Qualcomm held the 2022 Snapdragon Summit in Hawaii this morning, at which it officially released its new flagship product, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor, which has been improved in all aspects compared with the first generation.
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The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 model number is SM8550-AB and is manufactured using a 4nm process, here are some more details about the chip:
CPUs and GPUs
Although Qualcomm is currently focusing on improving energy efficiency, the new chip still brings a significant speed increase. Compared with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, the new processor brings up to 35% CPU performance improvement and 40% energy efficiency.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 has the same clock speed as the 8+ Gen 1, but the core composition is different. The new processor adopts a new 1+2+2+3 architecture with a super-large Kryo Prime core (based on Cortex-X3) running at 3.2GHz to provide high single-thread performance.
There are also four performance cores running at 2.8GHz for better handling of multi-threaded workloads. Finally, there are three efficiency cores clocked at 2.0GHz.
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 brings support for new, faster memory technology. The memory now supports LP-DDR5X with frequencies up to 4,200MHz (up from LP-DDR5’s 3,200MHz), and the storage supports the new UFS 4.0.
The Adreno GPU on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 has a 25% performance increase and a 45% power efficiency increase. It also brings support for hardware-accelerated ray tracing to the Snapdragon platform. Additionally, this GPU is the first to support Vulkan 1.3 (and OpenGL ES 3.2).
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 supports QHD+ resolution displays up to 144Hz refresh rate, or 4K displays at 60Hz, and also supports external displays up to 4K, 60Hz (with 10-bit Rec.2020 color gamut, HDR10+, and Dolby Vision capabilities ). AV1 video decoding is also supported, supporting data streams up to 8K, and 60fps (including HDR).
Camera
Qualcomm claims that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 has optimized the Sony sensor that supports Digital Overla HDR (DOL-HDR) and Samsung’s 200-megapixel HP3 sensor to work with the Snapdragon ISP. Like the previous generation, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is equipped with an 18-bit triple ISP, which can process data from three 36-megapixel cameras (30fps) at the same time. The pixel support for a single camera can reach up to 200MP, and the shutter lag is zero. 108-megapixel sensor.
For video, the chipset can shoot 8K HDR footage at 30fps (and capture 64-megapixel photos at the same time), 4K footage at 120fps, and also supports slow-motion video (720p at 960fps). Multiple HDR formats are supported, including HDR10+, HLG, and Dolby Vision.
Network
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is upgraded to the new Snapdragon X70 modem, which supports both mmWave and sub 6GHz 5G networks. Its peak downstream speed is 10Gbps, and its peak upstream speed is 3.5Gbps (similar to its predecessor).
The modem supports Dual SIM, Dual Active (DSDA) operation, where two 5G SIMs (or 5G+4G) can be active simultaneously.
Thanks to the new FastConnect 7800 system, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 supports the Wi-Fi 7 standard (802.11be) with a maximum speed of 5.8Gbps (up from the previous 3.6Gbps). In addition to speed, the new standard also reduces latency.
As before, the FastConnect system supports Bluetooth 5.3, through the latest Snapdragon sound system, which can provide 48kHz lossless music streaming, and the lowest ever 48ms latency. In terms of wired connections, the chip supports USB 3.1 and Quick Charge 5.
AI
The new Hexagon processors introduce support for the new INT4 format, the first of its kind on a Qualcomm mobile chip, delivering 60 percent better performance per watt than before.
The Hexagon is also faster overall, with 4.35 times the performance of the AI, which can improve photo quality by identifying which parts of an image are faces, hair, clothing, backgrounds, and more.
Moreover, Qualcomm said that Samsung, ASUS ROG, Honor, iQOO, Motorola, OnePlus, OPPO, Sharp, Sony, Vivo, and Xiaomi are all mobile phones equipped with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor will be launched, and the first batch of mobile phones based on this processor will be launched before the end of this year, but Qualcomm did not say which one is the first.
