The Nvidia Shield Tablet X1 could be hitting the shelves pretty soon, as details of a prototype have made their way to GFXBench.
Before we get into the juicy details of the upcoming Nvidia slab, let's rewind a bit. The company's Shield Tablet was recently retooled and re-released as the Shield Tablet K1, which is probably to let everyone know that it houses the Tegra K1 processor. Compared with the original version, it only came with some slight changes and retained most of its hardware specifications, dropping the stylus and shedding $100 off its price tag.
Earlier this year, Nvidia announced its Tegra X1 SoC, which led to speculations of the Shield Tablet's successor having the said chipset. However, as mentioned earlier, that didn't materialize.
Going back to the present, recent developments indicate that the Nvidia tablet next in line will finally be fitted with the newer chipset, according to GFXBench. As far as the company's naming conventions go, it will be called the Nvidia Shield Tablet X1 after its processor, just like the Shield Tablet K1.
What's odd about the benchmark results is that the Tegra X1 SoC was listed as having only four Cortex A57 cores, where it's lacking four more Cortex A53 cores to deliver its promised octa-core offering. But on an interesting note, it will come with a custom-developed GPU that can perform twice as better than the one that's equipped on the Tegra K1, hitting 1 teraflop of floating performance.
Out of the box, the Nvidia Shield Tablet X1 will run on Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Just like its predecessor, it will sport an 8-inch touchscreen display with a 1,920 x 1,200 resolution, but it will have an upgraded 32GB of storage along with 3GB worth of RAM. The tablet will also support both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity as well as a GPS feature to boot.
Nvidia is yet to announce an official release date, but seeing that the year is almost up, it's probably safe to assume that we'll be able to get our hands on the Nvidia Shield Tablet X1 sometime in early 2016.
Photo: Maurizio Pesce | Flickr
