MediaTek announced Kompanio 520 and 528 chipsets for entry-level Chromebooks

Thursday, November 10, at MediaTek Executive Summit, Adam King, Vice President and General Manager, Client Computing Business Unit, Mediatek, announced the Company 520 and Company 528 chipsets for entry-level Chromebooks. The new chips are the successors to the Kompanio 500, with an improved processor, GPU, video codec, better power efficiency and higher resolution display support.

For both products, the heterogeneity 8-core CPU combined 2 Arm Cortex-A76 performance cores and Efficient 6 Core Cortex-A55, a significant upgrade from the Kompanion 500 which includes 4 Cortex-A73 and 4 Cortex-A53. The processor sits on LPDDR4x RAM clocked at 3733 MHz.

The only difference between the 520 and the 528 is the performance core frequencyWhich one is clocked at 2GHz for the 520 and 2.2GHz for the 528.

During the presentation, Adam King said that the single-core performance has been increased by 80% while the multi-core performance is 15% better than the previous generation.

“SINGLE-CORE PERFORMANCE GOT 80% MORE OVER THE PREVIOUS GENERATION”

Mediatek says it has a huge advantage over the Intel Celeron N4500a common non-heterogeneous dual-core Chromebook processor, especially when it comes to performance per watt. Consuming less energy to perform a given task could also be considered less carbon-emitting (electricity generation emits carbon), and higher energy efficiency should translate into better ESG measures (Environment, Social and Governance) in our opinion.

“The durability benefits of MediaTek Kompanio products are also significant, especially in heavy workloads where MediaTek’s low-power processors generate 40-60% greenhouse gas emissions of origin. less energy compared to competing platforms.said Victor Tyan, Senior Director, Client Computing GTM.

On the GPU side, the Arm Mali-G72 MP3 is replaced by the Arm Mali G52 MC2 2EE in the two new chips. “Both GPUs [Arm Mali-G72 MP3 & Arm Mali G52 MC2] are very close in performance and for most people the difference in performance will not be noticeable in real world scenarios. But if you still want the best GPU, then Mali-G52 MC2 is the way to go“, according to Tech Centurion (Centurion Mark). We will have to test to have more precise results.

The new dual-core AI Processing Unit (APU) offers AI features such as AI-based real-time low-light video noise reduction and helps with image segmentation and tagging used for virtual green screen and image quality enhancement (i.e. optimized color and contrast adjustment for different parts of the image).

The ISP has been improved with support for up to 32 MP for the camera. This functionality is exploited from the SoCs of smartphones. OEMs might not be using the highest resolution in the near future, but they can easily reduce it to 5MP for example, which is a huge improvement over existing laptop webcams (mostly with 0. 7MP).

Improved media engine includes VP9 hardware decoding and H.265 encoding, which is an upgrade of H.264 encoding and H.264 decoding, H.265/HEVC latest generation (VP9 software). The system supports Full HD 60fps video recording now, an upgrade to FHD 30 fps support in the Kompanio 500. MediaTek claims a 2X performance boost for the media unit.

The Kompanio 520 and 528 each support one Full HD+ display and an external Full HD displaywhich doubles the resolution support over previous generation chipsets.

ChromeOS is known for its good security track record and Victor Tyan reminded us that MediaTek is working closely with Google to incorporate the latest security features such as verified boot, built-in antivirus protection and multi-user support. with their latest Kompanio 520 and 528 processors.

Conclusion

The Kompanio 520 and 528 processors show great promise in terms of performance and high power efficiency for the ultra-affordable Chromebook segment.

MediaTek emphasized all-day battery life, a feature that helps alleviate battery life anxiety and allows students to better focus on their work. To prove the point, the chipmaker showed off a photo of its booth at an education fair, where a range of Kompanio-powered Chromebooks were on display without a single power cable lying around.

Schools might like this feature because it’s definitely safer for kids to roam freely in a classroom without wires and it can be easier for IT staff to manage all the computers.

Deposit Computers. Learn more about Android, Chromebook, Editorspick, Google, MediaTek, Processors and SoCs.