The Snapdragon 850 has been announced for future notebooks, termed as Always Connected PCs, but will this end up discouraging manufacturers from using the Snapdragon 845?
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 850 will pave the way for notebooks getting a significant performance boost over devices powered by the Snapdragon 835. However, just a while back, we reported that Qualcomm, Windows, and OEMs had partnered together to bring forth notebooks, 2-in-1s and hybrid powered by the Snapdragon 845 and they will be able to display up to 50 percent performance increase from these machines. With the latest unveiling, has Qualcomm pretty much shot itself in the foot as it may lead to fewer sales of its latest and greatest chipset? We think not and we might have a feeling why.
Here is why we think so; after Qualcomm released details of its second-gen 10nm FinFET Snapdragon 850, we took a closer look at what performance benefits would it be able to throw in our direction. Turns out that the Snapdragon 850 uses the same octa-core configuration as the Snapdragon 845, utilizing the Kryo 385 Gold and Kryo 380 Silver cores for performance and efficiency.
Related Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 Official: Same 2nd-Gen 10nm FinFET Process, Higher Kryo 385 Clock Speeds and Dedicated for Always Connected PCs
The difference here is that the clock speeds that the alleged Snapdragon 845 was running in the Geekbench benchmark were 2.96GHz. The Snapdragon 850’s Kryo 385 Gold (also known as the performance cores) cores, as detailed by Qualcomm, are running at 2.95GHz, slightly higher than the same cores running in the Snapdragon 845 (default clock speed of 2.80GHz). Even if you take a look at the benchmark right now, nowhere it is reported that the board belongs to the Snapdragon 845.
This will indicate that the notebook sample being benchmarked was running a Snapdragon 850. Another conclusion we can draw from this is that the Snapdragon 845 is not going to be found in notebooks while fueling smartphones as originally intended. We are aware that our statements could be wrong, but cross-checking the information from the benchmark and the details that Qualcomm brought forward have very little difference and they all point towards the clock speed of the Snapdragon 850’s processor, which are similar if not for that 0.01GHz speed difference.
In short, the Snapdragon 850 is what will be seen in notebooks and its modified mobile computing machines and perhaps next year, when the Snapdragon 855 is readily found in smartphones, an improved successor to the Snapdragon 850 will be seen in action too.
Do you believe the Snapdragon 845 reportedly benchmarked could have been Qualcomm’s latest SoC all along? Tell us down in the comments.
