If you’re the proud owner of the Samsung Galaxy S4 or HTC One, you’re running the latest and greatest quad-core processor from Qualcomm. They’ve been a staple in the mobile market as of late, and are leading the charge on top-tier smartphones, and in the 4G LTE market as well. Today we had a moment to talk with Qualcomm about their upcoming tech following this weeks earnings report, and learned some exciting news about their next chip, the Snapdragon 800.
We already know the super impressive 2.3 GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 mobile processor is coming extremely soon, but we weren’t sure who all would be on board. The flagship LG G2 coming in August has been confirmed to run the Snapdragon 800, as did Sony with their new Xperia Z Ultra. With Quick Charge 2.0, extremely fast speeds, battery efficiency, and of course global 4G LTE (and 4G LTE-Advanced) support, we can see why so many are on board.
If you had any doubt that the next wave of flagship smartphone wouldn’t be powered by Qualcomm, let this quote we have below ease your mind. While speaking to Murthy Renduchintala, EVP of Qualcomm Technologies, he had this to say about the coming months and what to expect.
Virtually every global OEM with a premium-tier smartphone is designing it with a Snapdragon 800, which we’ll see in the coming months.”
He then went on to mention that while we can expect to see flagship smartphone running the 800 from virtually everyone, there’s a few who make their own processor architectures that won’t be on board. One that comes to mind is Samsung, as they have their Exynos chipset, but clearly they’ve already been using the Snapdragon 600 on their flagship GS4, and we’re assuming the 800 will be in their Note III or other upcoming devices.
It’s pretty exciting to know that over the next few months we’ll be seeing a huge influx of impressive smartphones all running one of the most powerful smartphone processors on the planet. We already knew it was a fast processor from our hands-on with the Snapdragon 800, so now it will be up to OEMs to offer a differentiated experience from the competition to get the consumers dollar.
Things like the stellar build quality and front facing speakers surely set the HTC One apart, and we’re hoping similar advances are coming soon with all these top-tier smartphones that are in the works. In closing Qualcomm mentioned we can expect to see front-end support for their RF360 platform, which offers global 2G/3G/4GLTE support under one roof. Which means we can start to see more of this one device works on all carriers approach that has been making the rounds as of late.
The second half of 2013 will be an exciting one. With flagship smartphones, top-tier tablets, and competition from NVIDIA with their Tegra 4 we’re excited for it all. Stay tuned!
