Qualcomm broadcasts Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2: premium phase SoC will get a Cortex-X CPU core

After a 2021/2022 product cycle a bit of extra iAttention-grabbing Than maybe Qualcomm would have appreciated, 2023 has been a a lot simpler 12 months for the prolific SoC and mobile modem vendor. After releasing the primary member of the Gen 2 household earlier this 12 months with the flagship-class Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, the corporate is making ready to maneuver to the subsequent part of its product stack with the Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 Qualcomm’s conventional $400 to $600 “premium” market phase, which focuses on flagship options with extra modest efficiency and value, for Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2, Qualcomm goals to offer a dramatic efficiency enhance to the platform .

Positioned because the successor to final 12 months’s Snapdragon 7 Gen 1, this 12 months’s iteration of the Snapdragon 7 is, basically, extra targeted on boosting efficiency than including options. Whereas the Gen 1 portion of final 12 months added mmWave assist and new CPU and GPU architectures, particularly ARMv9 structure CPU cores, there are just a few new options this 12 months. Rather than that, nonetheless, is what Qualcomm is touting as one of many largest efficiency enhancements ever for the Snapdragon 7 household. This was made attainable largely by a much-welcomed swap from the beleaguered 4nm means of Samsung to TSMC’s 4nm course of, mirroring the swap Qualcomm made final 12 months for the well-received Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 mid-cycle portion.

Additionally new this 12 months, Qualcomm is hinting that this would possibly not be the one Snapdragon 7 Gen 2 half we’ll see this 12 months, confronted with the choice to launch their first Gen 2 half as 7+ as an alternative of seven. In merely put, launching as a Snapdragon 7+ half leaves room for Qualcomm to launch a vanilla Snapdragon 7 half later. Admittedly, Qualcomm is not explicitly asserting any such half now, however there’s little purpose to launch a 7+ first except they’ve one thing beneath it deliberate; in any other case they may have launched it as a 7 half just like the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1, which was at all times a one-chip stack.

Qualcomm Snapdragon class 7 SoC
SoC	Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 (SM7475-AB)	Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 (SM7450-AB)
processor	1x Cortex-X2 at 2.91GHz 3x Cortex-A710 at 2.49GHz 4x Cortex-A510 at 1.8GHz	1x Cortex-A710 at 2.4GHz 3x Cortex-A710 at 2.36GHz 4x Cortex-A510 at 1.8GHz
GPUs	adreno	adreno
DSP/NPU	hexagon	hexagon
Reminiscence Ticket inspector	2 16-bit channels at 3200MHz LPDDR5 / 25.6GB/sec	2 16-bit channels at 3200MHz LPDDR5 / 25.6GB/sec
ISP/digicam	Triple ISP 18-bit spectra 1x 200MP or 108MP with ZSL OR 64+36MP with ZSL OR 3x 32MP with ZSL 4K HDR video and 64MP burst seize	Triple ISP 14-bit spectra 1x 200MP or 84MP with ZSL OR 64+20MP with ZSL OR 3x 25MP with ZSL 4K HDR video and 64MP burst seize
Encode/ Decode	4K60 H.265 10-bit DolbyVision, HDR10+, HDR10, HLG 1080p240 gradual movement recording	4K30 H.265 10-bit DolbyVision, HDR10+, HDR10, HLG 720p480 gradual movement recording
built-in modem	X62 built-in (5G NR Sub-6 + mmWave) DL = 4400Mbps Twin SIM energetic 5G/4G (DSDA)	X62 built-in (5G NR Sub-6 + mmWave) DL = 4400Mbps
mfc. Processes	TSMC 4nm	Samsung 4nm

When it comes to CPU group, Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 maintains the identical 1+3+4 CPU core configuration that we have now seen in the previous few generations of the Snapdragon 7 household. The massive information right here is that the best performing Prime core is leading to a major efficiency enchancment, as Qualcomm switches from utilizing a barely greater clocked mid-core to utilizing the next performing CPU structure.

So, for the primary time ever for a Snapdragon 7 half, Qualcomm is leveraging one among Arm’s Cortex-X cores for the Prime core. The Cortex-X2 used right here is technically Arm’s earlier technology design, so it will not trample on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 and its Cortex-X3 core. However in comparison with the A710 core used for the 7 Gen 1 Prime core (and seven+ Gen 2 mid-cores), the Cortex-X2 represents a major enchancment in each IPC and clock pace. In consequence, the height clock pace for the Prime core jumped from 2.4GHz to 2.91GHz, which additional provides to the IPC good points of the extra complicated core.

All informed, Qualcomm is touting “as much as” 50% CPU efficiency enchancment for 7+ Gen 2 in comparison with 7 Gen 1; just about all of this comes from the brand new Prime core.

The tradeoff is that such a big efficiency enhance is just actually accessible for single-threaded workloads, since there’s just one Cortex-X2 core. The three mid-range (efficiency) cores are as soon as once more primarily based on Cortex-A710 and are clocked 2% greater than earlier than. Thus, the 7+ Gen 1 will not see enormous good points on closely multithreaded workloads. The improved power effectivity of TSMC’s 4nm course of ought to repay, however a few of these good points have been invested in making that power-hungry Cortex-X2 viable from a battery life perspective.

In the meantime, the 7+ Gen 2 additionally incorporates a quicker Adreno GPU. As has been the case with Qualcomm’s built-in GPUs for a few generations now, the corporate would not assign them a product quantity, not to mention reveal important architectural particulars, so there is a restricted quantity of element we are able to share. Based mostly on the function abstract, it would not seem like utilizing the brand new GPU structure of the 8 Gen 2; so it will seem that Qualcomm included a bigger model of their current GPU and nearly actually gave it a wholesome clock pace enhance.

In any case, the GPU efficiency expectations for the brand new SoC are important: Qualcomm boasts an enormous 2x efficiency enchancment over 7 Gen 1, a platform that delivered solely 20% greater than its predecessor. Whereas these aren’t flagship SoCs, Qualcomm nonetheless likes to place the Snapdragon 7 sequence as an excellent match for gaming smartphones, particularly in China, so it is not too stunning to see Qualcomm investing a lot in GPU efficiency.

All in all, Qualcomm is touting a 13% enchancment in energy effectivity over the 7 Gen 1, at the least on an “prolonged each day use” foundation. The transfer to TSMC’s 4nm course of ought to yield important dividends as evidenced by final 12 months’s 8+ Gen 1 half, however on the identical time it is clear that Qualcomm has invested an excellent portion of those good points into enhancing general efficiency.

Feeding the dragon is a 32-bit (twin 16-bit) LPDDR5 reminiscence controller. In contrast to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, the 7+ Gen 2 doesn’t assist quicker LPDDR5X reminiscence, which implies that the established order reigns for the Snapdragon 7 household. On this case, meaning assist for reminiscence speeds as much as LPDDR5- 6400, which reaches 25.6GB/second of reminiscence bandwidth. In distinction to the numerous will increase in CPU and GPU efficiency, there shall be way more stress on Qualcomm’s cache and reminiscence subsystem to maintain varied processing blocks powered.

By the best way, it is not simply CPU and GPU blocks which have seen a efficiency enhance. Qualcomm’s Hexagon DSP/AI engine block additionally obtained a major efficiency enhance, rivaling the 2x GPU enhance. Qualcomm was gentle on the technical particulars right here, nonetheless no options like INT4 or micro-tiling had been talked about in our briefing – two principal options of the next-gen Hexagon block on the eighth Gen 2 – so it appears seemingly that this can be a closely upgraded model of the Hexagon block used on the earlier 7 Gen 1.

One piece of Snapdragon 8 expertise that is making its manner as much as the Snapdragon 7, nonetheless, is its 18-bit Spectra triple ISP. Changing the 14-bit unit present in earlier generations of the platform, the 18-bit unit on the 7+ Gen 2 will deliver assist for triple publicity computational HDR video seize, in addition to improved low-light images, which Qualcomm calls Mega Low Light-weight function. The top result’s that the 7+ Gen 2 can seize at greater resolutions when utilizing the zero shutter lag function, and mixed with the up to date GPU, can now file 4K video at as much as 60fps, doubling the 7 Gen 1’s 4K30 restrict. .

Lastly, rounding out the package deal is a reprise of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X62 built-in modem. Like final 12 months’s SoC, this can be a mmWave + Sub-6 Launch 16 design that may hit a theoretical most obtain pace of 4.4Gbps. Nonetheless, this 12 months’s design incorporates a twist: twin energetic twin SIM (DSDA) assist, which is one other first for the Snapdragon 7 platform. Each energetic radios on the 7+ Gen 2 assist 5G and 4G communications, permitting twin SIM customers to make use of basically any community they want on each radios. That is one other premium function, which was restricted to Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 platform till now.

For non-cellular connectivity, the 7+ Gen 2 makes use of a FastConnect 6900 radio system. It is a comparatively modest improve over the earlier 6700 radio, bringing Bluetooth assist to protocol model 5.3 and rising the bandwidth of peak Wi-Fi 6E radio streaming 2×2 at 3.6 Gbps with dual-band concurrent assist (DBS) .

In conclusion, the Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 will arrive in the marketplace in a short time. In line with Qualcomm, telephones utilizing the SoC shall be accessible later this month, with Redmi and Realme among the many OEMs planning to launch telephones primarily based on the brand new chip.