The new Xbox 360 Slim comes packing a new combined CPU-GPU processor – code-name 'Vejle' - with details now emerging on what exactly makes up the sixth Xbox 360 chip configuration.
Vejle – named after a city in Denmark – was been created by Microsoft in association with IBM, specifically designed to let the new Xbox 360 Slim console operate on less power and run noticeably quieter than past versions of the console.
Cost and space savings
The chip combines the 360's microprocessor and its graphics chip on a single piece of silicon, which has enabled considerable cost and space savings, letting Microsoft add in new features to the console such as wireless networking.
Microsoft's new combined CPU-GPU chip has 372 million transistors. It is being manufactured by IBM and one other unnamed manufacturer in a 45 micron silicon-on-insulator manufacturing process.
It marks a considerable step forward from the chip design for the first iteration of the Xbox 360 back at launch in 2005, which had an IBM-designed processor and an AMD-designed graphics chip built using a 90-nanometer silicon-on-insulator process.
No more RROD
That particular model was predisposed to overheating, which became the PR nightmare known to gamers as the 'red ring of death' – essentially bricking your Xbox 360.
Microsoft's latest combined chip uses 60 per cent less power and 50 per cent less space than the original 2005 pair of chips from IBM and AMD.
Via Venturebeat
