Samsung has announced an ARM-11 based application processor fabricated using the company's 65-nanometer technology. Targeting Linux, Symbian, and Windows Mobile devices with clock speeds up to 667MHz, the S3C6410 offers MPEG4 encoding/decoding, TV output and two-way videoconferencing capabilities, according to the… company.

The S3C6410 has an ARM1176-based processor core along with what Samsung refers to as “advanced hardware blocks for multimedia processing.” A hardwired Multi-Format Codec (MFC) unit allows the S3C6410 to perform video capturing in MPEG4/H.263/H.264 formats, and play back video in MPEG4/H.263/H.264/VC1 formats, while still delivering long battery life, Samsung says.

The S3C6410 is said to capture and playback standard-definition (SD) quality video at 30fps, while supporting two-way real-time video conferencing. In addition, the embedded hardware encoder/decoder also includes TV-out capability in both the NTSC and PAL formats.

The memory system on the S3C6410 has dual DRAM and flash external memory ports for parallel access, and the dual DRAM port can be configured to support mobile DDR and standard SDRAM simultaneously. The flash port supports NAND (MLC and SLC), NOR, OneNAND, moviNAND, and ROM, according to Samsung.

Samsung provided no information about the S3C6410's relationship to the company's existing S3C6400 processor, an earlier product for which it had touted identical features and advantages. Another ARM1176-based part (see block diagram below), the S3C6400 has been used in products such as Micro-Star International's Soleus-based 5608 and — according to rumor — Apple's iPhone.

A block diagram of Samsung's earlier S3C6400 processor
(Click to enlarge)

Availability

The S3C6410 will be sampling in May, with mass production scheduled for the third quarter of 2008, according to Samsung.

 
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