ARM Cortex-A9 explained

ARM Cortex-A9
Produced-Start:	2007
Slowest:	0.8 GHz
Fastest:	2 GHz
Designfirm:	ARM Holdings
Arch:	ARMv7-A
Numcores:	1–4
L1cache:	32 KB I, 32 KB D
L2cache:	128 KB–8 MB (configurable with L2sr1 cache controller)
Predecessor:	ARM Cortex-A8
Successor:	ARM Cortex-A12

The ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore is a 32-bit multi-core processor that provides up to 4 cache-coherent cores, each implementing the ARM v7 architecture instruction set.^[1] It was introduced in 2007.

Features

See main article: article. Key features of the Cortex-A9 core are:^[2]

• Out-of-order speculative issue superscalar execution 8-stage pipeline giving 2.50 DMIPS/MHz/core.
• NEON SIMD instruction set extension performing up to 16 operations per instruction (optional).
• High performance VFPv3 floating point unit doubling the performance of previous ARM FPUs (optional).
• Thumb-2 instruction set encoding reduces the size of programs with little impact on performance.
• TrustZone security extensions.
• Jazelle DBX support for Java execution.
• Jazelle RCT for JIT compilation.
• Program Trace Macrocell and CoreSight Design Kit for non-intrusive tracing of instruction execution.
• L2 cache controller (0–4 MB).
• Multi-core processing.

ARM states that the TSMC 40G hard macro implementation typically operates at 2 GHz; a single core (excluding caches) occupies less than 1.5 mm² when designed in a TSMC 65 nanometer (nm) generic process^[3] and can be clocked at speeds over 1 GHz, consuming less than 250 mW per core.^[4]

Chips

Several system on a chip (SoC) devices implement the Cortex-A9 core, including:

• Altera SoC FPGA
• AMLogic AML8726-M^[5]
• Apple A5, A5X
• Broadcom BCM11311 (Persona ICE)^[6]
• Calxeda EnergyCore ECX-1000^[7]
• Entropic EN7588,^[8] EN7530
• NXP Semiconductors (Formerly Freescale) QorIQ Layerscape LS1024A
• Freescale Semiconductor i.MX6^[9]
• HiSilicon K3V2 -Hi3620^[10]
• Marvell Avastar 88W8787, used in the Sony PlayStation Vita^{[11] [12]}
• MediaTek MT6575^[13] (single core), MT6577^[14] (dual core)
• Mindspeed Technologies Mindspeed Comcerto 2000^{[15] [16] [17]}
• Nufront NuSmart 2816, 2816M, 115^[18]
• Nvidia Tegra 2 (without NEON extensions), Tegra 3 and Tegra 4i
• Trident Microsystems 847x/8x/9x SoC family
• Renesas Electronics RZ/A1H, M, L, LU Family
• Samsung Exynos 4210,^[19] 4212, 4412, 4415
• Rockchip RK3066, RK292x, RK31xx
• STMicroelectronics SPEAr1310, SPEAr1340
• ST-Ericsson Nova A9500, NovaThor U8500, NovaThor U9500
• Texas Instruments OMAP4 processors
• Texas Instruments Sitara AM437x^[20]
• WonderMedia WM8850, WM8950 and WM8980^[21]
• Xilinx Extensible Processing Platform
• ZiiLABS ZMS-20

Systems on a chip

Developer	Name	Cores	Process	NEON SIMD	Vector floating point unit	GPU
	SoC FPGA	1–2	28 nm			optionally implemented in FPGA; TES Electronic Solutions D/AVE HD
	S3L	1	28 nm			-
	AML8726-M	1	65 nm			ARM Mali-400
	AML8726-MX	2	40 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP2
	AML8726-M8	4	28 nm			ARM Mali-450 MP6
		2	32 nm 45 nm			PowerVR SGX543MP2
		2	45 nm			PowerVR SGX543MP4
	BCM11311 (Persona ICE)	2	40 nm			Broadcom Videocore IV
	BCM21654	1	40 nm			Broadcom Videocore IV
	BCM21664T	2	40 nm			Broadcom Videocore IV
	EnergyCore ECX-1000	4	40 nm			-
	1892VM14Ya	2	40 nm			ARM Mali-300
	i.MX6	1–4	40 nm			Vivante Corporation GPU IP cores
	K3V2 (Hi3620)	4	40 nm			Vivante GC4000
	Cyclone V	1–2	28 nm			-
		2				ARM Mali-400 MP4
	ARMADA 38x	1–2	28 nm			-
	PXA986	2	45 nm			PowerVR SGX540 / Vivante GC1000 (Galaxy Tab 3 7-inch)
	PXA988	2	45 nm			Vivante GC1000
	MT6575	1	40 nm			PowerVR SGX531
	MT6577	2	40 nm			PowerVR SGX531
	Comcerto 2000	2				-
Nufront	NuSmartTM 2816(NS2816)	2				ARM Mali-400
Nufront	NuSmartTM 2816M (NS2816M)	2				ARM Mali-400
Nufront	NuSmartTM 115 (NS115)	2				ARM Mali-400
Nvidia	Tegra 2 series	2	40 nm			GeForce ULP
Nvidia	Tegra 3 (Kal-El) series	4	40 nm			GeForce ULP
	http://www.renesas.com/en-us/products/microcontrollers-microprocessors/rz/rza/rza1h.html					-
Renesas Electronics	RZ/A1H	1	various			WXGA 2D graphics 10MByte RAM SoC
Renesas Electronics	RZ/A1M	1	various			WXGA 2D graphics 5MByte RAM SoC
Renesas Electronics	RZ/A1L	1	various			WXGA 2D graphics 3MByte RAM SoC
Renesas Electronics	RZ/A1LU	1	various			RZ/A1L plus Ethernet AVB support and a JPEG codec unit, 3MByte RAM SoC
Rockchip	RK2928	1	40 nm			ARM Mali-400
Rockchip	RK3066	2	40 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP4
Rockchip	RK3128	2				ARM Mali-400 MP4
Rockchip	RK3188^[22]	4	28 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP4
Samsung	Exynos 4 Dual (4210)	2	45 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP4
Samsung	Exynos 4 Dual (4212)	2	32 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP4
Samsung	Exynos 4 Quad (4412)	4	32 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP4
Samsung	Exynos 4 Quad (4415)	4	28 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP4
STMicroelectronics	SPEAr1310					–
STMicroelectronics	SPEAr1340	2				ARM Mali-200
ST-Ericsson	Nova A9500	2	45 nm			ARM Mali-400
ST-Ericsson		2	45 nm			ARM Mali-400
ST-Ericsson		2	45 nm			ARM Mali-400
		4	40 nm			PowerVR SGX543MP4+
Texas Instruments	Sitara AM437x	1	45 nm	Yes	VFPv3	SGX530 Graphics Engine
Texas Instruments		2	45 nm			PowerVR SGX540
Texas Instruments		2	45 nm			PowerVR SGX544
Trident Microsystems	PNX8473	1				PowerVR SGX531
Trident Microsystems	PNX8483	1				PowerVR SGX531
Trident Microsystems	PNX8491	1				PowerVR SGX531
WonderMedia	WM8850	1	40 nm			ARM Mali-400
WonderMedia	WM8880	2	40 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP2
WonderMedia	WM8950	1	40 nm			ARM Mali-400
WonderMedia	WM8980	2	40 nm			ARM Mali-400 MP2
Xilinx	Zynq-7000^[23]	2	28 nm			–
ZiiLABS	ZMS-20					ZiiLABS flexible Stemcell media processing

See also

• ARM architecture
• List of ARM cores
• List of applications of ARM cores
• Comparison of ARMv8-A cores
• JTAG

External links

ARM Holdings

• • ARM Cortex-A9 Technical Reference Manuals

Other

• White paper - The ARM Cortex-A9 Processors
• RISC vs. CISC in the mobile era
• TI OMAP4440 specs
• STMicroelectronics SPEAr1310 Data brief
• RM Cortex-A9
• Popular ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore & Multi-core processor videos, YouTube.
• ARM Assembly language

Notes and References

1. Web site: ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore . Arm.com . 2012-02-02.
2. Web site: Cortex-A9 Processor Specifications . ARM.
3. Web site: Cortex-A9 Single Core Processor . Arm.com . 2012-02-02.
4. Web site: ARM spins multicore-enabled Cortex core - News - Linux for Devices. 7 January 2010. https://archive.today/20120906160327/http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/ARM-spins-multicoreenabled-Cortex-core/. 6 September 2012. dead.
5. Ibh
6. Web site: BCM11311 - Persona ICE Application Processor. Broadcom.
7. Web site: EnergyCore ECX-1000: Technical Specifications . . 2012-05-08 . https://web.archive.org/web/20120425233526/http://calxeda.com/products/energycore/ecx1000/techspecs . 25 April 2012 . dead.
8. Web site: High Performance, Dual-Core IP Set-top Box SoC . Entropic . 13 June 2013 . https://web.archive.org/web/20131029185929/http://www.entropic.com/solutions/telco/telco-set-top-box/en7588 . 29 October 2013 . dead .
9. Web site: Introducing the i.MX 6 Series . Freescale Semiconductor.
10. Web site: HiSilicon Unveils Quad-Core Cortex A9 K3V2 Processor (Hi3620). 27 February 2012.
11. Web site: Sony outs tech specs for NGP . Johnny Cullen . 24 January 2011 . . 25 January 2011.
12. Web site: Sony Playstation Vita Teardown & Product Analysis. TechInsights. 2013-10-15. https://web.archive.org/web/20130818193742/http://techinsights.com/teardowns/sony-playstation-vita-teardown/. 18 August 2013. dead.
13. Web site: MediaTek - MT6575 . MediaTek . 8 January 2013 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130115011302/http://www.mediatek.com/_en/01_products/04_pro.php?sn=1056 . 15 January 2013 . dead.
14. Web site: MediaTek - MT6577 . MediaTek . 8 January 2013 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130113100909/http://www.mediatek.com/_en/01_products/04_pro.php?sn=1074 . 13 January 2013 . dead.
15. Web site: Roy Rubenstein . An ARM based programmable processor is set to enable new communications products . 9 October 2012.
16. Web site: Kevin Trosian . Mindspeed to Showcase the Industry's First ARM Cortex A9-based Communications Processor with Integrated DPI at 2013 CES . 8 January 2013 .
17. Web site: MACOM to Showcase Newly Acquired Mindspeed Comcerto 2000 System-on-Chip (SoC) Processors at the 2014 International CES . 7 January 2014.
18. Web site: Computer System Chip . Nufront . 26 September 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110830162256/http://www.nufront.com/en/cpzx/eed31e97-d916-4441-8aa1-6f6413a692f9155.html . 30 August 2011 . dead.
19. Web site: Exynos 4210 . samsung.com . 2012-01-20 . 2012-02-02.
20. Web site: AM437x Sitara Processors.
21. Web site: WonderMedia Announces PRIZM WM8950 with Android 4.0 Support . 19 May 2013 . 2013-06-17 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130815203429/http://wm8650.net/v2/wondermedia-announces-prizm-wm8950-with-android-4-0-support/ . 15 August 2013 . dead .
22. Web site: Review of Rockchip RK3188 Quad-core chipset. 6 December 2012.
23. Web site: Xilinx Zynq-7000 Extensible Processing Platform . 13 April 2012 . https://web.archive.org/web/20120407172042/http://www.xilinx.com/products/silicon-devices/epp/zynq-7000/index.htm . 7 April 2012 . dead.