Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 Announced: All You Need to Know

The next flagship Snapdragon chipset is here and most Android hero smartphones will be featuring it next year. Xiaomi has already confirmed Snapdragon 845, the successor to the workhorse 835, for the Mi 7 and it is expected that Samsung, OnePlus, HTC, LG among others will launch their flagship smartphones with Snapdragon 845.

With the Snapdragon 835 powering Windows 10 PCs, Qualcomm is eyeing to develop Snapdragon 845 to a much better job in terms of augmented reality, virtual reality, imaging capabilities, machine learning, enhanced security and of course better power management and security. Qualcomm says "Snapdragon 845 is the gateway to a more immersive mobile world."

The Snapdragon 845 architecture includes Kyro 385 CPU, Spectra 280 ISP, Adreno 630 GPU, Aqstic Audio, Qualcomm Security Processing Unit, Hexagon 685 DSP, X20 LTE modem along with system memory.

Built on 10nm LPP FinFET process technology, the Kyro 385 CPU comes with four performance cores up to 2.8GHz (25 percent performance uplift compared to previous generation) and four efficiency cores up to 1.8GHz. This is aided with 2MB shared L3 cache and 3MB system cache.

"The Snapdragon 845 Mobile Platform is designed for consumers to capture cinema-grade videos and blur the lines between physical and virtual worlds," says Qualcomm.

The Qualcomm Spectra 280 ISP enables Ultra HD premium capture and offers Qualcomm Spectra Module Program, featuring Active Depth Sensing, MCTF video capture and multi-frame noise reduction. It supports 16MP recording at 60 fps along with slow motion video capture at 720p @480 fps.

The Adreno 630 Visual Processing Subsystem offers 30 percent improved graphics/video rendering and power reduction compared to previous generation

The Snapdragon 845 mobile platform is Gigabit ready and the X20 LTE modem supports up to 1.2 Gbps with dual SIM-Dual VoLTE (DSDV). There is QuickCharge 4+ along Bluetooth 5 enhancements for ultra-low power wireless ear bud support and direct audio broadcast to multiple devices.

(The author is attending the Snapdragon Summit in Maui, Hawaii on the invite of Qualcomm India.)