A new Google-branded device with the Snapdragon 855 has surfaced on Geekbench, the “Google coral”, says Geekbench. Now, in addition to sporting the Snapdragon 855, Geekbench says that Android Q comes pre-installed on it, which suggest that this could be an early build of the Google Pixel 4 (though that’s not our only guess, we’ll talk more in a second), as the device itself is not expected to arrive until Q4 this year.
This test device also sports 6GB of RAM, and Geekbench also revealed its single and multi-core benchmarking scores. The device managed to score 3,296 points in the single-core, and 9,235 points in the multi-core test on Geekbench. These scores are about 10-percent better than the scores Snapdragon 855 managed to achieve on Android 9 Pie-powered devices, which is always good to see.
In the first paragraph, we said that this could be the Pixel 4, which is true, but it could also be a new Chromebook that Google is working on, which is, interestingly enough, fueled by the Snapdragon 855. Why is that? Well, the device appears on Geekbench a ton of times, way over a hundred, in fact. On top of that, this is not the first time we’ve seen the “Google coral” device on Geekbench, as Google seems to be using this name for testing upcoming devices, that very same codename surfaced on Geekbench a ton of times in 2018.
Hold your smartphone-loving horses
The Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL were both announced in October last year, same goes for the Pixel 2 and 2 XL a year before that, so pretty much everyone is expecting the Pixel 4 and 4 XL to arrive in that timeframe as well, September or October.
It is way too early for legit Pixel 4 and 4 XL leaks, so we did not really hear much about these two devices, but considering SoCs that Google used in previous models, it’s safe to say that the Snapdragon 855 will, indeed, fuel the Pixel 4 and 4 XL, as Google always uses Qualcomm’s most powerful processor that is available.
The Google Pixel 4 and 4 XL are expected to be considerable improvements over their predecessors in the design department, especially considering the Pixel 3 XL’s design, as that was one of the ugliest phones in 2018. Google is also expected to up the specs in these two phones, RAM comes to mind first, as the Pixel 3 and 3 XL had some issues with keeping apps in memory, partially due to their resource-heavy camera… so, the company is expected to include at least 6GB of RAM in the next-gen Pixel devices.
One of the most interesting, if not the most interesting one, aspects of the Pixel line is the camera. All the Pixel-branded phones thus far had great cameras, and people have really high expectations in that regard, for a reason. It will be interesting to see if Google will stick with a single sensor on the back with the Pixel 4 and 4 XL, or will the company adopt two or maybe three cameras on the back. A single camera worked really well for the company thus far, as Google’s software processing was on point, but it remains to be seen what will happen with the Pixel 4 and 4 XL, as other OEMs have adopted many more cameras in 2018, and by the looks of it, those numbers will only increase in 2019.