More Qualcomm Snapdragon chips coming in 2015

Feb 18, 2015 14:43 GMT  ·  By

While most of the attention goes out to Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 810 and its overheating issues saga, the US chip giant has unveiled four new members of the Snapdragon family.

We knew more chips were on the way in 2015 thanks to a leaked document that showed up last month and here are the first arrivals.

Snapdragon 620 and Snapdragon 618

The first pair consists in the Snapdragon 620 and Snapdragon 618 which offer support for Qualcomm’s integrated X8 LTE modem and offers LTE download speeds of up to 300Mbps and uploads to 100Mbps.

They have also come with support for dual image signal processor support and high-quality FLAC audio support.

The Snapdragon 620 is a 64-bit octa-core affair outfitted with new ARM Cortex-A72 CPUs and Cortex-A53 cores, plus an updated Adreno GPU. It can sustain 4K Ultra HD video capture and playback and support for 2K display resolution.

The Snapdragon 618 is the hexa-core variant of the Snapdragon 620 so it comes bundling the same core features.

Snapdragon 425 and Snapdragon 415

The second pair is made up of the Snapdragon 425 and Snapdragon 415 chips. The first one takes advantage of the same X8 LTE modem found in the new 600 chips, but adds enhanced photo processing capabilities and dual image signal processor support.

The Snapdragon 425 packs a Qualcomm Hexagon application DSP (can be found in the 400 chips too), which is in charge of low-power tasks without making use of the CPU cores. This has important effects on battery life which gets prolonged.

The silicone piece will roll with Qualcomm RF360 front end solution in order to work with all major modes and frequency bands in the world including dual-SIM, LTE broadcast and VoLTE.

Last but not least comes the 64-bit octa-core Snapdragon 415, which has Cat 4 LTE (download speeds up to 150Mbps) and support for 720p resolution.

As you have probably guessed, these chips will end up powering middle-range smartphones thus diversifying their range of capabilities and bringing them to the next level.

These chips support features that most users would expect to find on a high-end phone, but now Qualcomm is making them available to the middle-rangers too.

Qualcomm says the new Snapdragon 620, 618, 425 and 415 devices will start being available on the market starting in the second half of 2015.