Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 4100 unveiled

Qualcomm has unveiled its latest System-on-Chip for wearable devices, the Snapdragon Wear 4100 platform.

The Snapdragon Wear 4100 platform is built on the 12nm manufacturing process and offer the following new features:

• Improved CPU, GPU, Memory, Cellular Modem, and Camera sub-systems with dual dedicated DSPs for modem/location and sensors/audio.
• An Always On (AON) ultra-low-power co-processor for several uses, including the display, sensors, maps, and time
• A stronger AON software interface to manage the SoC and the co-processor.

It also offers the following improvements over the previous generation:

• Super-Fast Performance and Connectivity: Comprised of quad-core A53 processors, a Qualcomm Adreno 504 GPU, LPDDR3 memory, and dual ISPs, it can deliver more than 85% better performance compared to the Snapdragon 3100 platform.
• The 4G LTE mode has been improved with a dedicated DSP and includes several low power features such as eDRX, platform-level power management, support for Cat 4/3/1, and single/dual antennas.
• Smarter Always-On Co-Processor: Qualcomm has partitioned memory and performance to allow 64K colors and extend offload experiences to include continuous heart rate monitoring and sleep, faster tilt-to-wake responsiveness, step counting, alarms, timers, and haptics.
• Ultra-Low Power Platform: The platform supports dual DSPs, support for dynamic clock and voltage scaling, Qualcomm Sensor Assisted Positioning, low power location tracking support, and an enhanced Bluetooth 5.0 architecture to provide 25% power reductions across key use cases.
• Richer, Enhanced Experiences: The hybrid platform provides better experiences across interactive, ambient, sports, and watch modes.
  • The interactive mode supports additional immersive experiences with camera, voice assistant, and voice/video messaging.
  • The ambient mode shows an increase in number of colors from 16 to 64K, providing better readability and more design options.
  • Maps are offloaded and enhanced the on-the-run experience in sports mode.
  • And lastly, the traditional watch mode’s features include heart rate, steps, alarms, reminders, and battery indicator with minimal impact on performance and battery life.

Two variants will be released, both of which support the Android Open Source Platform and the Wear OS by Google OS platform:

• The Snapdragon Wear 4100+ platform, which includes the main SoC, and the AON Co-Processor, along with the companion chips, including PMIC, RF for Modem/GPS & WiFi/BT, and RFFE.
• The Snapdragon Wear 4100 platform, which is comprised of the main SoC along with the companion chips.

Both chips are available starting today, with imoo and Mobvoi being the first smartwatch manufacturers to announce that their next-generation wearables will come with the new Snapdragon Wear 4100 platform.

Check out Qualcomm’s full post here.