With the biggest mobile event of the year, MWC 2022, underway in Barcelona, we have already seen new launches from Samsung, Realme, and many others. And now, one of the biggest mobile chipmakers Qualcomm has taken the wraps of its latest Snapdragon X70 5G modem at the trade show. This modem supports both sub-6GHz and mmWave frequencies, is the world’s first modem to include a 5G AI processor, and up to 10 Gbps 5G download speeds.
Qualcomm Snapdragon X70 5G Announced
The Snapdragon X70 5G modem arrives as a successor to the Snapdragon X65, which is found on the recently launched Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 flagship chipset. Qualcomm says that Snapdragon X70 5G is the “world’s only comprehensive 5G modem-RF system family capable of supporting every commercial 5G band from 600 MHz to 41 GHz.” This allows the phone makers to offer the desired 5G band coverage in partnership with telcos on their next-gen phones.
The highlight here is the presence of the Qualcomm 5G AI processor onboard, another world first for a modem-RF system. It enables the chipmaker to introduce advanced capabilities like the Qualcomm 5G AI Suite. It brings optimizations for “improved speeds, coverage, latency, mobility, link robustness, and power efficiency,” as per the press release.
The 5G AI suite is important for telcos, and you get features like AI-based channel-state feedback, mmWave beam management, AI-based network selection, and adaptive antenna tuning for higher speeds and improved coverage. Talking about the core specifications of the new Snapdragon X70 5G modem, you get 4x downlink carrier aggregation, uplink carrier aggregation, 5G Dual-SIM Dual-Active (DSDA), and standalone mmWave support.
Moreover, Snapdragon X70 5G has peak upload speeds of up to 3.5Gbps and download speeds of up to 10Gbps, much like its predecessor. This is the second modem-RF system from Qualcomm with Gigabit 5G support. That’s not all, though. The chipmaker also offers 60% more power efficiency with the Qualcomm 5G PowerSave Gen 3, coupled with a 4nm baseband process.
Though Qualcomm doesn’t explicitly mention it, we all know that Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 will have the new Snapdragon X70 5G modem-RF system onboard. The company says that we can expect commercial mobile devices with this modem to launch by late 2022. So stay tuned for more information and hope that 5G spectrum auctions and the commercial rollout happen in India by 15th August, as rumored.
