Along with the launch of its new smartwatch chip in the Snapdragon Wear 2500, Qualcomm also released a new line of chipsets for lower midrange devices. These are the Snapdragon 632, 439, and 429. You probably should not expect anything too flashy from these platforms, unlike the Snapdragon 800 series that are designed for expensive flagship devices. Even the Snapdragon 660 is designed for the more expensive midrange devices. These new chipsets are firmly set for the lower end of the mid-tier range.
Qualcomm says that these new chips “are engineered to bring higher performance, better battery life, more efficient designs, impressive graphics and artificial intelligence” – features that you find in expensive flagship phones – to those in the lower end of the market. This really should be good news for those in the market for budget-friendly devices in 2018.
Snapdragon 632
The Snapdragon 632 is the successor to the popular Snapdragon 625 and 626 chips, and it boasts of a 40 percent performance boost over its predecessors. This means that lower end devices will progressively grow more powerful over the next year, provided that they use this new chipset.
The Snapdragon 632 includes Qualcomm’s ultrafast X9 LTE Advanced modem, which delivers download speeds of up to 300Mbps. In addition to its power efficiency, the mobile platform supports 10+ hours of video streaming, 10+ hours of gaming, 8+ days of music playback, and 1+ days of talk time.
Manufacturers will be able to put in features in their midrange smartphones like 4K video capture, AI for digital imaging, gaming, and dual cameras at 13MP each into their phones. You can expect devices carrying the Snapdragon 632 by early 2019.
Snapdragon 439, 429
The Snapdragon 439 and 429 are designed for even more budget-friendly devices, but they pack a punch as well, especially compared to the older Snapdragon 400 series chipsets. This is because these are built on a more advanced FinFET process, so there is more performance per area of silicon. The Snapdragon 439 has 8 cores for the processor, while the Snapdragon 429 has 4 cores.
These new chipsets raise the bar in battery life and performance, giving new devices a boost of 25 percent less power usage and 25 percent higher performance. Both platforms also feature the Snapdragon X6 modem, which supports download speeds up to 150 Mbps, and Dual SIM Dual VoLTE voice and data connection.
Both platforms have features that will allow manufacturers to provide AI to enhance the camera, voice capabilities and security of the devices. Devices will be able to carry dual cameras at 8MP each. Devices carrying these two platforms should hit the market by the latter part of 2018.
SOURCE: Qualcomm
