Minimizing video lag is crucial to mixed-reality headsets which blend virtual content with live video overlays of the real world, and we’re today learning more about how Apple ensures that Vision Pro performance is up to the task.
A supply-chain report says that the new R1 chip, which processes all the cameras and sensor inputs, is being packaged with custom-designed low-latency memory. This setup is said to double the performance over what would otherwise be possible …
R1 chip key to Vision Pro performance
Vision Pro’s computing capabilities are powered by the same M2 chip used in the latest Macs. But a second chip, the R1, works in tandem to process data from the sensors and cameras. Specifically, the R1 chip handles data from:
- 12 cameras
- 6 microphones
- 5 sensors
The chip processes this data to provide:
- Head-tracking
- Eye-tracking
- 3D mapping of your surroundings
- Hand-tracking
The first two of these tell Vision Pro where you are looking, so that it can display the appropriate content from both the real world and virtual data over-layed on it.
Custom low-latency RAM
Having a separate processor handle these tasks is key to Vision Pro performance, and especially ensuring there is no discernible lag between head and eye movements and the content displayed.
The Korea Herald says that one of the secrets to processing speed is custom-designed ultra-low latency RAM within the R1 system-on-a-chip.
To support R1’s high-speed processing, SK hynix has developed the custom 1-gigabit DRAM. The new DRAM is known to have increased the number of input and output pins by eightfold to minimize delays. Such chips are also called Low Latency Wide IO. According to experts, the new chip also appears to have been designed using a special packaging method – Fan-Out Wafer Level Packaging – to be attached to the R1 chipset as a single unit […]
It is a new design that would help the headset double the data processing speed, according to industry officials here.
SK hynix, which is the world’s second-largest memory chipmaker, will reportedly be the sole supplier of this memory chip.
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