Redmond (WA) – There are some tech rumors that just won’t go away, one of them being Microsoft’s iPhone killer smartphone. A new report now suggests that Microsoft may be working with Nvidia on a cellphone that has Nvidia’s Tegra hardware at its core. And if that report is correct such a phone could only be three months away. Does this make sense or should Microsoft just buy Blackberry maker Research in Motion?
Microsoft has not commented on a Zune phone so far and did not confirm or deny any reports. Rumors about such a phone have typically been squashed by the argument that Microsoft would pose a threat to its Windows Mobile customers if it manufactured its own phone. But a new article published by the Inquirer revives those rumors with an interesting angle. The website suggests that the Microsoft-branded cellphone will be powered by Nvidia's Tegra system-on-a-chip (SoC). The site even pinpoints the phone's release date - 3GSM in February 2009.
The Tegra SoC integrates an ARM-based CPU and an Nvidia GPU core on a single die, in addition to a northbridge, southbridge and primary memory functionality. The first Tegra products are expected hit the market by the end of the year, but are believed to be limited to industrial and automotive applications initially. Since Apple appears to be determined to follow its own SoC route, Microsoft would be a huge win for Nvidia. And if that is in fact the case, the obvious question would be: What happened with Intel? Is the Moorestown SoC too late to join the party?
Apple's own SoC plans
When Apple acquired the chip designer P.A. Semi for $278 million in March of this year, Steve Jobs confirmed the company’s plans to use P.A. Semi engineering talent to build SoCs for use in iPhones, iPods and possibly other gadgets down the road. The company then hired a former IBM executive with experience in designing Power processors, Mark Papermaster, to take over devices engineering. IBM has blocked the move, fearing that Papermaster will lead Apple's internal chipset design team comprised of ex-P.A. Semi engineers and use IBM's secrets to develop new chips for Apple.
Some analysts believe that Apple triangulated the technology and manufacturing licensing deals with ARM, Imagination and Samsung technologies to design its next-gen iPhone processors. They think the next-gen iPhone SoC will feature the latest ARM design and Imagination's PowerVR SGX/VXD cores on a single die, manufactured by Samsung. The Samsung S5L8900 SoC used in the iPhone, iPhone 3G and first-gen iPod touch, features similar combo: A 32-bit RISC ARM processing core (ARM1176JZ(F)-S v1.0) down-clocked to 412 MHz (the second-gen iPod touch features an ARM1176 v4.0 core running at 532MHz) and Imagination's PowerVR MBX Lite GPU (an improved version of the GPU that powered Sega’s Dreamcast game console.)
We here at TG Daily believe there a pros and cons about Apple's SoC plans. And if you ask us, the fact that Nvidia's Tegra is, at least in theory, currently the most powerful SoC for mobile devices, casts some doubts over Apple's intention to differentiate itself in the hardware arena by designing its own SoC instead of relying on off-the-shelf components available to rivals.
Will Microsoft get it right?
If Microsoft beats Apple, licenses Tegra and Apple really follows its own SoC route, the iPhone maker could end up outclassed in the hardware arena. Add the Zune Marketplace content and the upcoming Windows Mobile 7.0 operating system that, by all accounts, will bring enough oomph for the OS to compete with Android and iPhone OS, on top of the Tegra-based hardware and you suddenly have all the key ingredients to build a device Apple should be afraid of.
Of course, hardware and OS are only half the story. The battle in the mobile phone space has shifted towards applications and ways of distributing them directly on users' handsets. The hardware advantage may not mean much if Microsoft is unable to come up with compelling software features, an attractive and easy to use user interface, killer applications and an efficient application distribution platform like iPhone's App Store or Android's Market.
Since Microsoft is known for going to great lengths to reach out to its developers, we have no doubt that Microsoft’s third-party developers would support the platform. Suddenly, the blueprint of a Zune phone looks not only more impressive than anything that's currently on the market. Multimedia-playback-gaming features of such a device could outperform even Sony's PSP and position a Zune phone as the best mobile computing/communication/gaming device. The problem, of course, remains that such a product would anger many of current Microsoft's partners.
Also, let’s not forget that Microsoft has not really a history of coming up with great hardware designs in consumer electronics, but has a very special talent to shoot itself in the foot at the very last moment. You just know that someone will make the decision that this Zune phone needs to come with a faux wood finish. There are other concerns as well: Tegra is an unknown platform. Will Microsoft put its bets on a new, unproven platform with very limited hardware support for a product that could potentially sell in the millions? Unlikely.
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