Qualcomm is expected to ship a 28-nm 2.5 GHz quad-core Snapdragon to manufacturers by the end of 2011.
During its Innovation Qualcomm event in Istanbul, Qualcomm revealed a rather interesting roadmap that includes a 28-nm S4 Class Snapdragon SoC containing a quad-core 2.5 GHz CPU and a next-gen quad-core Adreno GPU. The chip also reportedly offers stereoscopic 3D support, 1080p HD, and 3G and LTE connectivity for "next-generation" devices.
In addition to the S4 Class Snapdragon, Qualcomm's roadmap also showcased three SoCs for this generation: one for the mass market, one for high performance smartphones and tablets, and one for multi-tasking and advanced gaming.
For starters, the 65-nm S1 Class single-core chip for the general audience sports a CPU clocked up to 1 GHz, up to the Adreno 200 GPU, and up to 3G HSPA.
However, the beefier 45-nm single-core chip for tablets and high-end phones provides a CPU clocked up to 1.4 GHz, the Adrena 205 GPU, and support for HSPA+, a 1024 x 768 screen resolution, 720p HD, dolby 5.1 and stereoscopic 3D. As for the 45-nm S3 Class chip, it will come in single and dual-core flavors clocked up to 1.5 GHz, feature the Adreno 220 GPU, and support 3G HSPA+, a 1440 x 900 resolution, 1080p HD, Dolby 5.1, and stereoscopic 3D.
According to Qualcomm, the top-of-the-line S4 Class chip will arrive in single, dual and quad-core variants. Overall the new processors are expected to reach manufacturers by the end of the year, and then into the hands of consumers during Q1 2012. This indicates that quad-core 2.5 GHz smartphones may be launched at Mobile World Congress 2012 in February.
And although the company is introducing quad-core SoCs clocked at 2.5 GHz, company CEO Paul Jacobs said overall performance is not all about speed. "It’s not about how many cores or how many gigabytes, it’s how well you can optimise the system," he said.
Was that a crack at Google's Android OS?
...coming from a guy selling 2.5GHz quad-core phone CPUs.
...coming from a guy selling 2.5GHz quad-core phone CPUs.
If it wasn't before you just made it one. But I think its true. My Atrix 4g is not nearly as smooth as my friends HD7. Yet is has a dual core.
Apple is already planning for ARM laptops and MS8 will work with either ARM or x86 so we will see ARM laptops next year, and maybe even some cheap desktops in ARM. Intel has a real challenge here if they aren't careful. ARM has some very innovative and powerful companies pushing it.
Just because its 2.5 ghz and a quad core does not mean it will have good performance. Looking at Nvidia's roadmap they think their next gen quad core will be around a core 2 duo in performance, still a very very long way from Ivy Bridge.
Windows and OSX software for X86 wont run on ARM unless emulated and then suffer a performance hit for that, so Intel will still have a huge advantage there. Then you have Intel dominating with process technology and bringing out 22nm 3d transistor chips which will shrink the power usage of Intel's chips, maybe by enough to make them power comparable to ARM designs running at clock frequencies high enough to make them suitable for a good PC experience. Intel through innovative process technology, power reduction, speed increases and shit loads of money might due to ARM what they have been doing to AMD all these years.
Sooo... we need benchmarks. Can anyone provide?
That is one of the reasons PC sales, especially desktops, are down. Why buy a big bulky desktop when you can buy a lightweight notebook, or tablet that does everything the average users wants to do, with the advantage of portability. It's the netbook/nettop/very lightweight notebook area where ARM will gain ground. Not because it's it fastest you can get, but because it is fast enough to fulfill the needs of 90% of users at lower cost and lower power consumption.
bulldozer WIIL BE ONE HELL OF EXAMPLE OF WHAT YOU ARE SAYING
I hear AMD finished Bulldozer last year, they are just too afraid of it's awesomeness.
nvidia and samsung will have better stuff to offer... as always.
its kind of a trade off.
arm = LOW POWER, and by low i mean insanely low... but does less per clock for that.
x86 = power hungry, but does far more per clock.
arm needs to have specialized software to full take advantage of it, while x86 can brute force bad coding and be usefull...
basically, if you make it for arm, it will work and be low power, such as a media center and specific codecs, but you honestly arent going to be running photoshop on it.
the reason that its being looked at for servers, is because its low power. google for instance, costs i think it was 130000 per hour in power alone, i did the math a long time ago when they talked about what they used for 1 service. if you had to have 8 arms to do what 1 of the other cpus does, it would be cost effective because the 8 arms would out do any of the competition on power usage. and because you wouldn't need as much cooling, if any, you could make it more compact, saveing space while still preforming at what you need it to, with less of a power draw.
Nonsense, ARM are market leaders for low cost, low power CPU's while by the same token Intel 's Atom line is rubbish in comparison (power consumption is to high) and AMD doesn't even have an ultra mobile strategy.
The Retina Display is still not found in those high end smartphones using Android because of poor operating system design.
No matter how good the CPU, it is still not as good as using the GPU for window composition, graphics rendering and font rendering. Both Google and Microsoft does not design their mobile system to better utilize the pass experience and current technologies even they can create the mobile operating system from scratch. Such a shame that, only Apple is doing the right technology, for developers and consumers.