Qualcomm introduced two new mobile chipsets: Snapdragon 660 and 630 aimed at the mid-range mobile segment. And going by all the enhanced capabilities the two chips are touted to support features that so far were exclusive to high-end devices, are likely to become commonplace in the mid-range devices as well.
To get into the finer details, both the SD 660 and SD 630 are produced using 14nm FinFET fabrication process. And that makes the duos to be extremely frugal on the battery, besides reducing their physical size as well.
Both are also of 64-bit architecture, with SD 660 featuring eight Kyro 260 CPU cores clocked at 2.2GHz. The SD 630, on the other hand, comes with eight Cortex A53 cores having a clock speed of 2.2GHz.
Key features of Snapdragon 660 and 630
The mid-tier phone segment seems poised for a major enhancement in both their performance scope as well as feature set thanks to the two new Snapdragon chipsets. Mentioned below are features that could soon be commonplace on new mid-range devices of the not too distant future.
Better battery life with Quick Charge 4.0
Devices will last longer on a single charge now that both the new chips have been produced as per 14nM process. And once you run out of the juice, recharging will be a breeze given that the chips now support Quick Charge 4.0 fast charging technology. Qualcomm is claiming about five hours of battery life to be attained in just five mins of charging.
With the chips itself now having smaller dimensions, this again will let the manufacturers pack in bigger batteries if they want. Either way, battery life seems set for a major bump.
Dual camera setup
While there sure are a few devices in the mid-range segment featuring dual primary camera, those are more of an exception than the rule. The trend could well get reversed now that support for dual cams is baked right into the chip itself.
Machine Learning
This is something that requires copious amounts of processing power to deliver anything meaningful. And with the new SD 660 and SD 630 doing exactly that, machine learning bit would make it to the more budget devices as well. This again will open up newer opportunities in VR/AR based game development or in the field of home automation.
Vulkan API for smoother graphics
With both SD 660 and SD 630 including support for Vulkan API, even graphics rich games would be buttery smooth on the more affordable devices. In fact, this can open up a vast segment of the mobile users to top tier gaming that so far used to be a sole recluse of high-end handsets.
Bluetooth 5.0
The new SD 660 and SD 630 chips come with inherent support for the latest generation Bluetooth technology. So you will have your range extended by a factor of four while transmission speed too increases by twice over compared to Bluetooth 4.2. Audio capabilities over Bluetooth are also set for a boost now that the necessary aptX codex is hard coded in the chip itself.
