Nvidia is sending out their annual Mobile World Congress invitations, but there’s nothing routine or ordinary about the announcement they’re teasing in 2012. As you can see in the invite above, at least one smartphone, likely running Android, will be showcased with a Tegra 3 quad-core processor. We’ve seen how quad-core computing can greatly improve performance on Android tablets, like the Asus Transformer Prime, but soon we’ll see that same gain in the mobile space. It’s amazing to think we’re at that point already.
It’s logical to assume the rumored HTC Edge / Congressional will be one of the first, if not the first, handsets to be powered by the ultra powerful quad-core chipset. It would be huge for the Taiwanese company to make the jump from Qualcomm to Nvidia, since many have suggested that they stalled in 2011. Nvidia leapfrogged the competition last year when they introduced their dual-core Tegra 2 processor. It took months for competitors, like Qualcomm (Snapdragon) and Texas Instruments (OMAP), to catch up. Thus, the initial batch of Android smartphones or tablets released with Tegra 2 were automatically ahead of the game. Unfortunately, for HTC, that meant their dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon-powered devices were a bit late to the game.
The same could be true for any manufacturer, presumably HTC or maybe even LG, who’s able to release a Tegra3 powered smartphone before the rest. HTC could also use Tegra 3 in their next generation Android tablets, which could be unveiled in Barcelona as well. We’ll be sure to cover MWC 2012 at the end of February and bring you all the latest.
Source: theVerge
