Category: ST-Ericsson

ST Ericsson U8500 in Smartphones shipping in China

Posted by – January 9, 2012

ST Ericsson U8500 1Ghz Dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 is shipping in a version of the HTC Sensation selling in China with an integrated CDMA modem. Now also Via Mobile is shipping the U8500 in a 4.3″ capacitive HSPA+ smartphone. The price may be quite a lot lower than other high-end dual-core smartphones, to be confirmed.

Ice Cream Sandwich works on ST-Ericsson Nova A9500 ARM Cortex-A9

Posted by – November 19, 2011
Category: ST-Ericsson, Android

Using a small modification to ICS to use software GL from Vishal Bhoj, Linaro engineer Mathieu Poirier was able to get ICS running on the Snowball board. This may be the first demonstration of Ice Cream Sandwich running on another SoC than the OMAP4?

Update on the ST Ericsson SNOWBALL ARM Cortex-A9 development board

Posted by – October 30, 2011

The SKY-S9500-ULP-CXX aka SNOWBALL has been available as a development board for the ST Ericsson ARM Cortex-A9 processor for about 4 months now. Here’s an update on how they are doing. Find more at http://igloocommunity.org

Ericsson HSPA+ and LTE modems

Posted by – October 30, 2011

Ericsson is one of the leaders in cellular network infrastructure, for the past 4 years they also make HSDPA, HSPA+ and now also LTE modems to embed in Tablets, Laptops and more.

Nokia/Microsoft to use ST-Ericsson U8500 ARM Cortex-A9 in Windows Phone 8

Posted by – May 20, 2011

Forbes reports from Carlo Bozotti, the Chief Executive of European semiconductor maker STMicroelectronics, that Nokia will use the ST-Ericsson U8500 dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 with Mali-400 in at least some of its upcoming Windows Phone 8 devices to be released as soon as Nokia and Microsoft are able to make them ready. Here’s a video I filmed with ST-Ericsson showing this processor platform:

The move marks a major shift for Windows Phone devices, which up to now have used chips from wireless technology giant Qualcomm. Even the HTC Trophy, which Verizon Wireless announced today — making it the latest Windows Phone to launch in the U.S. — has a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor.

The uniformity is the result of Microsoft’s precise design guidelines for Windows Phone manufacturers. In the run-up to its big Windows Phone launch in the fall of 2010, Microsoft asked handset makers including HTC, LG, Samsung and Dell to utilize the same chipsets, display size and number of camera megapixels to give users a consistent experience across devices.

Earlier this year, however, Microsoft indicated it planned to open up Windows Phone development to other chipmakers. It now appears that ST-Ericsson, a joint venture between Geneva-based STMicroelectronics and Swedish telecom equipment and services supplier Ericsson, has been admitted to the Windows Phone ecosystem.

Another crazy rumor from Eldar Murtazin (who has been right before..) has been suggesting that Microsoft may be in talks to try buy Nokia’s Mobile Phone business flat out, probably for a bunch of tens of billions of dollars. Can you believe that?

My opinion is that Microsoft knows the ARM Powered mobile device space is where the future of technology is at, so short of yet releasing a Windroid fork of Linux based Android (that could launch Bing, own apps store etc..), Microsoft is probably going to do everything that they can to try to remain relevant in the smartphone and tablet space. Even if that might mean a $40 Billion buy-out of Nokia. Should the Finnish Nokia owners sell out to Redmond?

$20,000 OpenWorld Contest to design best app for STM32 ARM Cortex-M3

Posted by – March 30, 2011
Category: ST-Ericsson

Register now to win $20,000 in cash prizes for mobility applications based on STM32 ARM Cortex-M3 MCU developed on the EvoPrimer platform from STMicroelectronics.

http://stm32circle.com/ contest registration is open for the OpenWorld design contest promoting development of technologies for human-assistance applications. OpenWorld is a technology promotion of the “Autonomie” project – a collaborative industry-research consortium for the development of integrated electronic technologies that facilitate access to public spaces and services for the handicapped.

$20,000 in cash prizes will be awarded to participants with innovative and useful electronic applications designed to assist people, with any of a variety of disabilities or limiting medical conditions.

The contest is sponsored by project memebers, STMicroelectronics, ST-Ericsson and Raisonance.

ST-Ericsson LTE solutions

Posted by – February 20, 2011

Featuring ST-Ericsson existing and upcoming range of LTE solutions including ThorM7400, the industry’s first two chip LTE/HSPA+ modem.

ST-Ericsson HSPA+ solutions

Posted by – February 20, 2011

This video features ST-Ericsson’s second generation 21mbitps HSPA+ solution, used in the Samsung Galaxy 4G smartphone on T-Mobile. This kind of bandwidth can be used for high quality video streaming, and many other applications. ST-Ericsson is also launching the new 84mbitps Thor HSPA+ modem.

ST-Ericsson launches Nova, Thor and NovaThor at Mobile World Congress 2011

Posted by – February 20, 2011

ST-Ericsson shows their new Nova ARM Processors and Thor modems, and combined they are the NovaThor. Those include the new ARM Cortex-A9 Single-core U4500 and Dual-core U8500 and the HSDPA+ and LTE modem solutions and they are even announcing their ARM Cortex-A15 solution. This video also includes some talk about where ST-Ericsson comes from and where the company is going.

The funky official video:

Sub-$100 Android Smartphones shipping right now powered by ST-Ericsson U6715

Posted by – February 19, 2011

The 468Mhz ST-Ericsson U6715 ARM9 processor includes current support for Android 2.1, to be upgradable to Android 2.2 in around a month, they use tricks like a Virtualization layers on top of Android to speed some things up for the user experience on this low end hardware. Yet, the experience is very impressive considering the potential $100 unlocked retail price for these Android smartphone devices such as the K-Touch W606, Acer beTouch E130, Coolpad W711 and the GHT Maestro, they can all include 3G support and good battery runtime.

3D capture and playback on the ST-Ericsson U8500 platform

Posted by – February 19, 2011

ST-Ericsson U8500 can capture 720p 3D at 30fps and 1080p 2D at 30fps. Here’s a demo of the 3D effect captured using 2 cameras and displayed on a 3D HDTV.

Augmented Reality on the ST-Ericsson U8500 platform

Posted by – February 19, 2011

ST-Ericsson are showcasing their performance for augmented reality, tracking at 30fps and rendering at 60fps. There are more and more applications for augmented reality and the new ARM Cortex-A9 processors such as the ST-Ericsson U8500 that includes Mali-400 graphics make this even more usable.

ST-Ericsson U4500 to power sub-$100 ARM Cortex-A9 smartphones!

Posted by – February 19, 2011

The idea is to provide better than Nexus One like performance early 2012 in low cost Android smartphones that could be sold by then for as little as below $200 even at below the $100 price point. ST-Ericsson U4500 is a single core ARM Cortex-A9 processor, that could be clocked at around 600mhz to achieve a similar performance to the 1Ghz Nexus One that was released early 2010. The idea is to bring that level of performance to potentially hundreds of millions of more people. Also check out my video on the ST-Ericsson A9500 development board to be released around May this year.

ST-Ericsson A9500 ARM Cortex-A9 Development Board

Posted by – February 16, 2011

This is the SKY-S9500-ULP-CXX aka SNOWBALL, the ST-Ericsson ARM Cortex-A9 development board, they put in there all the memory and everything needed to hack together end user products. It will be sold for about $200 from around April or May, it runs Android, Ubuntu and Meego thus far. You can find more information at http://igloocommunity.org

ST Ericsson U8500 ARM Cortex-A9

Posted by – November 13, 2010

Check out the Meego OS running on this nice new super powerful ARM Cortex-A9 processor and some talk with a representative about the performance and potential of this processor platform.

ARM Cortex A15 is unveiled

Posted by – September 10, 2010

The ARM Eagle platform is to be clalled ARM Cortex A15, targetted to be found in products to ship by 2013, will enable Mobile Computing, Smart phones and Tablets that are to be 10 times more powerful than current ones on the market while still achieving low power consumption and cost effective hardware designs. Texas Instruments, ST Ericsson and Samsung are announcing that they are building such processor designs.

The launch of the Cortex A-15 processor marks an exciting milestone for ARM, it brings together more than 20 years of ARMs expertise in low power design with new leading edge technologies. Together, these will enable further opportunities for ARM Partners to develop the consumer products for the next generation of connected computing.

For now, on this site, we are going to have a lot more fun with the ARM Cortex A8 that are on the market and being released and ARM Cortex A9 products to be released soon. But we are also looking forward to even more powerful yet low power and low enough cost ARM processors to achieve even more in terms of bringing ARM architechture up further from the smart phone, up to tablets, laptops, desktops and even to power the future of servers doing all the cloud computing.

How powerful do you think ARM Cortex A15 is going to be? You can discuss in the comments.

Acer Android Phone beTouch E120

Posted by – June 3, 2010

The new Low-End Android (1.6) Phone by Acer with a 2.8″ resistive LCD touchscreen, a 3 MP camera powered by a new ST Ericsson Processor.

Acer Android Phone beTouch E130

Posted by – June 3, 2010

It has a 2.6″ TFT LCD screen, a 3.2 MP camera.
OS: Android 1.6
Processor: ST Ericsson PNX 6715, 416 MHz

ARM Mali400 for 3D user interfaces and games

Posted by – June 2, 2010

This STMicroelectronics STi7108 development platform demonstrates what the future of set top box user interfaces will look like, with support for multiple live video views and pretty advanced 720p or even 1080p playing on the HDTV of 3D games like Quake 3.

Qt development framework demonstrated

Posted by – May 15, 2010

Qt is a cross-platform application and UI framework for developing once, and deploying across lots of embedded Linux platforms, Windows CE, Symbian and Maemo without rewriting the source code. At Mobile World Congress, Qt was demonstrating their solution used in many different devices.

Qt Quick (Qt User Interface Creation Kit) is a high-level user interface technology that makes it dramatically easier for UI designers and developers with scripting language skills to quickly and easily create beautiful, pixel perfect UIs and lightweight, touch-enabled apps with Qt – all without requiring any C++ skills. It will be part of the Qt 4.7 release, which has had its first technology preview released in March.