Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Qualcomm Readies 4 Midrange Snapdragon Processors

Qualcomm introduced its Snapdragon 620, 618, 425, and 415 processors, supporting a wide range of mobile devices and a range of price points.  Both the 600 and 400 series processors feature Qualcomm Hexagon application DSP, which has the ability to process low-power tasks without waking up the CPU cores. The new designs offer an integrated X8 LTE modem (Category 7 with download speeds of up to 300Mbps and upload speeds of up to 100Mbps) and high-end multimedia features such as dual image signal processors (ISP) and FLAC support for high-quality audio.

Some details:

  • The Snapdragon 620 integrates a brand new ARM Cortex-A72 CPUs and next-gen Qualcomm Adreno GPU. It brings support for 4K Ultra HD video capture and playback and 2K display resolution. 

  • The Snapdragon 618 will be the hexa-core variant of the 620, loaded with the same core features.
  • The Snapdragon 425 processor has the same X8 LTE as the 620 and 618, complete with integrated Cat 7 modem. It supports a high quality camera with enhanced photo processing and dual ISP.
  • The Snapdragon 415 provides an affordable octa-core solution for manufacturing customers who are looking for a quick transition from Snapdragon 410, which has amassed over 80+ design wins since its inception became available late last year. The Snapdragon 415 features support for integrated Cat 4 LTE (speeds up to 150Mbps), 64-bit CPU architecture, and 720p display resolutions.


Commercial devices featuring the new Snapdragon 620, 618, 425, and 415 processors are expected to be available in the second half of 2015.

A further marketing note, Qualcomm is now using "Snapdragon" as the brand for its discrete LTE multimode modems (previously Gobi).