The possible connection between Google’s upcoming Tensor G5 chip and Imagination Technologies as a GPU vendor is not exactly new. Various reports and rumors have already hinted at that, but now we have yet another interesting industry source on the matter. Keep up with us here for a second since the explanation is a bit complicated.
Last month, there was a RISC-V Day Tokyo conference in Japan. One of the materials that came out from the conference was a blog post by postgraduate student Yang Yanling detailing RISC-V and Imagination GPU integration. Imagination Technologies themselves shared the blog post on WeChat, giving it quite a bit of credibility. Said post also featured a breakdown of different chips that use and will be using Imagination GPUs. One of the now-removed tables explicitly mentions the Google Tensor G5.
Imagination GPU integration table
As previous rumors have suggested, the Tensor G5, expected to power the Google Pixel 10, will be using the DXT-48-1536 GPU. It is a modern GPU solution that, unlike the Arm Mali-G715 inside the Tensor G3 and G4, is capable of modern feats like ray tracing.
We also know that the Tensor G5 will be fabbed by TSMC instead of Samsung on a 3nm-class node. Google will use Arm Cortex CPU cores and a new fully custom image signal processor (ISP), which will replace the partially custom designs of its predecessors, which relied on modified Samsung ISPs with Google-designed blocks. Google is also expected to use a custom memory controller, system-level cache and power modules. Third-party solutions will be sourced for USB, PCIe, and I3C components as well as third-party interfaces for the DSI (display), DisplayPort, flash storage and memory (LPDDR5x).
It is also worth noting that the same table that details the Tensor G5 chip also mentions a mysterious custom Xiaomi chipset, going by the name XuanJie, that is said to use an Imagination Technologies GPU.
