The American chip developer’s rebranding extends to all of its processing chip categories in good time
The new Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 chip is not yet officially available in smart devices, but from the moment it was presented to the world a few months ago, it was already clear to us that the new branding method of the Qualcomm company (Qualcomm), which is designed to be precise and simplify its offering of processing chips for smartphones and tablets (and at the same time also to refresh public opinion in the shadow of the increased competition from Mediatek and its modern products) will soon reach all price levels of its products – and this is indeed happening now with the presentation of the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 and the Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 at the same time, on the way to first appearances in the devices at the beginning of next year and in the coming months respectively.
The Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 is based on Samsung’s 4LPE process (or 4nm, as it’s more popularly called) instead of TSMC’s 6nm manufacturing process in the Snapdragon 695 which enjoys the top title in the 600 family today, with an array of four Kryo-based cores on Cortex-A78 with a frequency of up to 2.2GHz and four more cores based on Cortex-A55 with a frequency of up to 1.8GHz which should translate into an improvement of about 40 percent in performance compared to the current generation – which is indeed based on the same cores and similar frequencies but in an array of a pair of large and powerful cores And six economical cores, instead of the blessed transition to the 4 + 4 approach in the new era.
The built-in Adreno graphics core in Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 does not receive an official model name, but with a promise of up to 35 percent performance improvement compared to the graphics core in the Snapdragon 695 and with support for VRS (Variable Rate Shading) it appears to be is based on the company’s new generation architecture – where a more modern dual-channel LPDDR5 memory controller also contributes to making the new model feel like a significant improvement on all fronts. There is also support for faster Wi-Fi 6E wireless connectivity, an image processing engine with support for 4K video shooting With HDR, support for decoding and encoding 4K video at a rate of up to 30 frames per second and an improved built-in Snapdragon X62 modem (as in Snapdragon 7 Gen 1) with fifth generation support for theoretical download speeds of up to 2.9Gbps.
Expect to see this new chip in various mid-range devices during the first quarter of 2023 – hopefully there won’t be any unexpected delays, given that the more advanced Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 was slated to appear in devices in the second quarter of 2022 but continues to be delayed in the meantime.
The Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 is content with TSMC’s 6 nm manufacturing process, which is still a leap forward compared to 8 nm lithography in the Snapdragon 480 and Snapdragon 480 Plus models – and an array of a pair of Kryo cores based on the Cortex-A78 architecture with a frequency of up to 2GHz plus six Cortex-A55 cores at a frequency of up to 1.8GHz, on the way to an improvement of up to 15 percent in performance compared to the current generation in the Snapdragon 400 series and capabilities that should be similar to those of the Snapdragon 695 in question, at least on paper.
The Snapdragon 4 Gen 1’s non-numerical Adreno core will deliver a 10 percent performance boost alongside support for VRS technology, and the updated image processing engine will support sensors with a resolution of up to 108 megapixels instead of only up to 64 megapixels In the previous generation – but beyond that it seems that there are no additional improvements, as part of the continued use of a dual-channel LPDDR4X memory controller, dual-channel Wi-Fi 5 connectivity and a built-in built-in Snapdragon X51 modem with support for fifth-generation networks at theoretical speeds of up to 2.5Gbps.
This chip should arrive faster than its brother, with availability declared already during the third quarter of this year – which is about to end at the end of this month. Is it going to replace the Snapdragon 680 in the common popular models of Qualcomm and its partners? This could be very happy news, thanks to the use of much more recent processing cores and a more relevant cellular modem for the modern era.