Inside the Kindle Fire processor

Thanks to iFixit’s teardown of the Amazon Kindle Fire, we now know a lot more about the new Android tablet on the block, especially the processor.

The processor is here, underneath the Hynix RAM chip on the mainboard. the RAM chip is soldered on top of the CPU, so a heat gun is needed to lift it off:

Image credit: iFixit

Here’s the naked CPU:

Image credit: iFixit

The processor is a Texas Instruments OMAP 4430 part. And as it happens, we know a lot about the OMAP 4 platform.

Image credit: Texas Instruments

The OMPA 4430 is a dual-core ARM A9 part clocked at 1GHz built using 45nm CMOS process. It features Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) and an integrated POWERVR SGX540 graphics accelerator (supporting OpenGL ES v2.0, OpenGL ES v1.1, OpenVG v1.1 and EGL v1.3) for 3D games and UI. It also features IVA 3 hardware accelerators to allow full HD 1080p video encode/decode. The chip also features on-board USB 2.0 support.

Everything about the chip is designed with low power in mind.

Related:

• iFixit: Amazon Kindle Fire teardown
• Kindle Fire is on the way, but not for me
• Kindle Fire: The tablet for the rest of us
• Amazon’s Kindle Fire: Snappy consumption, impulse purchase device
• Amazon Kindle Fire teardown: What’s inside?
• 7 reasons the Kindle Fire is better than the iPad