Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 8 Gen 1! Here to Power 2022 Android Flagships
Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 8 Gen 1
Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 - That's the name to be used in 2022 when buying flagship Android phones. Qualcomm has rebranded this year, and Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 is the first in the new series. It's actually essentially a successor to the Snapdragon 888 and brings in the usual yearly performance gains.
Smartphones using Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 will start coming out in late 2021, and Xiaomi will announce its reservation for Xiaomi 12 series. In addition, IQOO, Motorola, Nubia, Oppo, Realme, Redmi, Black Shark, Honor, OnePlus, SHARP, Sony, Vivo, Xiaomi, and ZTE have also confirmed the launch of phones with Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 in the year 2022.
Snapdragon 8 Gen 1: All you need to know
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 is based on the Armv9 architecture and uses the 4nm manufacturing process. There is an octa-core processor with a single 3GHz Cortex X2 super performance core; this is accompanied by three 2.5 GHz Cortex-A710 cores. There are four Cortex A510 cores clocked at 1.5 GHz for efficient tasks.
This configuration offers a 20 percent increase in gross performance and a 30 percent increase in energy efficiency. Moreover, the updated GPU offers 30 percent faster graphics processing and a 25 percent enhancement in power efficiency.
The 5G modem sees an upgrade in the form of the Snapdragon X65, which supports 5G mmWave and sub-6GHz network connectivity. The modem can support speeds of up to 10GBps, although the world has yet to catch up with those levels of mobile data speeds. In addition, there is support for Wi-Fi 6, Wi-Fi 6E, and Bluetooth LE audio.
As part of its Snapdragon Sight, the Spectra ISP now supports 18-bit processing, which with its improved processing speeds, it can take 240 12MP photos in one second or record 8K HDR10 + videos well as 18-bit RAW files. In addition, a new fourth "Always-On ISP allows the camera to run with extremely low power consumption so users can experience always-on face unlocking and locking if your face isn't present for heightened privacy," says Qualcomm.
AI performance is boosted by the 7th generation AI engine, which is said to be four times faster than the previous model, and at the same time, 1.7 times more energy efficient. The artificial intelligence engine is used to enhance mobile gaming experiences on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, somewhat similar to NVIDIA DLSS technology.
Lastly, security also sees a boost with a trust management engine that is compatible with the Android Ready SE standard and can hold critical data like digital car keys, IDs, wallet data, and more. The chip also has iSIM support.