Snapdragon 8cx: 7nm PC platform

We are engaged in the creation of innovative technologies that completely change the way people in the world use various devices for computing and communicating with each other or with the Internet. Now we apply this knowledge in the field of PC. Our goal is to solve the problems that laptop users have been facing for years, including the short battery life, slow system loading, and the lack of a fast, secure network connection. In fact, we strive to make our PCs look more like our smartphones.

At the moment, we are developing a new category of Always On, Always Connected for laptops, to give users exactly the functions that they value most on their smartphones: instant power on, permanent Internet connection and high LTE network speeds, long battery life, device location, slim chassis and quiet and efficient cooling. And then we combine these features with high-performance Windows 10 PCs.

In just six months, five devices based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon platform entered the market. On the last day of our Snapdragon Tech Summit in Hawaii, we announced the release of the third Snapdragon platform, Snapdragon 8cx. It will be the first specialized laptop platform built using a 7-nanometer process.

As Miguel Nunes, director of product management at Qualcomm Technologies, noted, the Snapdragon 8cx will be the most powerful Snapdragon platform we've created. It was developed specifically for laptops and is able to provide maximum performance and long battery life. We continue to push the boundaries of what is possible for personal computers so that you can enjoy the useful functions that you are used to using your smartphones.


The first platform based on a 7-nanometer process

High performance and long battery life

The PC industry for a long time tried to achieve maximum performance, but this often negatively affected the battery life of the devices. In addition, the maximum peak performance does not always guarantee the convenience and comfort for the user in everyday use of a PC. Therefore, Snapdragon 8cx maintains a balance between high performance and long battery life on a single battery charge.

High performance is achieved through the use of a powerful graphics processor, Qualcomm Adreno 680. Adreno 680 is 2 times faster than the previous generation of our GPUs and 60% faster than the processor in the Snapdragon 850 mobile platform. The graphics with it are really impressive, because we used 2 times more transistors , 2 times increased memory bandwidth and added support for the latest APIs for DX12. Working in tandem, all these components provide the laptop with maximum performance, but do not affect the battery life too much (more on this below).

And innovative changes in the architecture of the platform do not end there. The Qualcomm Kryo 495 8cx CPU has become our most efficient Kryo processor. Kryo 495 is an 8-core central processor with an increased system cache, as well as a second and third level cache, which allows the system to easily and effortlessly cope with switching between a large number of tasks.

How does the Kryo 495 compare to its competitors? In its maximum performance, the Snapdragon 8cx with the Kryo 495 is no different from modern 15-W solutions from other manufacturers, but it does not require active cooling, it weighs less and fits easily into the thin cases of modern laptops. But if we compare its performance with platforms that are made in a similar form factor (7W TDP), then the performance of the Snapdragon 8cx is twice as high as the competitors' solutions, and the power consumption is much lower.

High performance applies not only to numbers, but also to your own productivity when working with a PC and the ease with which it can cope with modern entertainment. Support for second-generation USB 3.1 and third-generation PCI-E buses allow any peripheral devices and high-speed external drives to be connected to the laptop. We also did not forget about the image and sound quality, which is why Snapdragon 8cx supports up to two displays with HDR 4K resolution and work with sound in Hi-Fi quality. Thanks to Qualcomm Aqstic and Qualcomm aptX audio codecs, modern Snapdragon 8cx-based laptops are capable of transmitting HD-quality sound to external speakers or connected headphones, including when connected wirelessly.

In idle mode and when working with demanding applications, the Snapdragon 8cx consumes energy very economically, so a single battery charge can easily last for several days. And when it does end, support for Qualcomm Quick Charge 4+ technology will help you quickly charge your laptop and return to your favorite activity.

Incredible connectivity with multi-gigabit LTE networks

In addition to supporting industry-leading Wi-Fi and Bluetooth wireless solutions, our platform also uses the Snapdragon X24 integrated LTE modem, which supports LTE Category 20 speeds of up to 2 Gb / s.

Snapdragon 8cx also supports the MIMO 4X4 standard and aggregation of up to 7 carrier frequencies, which provides an increase in bandwidth of 70% at the cell border or in places with a weak signal or busy network compared to competing solutions. For users, these data transfer speeds mean that you can access your files from the cloud as fast as you can from local storage. And the Snapdragon X24 modem allows you to achieve gigabyte speeds when working with 90% of global mobile operators.


The most advanced and powerful Snapdragon platform

Ecosystem for laptops with a constant network connection and business opportunities

The Snapdragon platform already supports many popular applications for work and leisure, including Office 365 and games from Gameloft. In addition, the platform now has native browser support, including (for the first time) Mozilla Firefox. At the same time, Firefox is a native ARM64 application, therefore it is able to use all the advantages of our 8-core Kryo processor to achieve the maximum speed of opening and processing pages.

In addition, the Snapdragon platform now supports new business and enterprise opportunities with Windows 10 Enterprise and many other vendors, including Symantec, VmWare, and Cisco. During his presentation, Nunez invited Erin Chapple, Microsoft's corporate vice president, who talked about these features in more detail.

Modern laptops with a constant network connection have become part of the “new decade of wireless technology”, which covers the establishment of the 5G standard, the development of cloud computing, new smartphones, the advent of the Internet of things, and many other discoveries. In the future, Qualcomm Technologies will continue to develop the PC segment and 5G technologies. We believe that the commercial introduction of 5G networks, the Snapdragon 855 platform and the Snapdragon 8cx will help our customers create new products in a wide variety of industries.