC. So it doesn't exactly seem to me that Freescale is losing share in that area - rather, that they have not yet broken into that particular market at all. What I was trying to say is that historically the i.MX have been lower end parts that were designed into different kinds of applications, and as far as I know, they are still doing OK in those markets. (The current generation of e-ink Kindles do have i.MX SoCs, for one thing.) Incidentally my understanding is that the Kindle Fire was done by the same ODM as the Blackberry Playbook and that they're fairly similar in terms of the component selection. Makes sense that the ODM would go with parts they're familiar with.
      - joezydeco 15y ago
        Sure, historically iMX was winning in those low-end markets. I think Freescale still has a large footprint in automotive thanks to Motorola's history of doing automotive-grade components and related parts (airbag accelerometers, etc). The early iMX parts were decendents of Dragonball. I would think Freescale really wants a high-visibility design win in the multimedia tablet/eBook market. You don't put all that CPU power and media acceleration on the die for nothing. My original point is that TI is capturing all of these wins for some reason over Freescale. I'm curious to know what the advantage is.

joezydeco 15y ago

The first Kindle, Sony Reader, and Microsoft Zune (AKA Toshiba Gigabeat) were i.MX designs. The i.MX5 series has the same ARM Cortex-A8 core as the OMAP3 and Apple A4. Processing power isn't the factor here, but OMAP definitely is easier to fit into a design with the stacked RAM.

tesseract 15y ago
Those aren't exactly comparable devices to the Kindle Fire. And the i.MX5 is a relatively new device as far as I know.
- joezydeco 15y ago
  Is the Color Nook comparable? How about the Galaxy Tab 7? The i.MX5 and OMAP4 were both announced in early 2010. Here's someone showing a tablet reference design with the chip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUk296efZE8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUk296efZE8 As for running Linux, I've had a usuable mx51 reference board running Ubuntu on my desk for over a year now. It's driving a 21" HDMI monitor.
  - tesseract 15y ago
    Isn't the color Nook OMAP based? And as I recall, the Galaxy Tab has a Hummingbird. I think we're talking past each other a bit. I know that Freescale has some newish parts that they are marketing for tablets. I saw one of their reference designs at a conference recently too. But as far as I know, no one has shipped a device intended to directly compete with the iPad (which is what a "tablet" seems to be basically understood as these days) based on a Freescale SoC. So it doesn't exactly seem to me that Freescale is losing share in that area - rather, that they have not yet broken into that particular market at all. What I was trying to say is that historically the i.MX have been lower end parts that were designed into different kinds of applications, and as far as I know, they are still doing OK in those markets. (The current generation of e-ink Kindles do have i.MX SoCs, for one thing.) Incidentally my understanding is that the Kindle Fire was done by the same ODM as the Blackberry Playbook and that they're fairly similar in terms of the component selection. Makes sense that the ODM would go with parts they're familiar with.
    - joezydeco 15y ago
      Sure, historically iMX was winning in those low-end markets. I think Freescale still has a large footprint in automotive thanks to Motorola's history of doing automotive-grade components and related parts (airbag accelerometers, etc). The early iMX parts were decendents of Dragonball. I would think Freescale really wants a high-visibility design win in the multimedia tablet/eBook market. You don't put all that CPU power and media acceleration on the die for nothing. My original point is that TI is capturing all of these wins for some reason over Freescale. I'm curious to know what the advantage is.