At its latest launch event on Friday, Qualcomm announced the new Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 chipset that will likely be seen in most of the upper mid-range the Snapdragon 778G that was released last year alongside a slew of other SoCs, including the Snapdragon 695, the Snapdragon 680, and the Snapdragon 480 Plus. Barring the Snapdragon 680, all the aforementioned chipsets 5G connectivity.
Alongside the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1, Qualcomm also unveiled the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 that was rumored heavily in the lead-up to its launch. It is the successor to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 that was unveiled late last year and comes with a number of tweaks and upgrades over its predecessor. Overall, the two chipsets are Qualcomm's answer to MediaTek's recent launches that include the Dimensity 9000 and Dimensity 8000-series chips, which have consistently racked up high scores in various benchmarks.
The new Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 is an upper mid-range SoC built using Samsung’s 4nm process. Like the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1, it also packs an octa-core U with Qualcomm's custom Kyro cores. It has 4x Cortex-A710 cores clocked at a maximum of up to 2.4GHz and 4x Cortex-A510 efficiency cores clocked at up to 1.8GHz. The chip also has an integrated Adreno 662 GPU that Qualcomm claims offers 20 percent faster graphics processing that its predecessor. It also comes with Qualcomm's 7th-gen AI engine that the company claims enables 30 percent better performance than the Snapdragon 778G.
Snapdragon 7 Gen 1's Focus On Gaming
Other specs of the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 include the Snapdragon X62 5G modem that s blazing fast speeds of up to 4.4Gbps. It also s sub-6GHz and mmWave, as well as dual standby 5G connectivity on both standalone (SA) and non-standalone (NSA) modes. The chip also comes with Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 on-board. In of its imaging chops, the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 comes with the Qualcomm Spectra Triple 14-bit ISP that can capture up to 2.5 gigapixels per second. Overall, it s up to 200-megapixel photo capture and 4K HDR video capture at 30fps. The Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 also s up to QHD+ displays with up to 144Hz refresh rate.
Qualcomm is marketing the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 as a gaming-focused chipset that comes with a lot of graphics grunt, both in of the hardware and the software. Towards that end, the Adreno 662 GPU will be aided by other features, such as the Adreno Frame Motion Engine that is said to double framerates in games while retaining the power consumption levels of the 778G. Another notable gaming-centric feature highlighted by the company is Qualcomm Game Quick Touch, which is said to reduce touch latency. Qualcomm says that OnePlus, Motorola, Oppo, Xiaomi, Realme, Vivo and Honor are some of the brands that will launch smartphones with the new chip, starting in Q2, 2022.
Source: Qualcomm