There would be more and more 5G enabled smartphones at the sweet mid-range heading towards us. Qualcomm has unveiled the Snapdragon 690 5G mobile platform. It’s the first SoC in the series to boast 5G modem support. It would also be the go-to processor for serval mobile vendors to bring 5G smartphones at an affordable price tag.
The Snapdragon 690 comes with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X51 5G Modem-RF System, but it won’t support the mmWave 5G. Other than 5G, the chipset support 4K HDR video recording at 30 FPS, up to 192 MP photo capture and displays with up to 120 Hz refresh rate.
The new 6-series chipset is built on Samsung’s 8nm fabrication process and comes with upgraded Qualcomm Kryo 560 CPU and Qualcomm Adreno 619L GPU. Reportedly, it could offer up to 60 per cent graphics improvement from the predecessor (Snapdragon 675 CPU). It also packs 5th gen Qualcomm AI Engine and the Qualcomm Hexagon Tensor Accelerator offering speed and efficiency in AI tasks.
The Snapdragon X51 5G integrated modem in the chipset supports peak download speed of 2.5 Gbps and up to 660 Mbps on 5G network. If you’re using the same chipset in the 4G LTE network, then it could support a peak download speed of 1.2 Gbps and upload speed of up to 210 Mbps.
There is also support for Qualcomm FastConnect 6200 Mobile Connectivity Subsystem with highly integrated 2×2 mobile connectivity making the chipset Wi-Fi 6 read. Other specifications include support for Bluetooth 5.1, Qualcomm aptX Adaptive Audio and Indian GPS or NavIC support.
Smartphones with Snapdragon 690 5G mobile platform will be widely available in the second half of 2020. Major mobile vendors including Nokia, LG and Motorola are launching new smartphones with this chipset inside.