ZiiLabs unleashes Jaguar3 super slim slate reference design

SINGAPORE – 13 September 2011 – ZiiLABS, a pioneering media processor and platforms company (a unconditionally-owned subsidiary of Creative Technology Ltd), today introduced its JAGUAR3, probably the most powerful 3rd Generation Android 3.2 tablet series.

JAGUAR3 is a chain of ultra-slim, ultra-lightweight and trendy 10.1″ tablet reference designs targeted on the OEM markets. With over a decade of designing experience in portable mobile devices, Creative provided the ergonomic and sexy design of this series of JAGUAR3 tablets.

JAGUAR3′s superior performance, low power consumption and rich feature set comes from the twin-core 1.5GHz ARM Cortex-A9 based ZMS-20 StemCell Processors. ZMS-20 has another 48 StemCell Processing cores within, which effectively make it right into a 50-core processor. These advanced GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) features easily make ZMS-20 essentially the most powerful SoC (system-on-chip) available for tablets today.

When OEM customers are able to ship their JAGUAR3 tablets, they’ve the choice to simply upgrade it to the subsequent generation ZMS-40 SoC chip which sports a quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 and 96 StemCell Processors. This 100-core 4th Generation tablet solution shall be available to OEMs within the next quarter.

The JAGUAR3 tablets may be made so slim and light-weight because of the massive integration of I/O devices and processors throughout the ZMS-20 and ZMS-40 chips and likewise the patent-pending power management technologies invented by ZiiLABS. This permits all of the components to be compacted right into a “granddaughter-board” – a micro-size motherboard measuring only 2.44″ x 4.64″, with performances that may rival most laptops and yet consuming only about 1 watt of power.

ZiiLABS has amassed over 25 years of expertise in 3D graphics, GPU and SoC designs. Under its previous name of 3DLABS, ZiiLABS was the primary to introduce the highly advanced and highly prized 3D graphics chip technologies to the computer market within the early ’90s. Leveraging on these extensive chip design skills, methodologies, patents and technologies, ZiiLABS is now capable of bring these phenomenal technologies with outstanding performance to the tablet market at a miniscule fraction of what they used to price.

The JAGUAR3 tablet reference designs are way over the “Reference Design Kits” utilized in the chip industry. They seem to be a set of comprehensive and complete ready-to-go, quick-to-market Reference Design Kits – from chip, hardware, OS, firmware, software, to IDs (industrial designs) and mechanical designs. They arrive in several “flavors” to permit OEM customers a number choices – from ID, price, performance, weight, thickness and all of the thanks to outright sexiness. These types of choices are offered without the OEM having to bear huge R&D costs, exorbitant NRE charges and agonizing design cycle delays.

“The explosive tablet market is pure ruthless in every sense. Even a slight delay in a quick-track 6-month design cycle can also be lethal. This can be a whole new ballgame where only the fastest can survive,” said Sim Wong Hoo, Chairman and CEO of Creative Technology Ltd. “JAGUAR3 allows OEMs to go into this massive explosive market instantly and economically while reducing the danger significantly. It breaks new ground because the strongest, the lightest, the slimmest, the foremost complete and lowest cost Android 3.2 tablet reference designs in the stores, enabling OEMs to simply ride the wave of the subsequent generation of Android computing.”

“In case you inspect the way forward for computing through our JAGUAR3 ‘granddaughter-board’, one can realize that the PCs today will look progressively more like mainframe computers of yesteryear. With the performance provided by JAGUAR3, tablets may be the mainstream computing devices of tomorrow.

“With the nice low-cost of our JAGUAR3 reference designs, our partners can manufacture tablets for as little as $100, opening up a worldwide of possibilities in areas comparable to China’s educational market, where resources might be limited and insist for classy learning tools is high. The good value tablet for China’s education market is sort of captive because it was the Chinese government’s goal since 2007 to supply free textbooks to all school kids in China. Over the last twenty years, we’ve got made a major investment in technology and content in China, where an example might be set for the remainder of the realm on how a low-cost, high-performance tablet can represent an awe-inspiring learning platform that saves money, saves the environment and enriches the lives of future generations,” added Sim.

Dr. Li Hui Qin, President of Creative Knowledge China, who was one of the handful of early pioneers in Chinese computing research said, “Leveraging on our 20 years of experience in Chinese platforms for PCs, we are developing a Chinese platform for Android 3.x and above. This platform will include application suites like eSchoolBag (电子书包) and Digital Briefcase (数字公文包), designed uniquely for China’s education and business markets respectively.”

“Over the years, Creative Knowledge has developed many highly acclaimed Chinese software and content. Currently, we are actively working with the Chinese educational authorities, textbook publishers and schools in developing their Digital Textbooks and Digital Interactive Classrooms. We are targeting over 200 million kids that will rush to embrace this exciting new medium. As all textbooks are becoming free under China’s compulsory education system, the authorities will be very motivated to replace them with lower cost tablets. If Creative and ZiiLABS can help to deliver great tablets at low price, it will profoundly change the fundamentals of the Chinese education system for generations to come,” added Dr Li.

“The JAGUAR3 continues our strategy to deliver groundbreaking platforms that enable our partners to differentiate and win market share in the exciting tablet space,” said Hock Leow, President of ZiiLABS. “We are experiencing phenomenal take-up of the platform across a wide range of markets from traditional consumer segments to high-volume verticals in business and education. The educational market in China is just one vertical market that has significant volume potential, and we’re excited to unveil the JAGUAR3 as a feature-rich, ready-to-market solution that may be quickly and simply implemented in other markets in addition.”

With a classy magnesium case, weighing lower than 480g and an ultra-thin 8.1 mm design, the better end JAGUAR3 solution delivers a colourful 10.1 inch tablet of 1280 by 800 pixel resolution at 176 pixels per inch, 16.7 million colors, an entire viewing angle and a capacitive multi-touch screen experience. At a rather higher mechanical cost, JAGUAR3 can easily support a perfect sexy “razor-slim” design of only 7.4 mm. Dependent on the battery used, over 10 hours of video playback and web browsing remains possible with such slim designs.

The better end JAGUAR3 also supports:

A dual camera system of as much as 12 Megapixel for rear facing image capture and HD for front facing
Complementing the same old Android offering, a rich suite of software is added to take advantage of the huge computing power of the ZMS processor, including:

Support for top Dynamic Range images
Easy-to-use 40 Megapixel panoramic photography
ZiiPhoto with intelligent photo browsing and real-time 3D photo effects
Advanced video playback with trick modes (comparable to rewind play, frame-by-frame advance and reverse)
Dual microphone array for noise-free recording and video conferencing, and
Creative Sound Blaster’s famed X-Fi audio effects

The ZMS-20 array of 48 StemCell Processors delivers an unprecedented 1080p High-Profile H.264 and VP8 video playback, immersive OpenGL ES 2.0 3D graphics, HDMI 1.4 output with mirroring and a completely independent dual-screen display (one for the tablet LCD and a unique one for the enormous external HDMI display), Adobe Flash 10.x acceleration and OpenCL programmability. The ZMS-40 with its 96 StemCell Processors can easily double these kinds of benchmarks and supply flexibility to power and accelerate future Android iterations.

Availability and Specifications

The ZiiLABS JAGUAR3 Reference Design Kits are expected to sample to choose customers in October 2011. Full specifications are available in at www.ziilabs.com