This week Qualcomm announced its new Snapdragon 835 processing chip that should feature in a number of smartphones over the coming months, including Samsung’s Galaxy S8, the Xiaomi Mi 6, and more. While not currently featured in any smartphone, a new leaked image is allowing us to see the Snapdragon 835 in a prototype phone that is thicker than most smartphones we see today. But that is not unusual in a prototype design used to primarily test the chip. As is normal it is running a graphical game to test the power and features of the chip.
The Qualcomm Snapdragon series has been a staple in smartphones for years. Starting with the Snapdragon 801, progressing to the Snapdragon 810, followed by the current Snapdragon 820, we can see the progression to the Snapdragon 835. Except for some overheating issues in the Snapdragon 810, it has been smooth sailing for the company. The new Snapdragon 835 has many new features and improvements over the older models. For instance, the 835 uses one-half the power of the v801. Which is quite an accomplishment and will likely make a difference to smartphone batteries.
The 10nm (nanometer) Snapdragon 835 returns to the octa-core design after exploring the quad-core design used on the v820 and v821 in 2016. There are four performance cores running at 2.45 GHz and the four efficiency cores running at 1.9 GHz. Qualcomm has paired this with the next generation 540 GPU to take over for the Adreno 530 used with the v820 and v821 in 2016. Included is the Snapdragon X16 LTE modem that can handle speeds up to Category 16 LTE, which is 1Gbps. The processor should allow you to use 60-percent less power while using WiFi. Bluetooth 5 is also supported on the Snapdragon 835 which will also likely feature in a number of smartphones this year. In addition, the Snapdragon 835 will support 4K displays, UFS 2.1 memory, DDR4 RAM, and Quick Charge 4.0 fast charge. It will offer enhanced Virtual Reality (VR) and other video applications. On the camera side, it will support dual cameras, one up to 32-megapixel or two 16-megapixel, and numerous autofocusing methods are supported. Support is there for 4K video capture up to 30 frames-per-second (fps), and 4K playback is capable up to 60 fps.