Imagination Technologies new Ci40 brings fight to Pi

Imagination Tech has a new single-board system called the Ci40

Single-board computers are quite a hit at the moment, with the likes of the Raspberry Pi spreading far and wide in schools and on the desks of bedroom hackers, and there are many companies doing something not too different. One such firm, Imagination Technologies, launched its Creator Ci20 last year. And now it’s ready to debut the sequel, the Creator Ci40.

Although the team behind it is being a bit coy about all of its specifics, the firm did say in the blog update that it is based on a chip that is designed specifically with the Internet of Things (IoT) in mind.

This is an important step we’re told, since as it stands many different IoT products utilise processors that are designed for smartphones or other small form factor hardware. While these chips work well, since their intended use was different, they aren’t as efficient or as versatile as they could be.

That’s all going to change with the Ci40 we’re told. Its creators even describe it as “the most innovative CPU architecture any SoC designer could wish for.”

It certainly seems a capable device on paper. The Ci40’s system-on-a-chip, which is built at GlobalFoundries on a 40nm process, has two processing cores that boast hardware multi-threading, something Imagination says “is a big advantage of MIPS over ARM and other mobile CPU architectures.” The claimed performance is 2.5 teraFLOPS at a power draw of three watts.

Communication is obviously important to any Internet of Things device, so the Ci40 includes built-in 802.11ac Wi-Fi and low-energy Bluetooth (aka Bluetooth Smart). That will help it communicate with other nearby devices.

Part of this update seems like a way to drum up a little social networking support, as we’re not told much beyond the basic structure of the board and that more information is coming soon. We’re then directed to the official Twitter account, where we can learn more information — soon.

If you would like to be notified when the new Ci40 goes up for pre-order, you can register your interest on the official site. If you want to await more information, however, it looks like we’ll learn more every seven days starting now, until it’s release.

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