ARM® partner DeePoon recently launched a brand new, all-in-one virtual reality headset powered by ARM. Based on an Exynos 7420 chipset, the DeePoon M2 features an octa core ARM Cortex®-A57 & Cortex-A53 CPU set with an ARM Mali™-T760MP8 GPU configuration to take care of the heavy graphics requirements of a VR device.
Why Mali?
The Mali family of GPUs is the number one shipping in the world and for good reason. The incorporated power saving technologies enable Mali GPUs to provide incredibly high performance whilst remaining safely within the power and thermal limitations of the mobile form factor. Advanced bandwidth saving features such as ARM Frame Buffer Compression (AFBC), Adaptive Scalable Texture Compression (ASTC) and Smart Composition are just some of the key power saving features behind DeePoon’s decision to team up with ARM and incorporate Mali into their new device.
Dennis Laudick, ARM VP of Partner Marketing, supports the M2 launch in China
How important are DeePoon’s tech choices?
Latency (or the delay between real-life movement and the subsequent update to the VR display) can be a real issue in a VR experience. This is because noticeable latency causes a disparity between what your eyes see on the display and what your brain understands as the logical visual adjustments in real life, and this mismatch can lead to dizziness and nausea. By allowing the GPU to render directly to the front buffer, bypassing the additional off-screen buffers used in traditional graphics rendering, Mali GPUs are able to significantly reduce the number of interactions taking place. This provides a latency guarantee and ensures the device remains below the 20ms maximum motions to photons latency prescribed by the industry as necessary for a great VR experience.
The super sleek and powerful DeePoon M2
The display is another important element in a VR device and DeePoon have covered this angle with the smart selection of Samsung’s 2k AMOLED display which provides them with a refresh rate between 60-70Hz. The real selling point of an AMOLED display for VR is the ability to achieve low persistence through partial illumination. This involves lighting a section of the display only when it is showing accurate information then immediately switching it off again. This significantly reduces blurring for the user and, if handled at a sufficiently high refresh rate, is imperceptible to the eye. This method allows you the added flexibility to show multiple partial images during a single refresh, thereby updating the user’s display mid-frame, reducing latency and adding to the sense of full immersion required in VR applications. DeePoon have also ensured there’s plenty of content to play with, partnering with numerous games companies to provide more than 100 VR games and applications available to the user.
The close co-operation between DeePoon, ARM and Samsung has provided a wealth of industry knowledge from the frontrunners in mobile VR, ensuring the M2 is well equipped to take the market by storm.
