For those who want to change their mobile phones this year but have been waiting on the sidelines, we can finally say "it's been a long wait". Not only because mobile phone products can provide more comprehensive specifications, functions and experiences in the second half of the

For those friends who want to change their mobile phones this year but have been waiting and watching, we can finally say "the long wait" .

This is not only because mobile phone products can provide more comprehensive specifications, functions and experiences in the second half of the year, but also because a mobile platform that is good enough is about to appear in the mainstream market, involving all aspects of smartphone use. The platform refresh that the entire industry and consumers have been waiting for. This is the Snapdragon 8+ released by Qualcomm not long ago. Mass production machines will be released in July.

(Source: Qualcomm)

This weekend, Xiaomi disclosed the performance of Xiaomi 12S Ultra, which will be officially released on Monday night. This is also one of the world's first models of Snapdragon 8+. From big world mobile games that most test the upper limit of mobile phone performance and long-term stability, to benchmark projects that have always been the benchmark for performance, as well as power consumption performance that is difficult for high-performance chips to do well, all of them have achieved gratifying results. .

Will the Snapdragon 8+, which made the media shout "cold", be the spark that will make the mobile phone market hot in the second half of the year?

Replacing TSMC, the Snapdragon 8+ is really "cool"

Weibo blogger @天天oz罗世, who is good at mining the internal information of the device, shared his Xiaomi 12S Ultra performance experience.

, like many media outlets who have already obtained Xiaomi 12S Ultra, chose "Genshin Impact", which currently has the highest graphics performance requirements, as a test project. Turn on the performance mode of MIUI, and set the game to high quality and other options to the highest settings. Then conduct a half-hour Liyue Port map running test in an air-conditioned room at 25°C. The rendering resolution is confirmed by the naked eye. for 720P.

(Picture source: Weibo@天天泽罗世)

From the results, Xiaomi Mi 12S Ultra equipped with Snapdragon 8+ can be regarded as a stable player in "Genshin Impact": the average frame rate came to 57 frames, mainly The frame rate fluctuation range is between 50 frames and 60 frames. There is still some room for a complete straight line, but the fluctuation range is small and it can run stably for a long time. The fluctuation changes after half an hour of gaming are relatively small, which is difficult to see on previous flagship machines.

He also said that Xiaomi 12S Ultra's temperature sensitivity has dropped significantly. After half an hour of gaming, the highest temperature on the front is 43.6℃ and on the back is 40.4℃, so the long-term game holding experience is much better. The power consumption has also been reduced along with the temperature. The average power consumption of 5.5W is more than 1W lower than the previous Snapdragon 8 model, which means that the battery life performance of high-intensity games will also be improved.

The AnTuTu benchmark score of Xiaomi’s official Mi 12S Pro shows that it has reached 1.11 million points, which is also higher than the mainstream level of Snapdragon 8. Taken together, we can find that Snapdragon 8+ has made all-round progress compared to the previous one. In addition to reaching a higher level of extreme performance, it is also exciting in terms of stability, heat generation, power consumption and other aspects of long-term use, or It can become another mobile platform with excellent reputation and sales.

The Snapdragon 8+ mobile platform was officially released on May 20, 2022, continuing the 1*Cortex-X2 ultra-large core + 3* Cortex-A710 large core + 4* Cortex-A510 small core of the Snapdragon 8 released in December last year. The core CPU architecture has a frequency increase of about 10%, and the GPU is also Adreno 730. Remarkably, the overall power consumption of Snapdragon 8+ has been reduced by 15%, while CPU and GPU have each been reduced by 30%.

(Source: Qualcomm)

Based on discussions and research results from various aspects, in addition to long-term optimization and improvements made by chip and mobile phone manufacturers, the main source of significant changes in Snapdragon 8+ is changes in foundries and production processes. Switching from the original Samsung 4nm process to TSMC's 4nm process OEM production, it can benefit from TSMC's current advantages over Samsung's chip foundry, and has fully improved in terms of heat generation and power consumption.

To evaluate a chip, one must rely on the actual mobile phone products sold to consumers. As for the Xiaomi 12S series’ currently disclosed gaming, running scores, and battery life results, the Snapdragon 8+ clearly deserves more trust from people. Of course, this will It's not a short process. As Snapdragon 8+ phones from Xiaomi and other manufacturers are launched one after another, this "half-generation chip" will receive its true evaluation.

Qualcomm vs MediaTek , high-end mobile phone chips usher in a new pattern

Snapdragon 8+ is Qualcomm’s long-awaited counterattack. From chip manufacturers to mobile phone manufacturers, many parties are releasing the same signal to the outside world. In the past two years, the chip caused Market public opinion finally has a chance to resolve.

In the past two years, Qualcomm has successively launched two flagship mobile platforms, , Snapdragon 888 and Snapdragon 8, each with high-quality improvements in AI, imaging, connectivity, and security. However, the market reputation has never reached the level of previous products. The production process caused an unexpected experience gap in the mobile platforms at that time. High-end mobile phones became more likely to heat up and freeze than before, and consumers began to choose to wait and see .

(Source: Qualcomm)

For some time, some manufacturers began to use Snapdragon 870 to launch their main mid-to-high-end models. This is a modification of the Snapdragon 865 chip released at the end of 2019, because it has the Snapdragon in recent years. The Dragon flagship platform has the best energy consumption performance, so it has been recognized by online public opinion and actual sales. But it is impossible to use Snapdragon 870 all the time. Its peripheral specifications are already a bit outdated at the moment.

MediaTek, which has been dormant in the mid- to low-end market for a long time, has seized the opportunity of the relatively unstable Qualcomm platform. It is trying to use chips with similar specifications but superior production processes to gain more recognition from mobile phone manufacturers and consumers. The Dimensity 9000 chip produced using TSMC's 4nm process is the product of this period. The CPU architecture is highly similar to the Snapdragon 8, but the overall energy consumption performance has the upper hand.

To say that the biggest winner of mobile phone chips in 2022 is actually the Dimensity 8100 chip, which is defined as a light flagship by MediaTek. Although the CPU does not have a super core, it shows a more reliable balance of performance, experience, and price on mid-to-high-end mobile phones due to the energy consumption dividend of TSMC OEM. Among the best-selling products in the first half of this year, many new products are equipped with Dimensity 8100, and their reputation is equally good.

It can be seen that the Snapdragon 8+, which has obtained the corresponding bonus for OEM switching, has a high probability that it will reverse the previous difficulties encountered by the Snapdragon flagship platform and truly transform the peak performance improvement into a more comprehensive Experience progress . Another source said that Snapdragon 8+ will have a longer life cycle than the "+" suffixed products in previous years. New mobile phones will be launched until mid-2023, and they will be highly competitive.

(Source: MediaTek)

Faced with Qualcomm’s new move, MediaTek, which is trying to change the market structure of mid-to-high-end mobile chips and has received many positive reviews this year, has come up with its back-end Dimensity 9000+, which will be adopted in the next few months. New mobile phones with this overclocked version of the chip are on the market. According to the news from Weibo blogger Digital Chat Station, MediaTek will bring the Dimensity 8 series follow-up chip with very good parameters at the end of the year, which is expected to consolidate its market position .

Improvements in many aspects, new phones in the second half of the year are worth watching

Qualcomm and MediaTek have brought new chips in the second half of 2022, which has brought new questions to consumers: Are mobile phones equipped with new chips worth looking forward to? Can it meet people's needs for improved experience after switching?

Based on the various energy consumption performances currently released, new mobile phones equipped with Snapdragon 8+ and Dimensity 9000+ are worthy of attention. After solving the problem of energy consumption, those aspects that affect the actual experience are also solved - the phone does not heat up significantly, so it will not reduce the frequency. If it does not reduce the frequency, it can run stably for a long time without lag, and it can be used with lower power consumption. For longer, users can continue to take photos and play games online.

Some people will say that the performance of Snapdragon 865/Snapdragon 870 mobile phones is quite sufficient, and the performance improvement brought by the new architecture is not important, so there is no need to change the phone. This statement is quite reasonable, but it cannot negate the value of high performance: sufficient performance will be the cornerstone of a high-quality experience. No matter how excellent the energy consumption is, it will be difficult to develop the evolution of AI, imaging, etc. without performance support.

Therefore, for consumers who have actual needs to change their phones in the near future, or who want to experience the changes of new phones, the new chips have sufficient ability to cope with the demand. Next, let’s take a first look at several mobile phones that will be equipped with Snapdragon 8+ to understand their respective characteristics.

Xiaomi 12S/Xiaomi 12S Pro

At first glance, Xiaomi 12S and Xiaomi 12S Pro are just "core-replacement" versions of the Xiaomi 12 series released at the end of December last year, but they have been upgraded to Snapdragon 8+ and have a rear camera lens cover. Marked with the word "LEICA" representing the cooperation between and Leica . In fact, these two phones may be more like the ultimate versions of the Xiaomi Mi 12 series, with improved energy consumption from Snapdragon 8+ and more bright spots in images.

(Source: Xiaomi)

The main camera of Xiaomi 12S has changed from the IMX766 of Xiaomi 12 to the same 1/1.28-inch bottom IMX707 as Xiaomi 12S Pro. It is still a small-sized high-end machine with a 6.28-inch curved screen. Xiaomi Mi 12S Pro continues to have a 2K LTPO screen, 120W wired fast charging, and a three-camera combination. It is equipped with three "Classic Master Lens Pack" filters from Leica cameras, and the shooting experience will change a lot.

Xiaomi 12S Ultra

The "ultra-large cup" Xiaomi 12S Ultra has finally appeared, which can be said to be the highlight of the upcoming Xiaomi conference. Since Xiaomi 10 Ultra, products with the Ultra suffix have meant Xiaomi’s latest achievements in mobile phone imaging. In addition to the very conspicuous “sky is round and square” camera module on the plain leather back cover of Xiaomi 12S Ultra, the most interesting thing is the new model. Sensors in partnership with Leica.

(Source: Xiaomi)

Xiaomi 12S Ultra will be equipped with the 1-inch Sony IMX989 sensor for the first time . Even today, when computational photography has become the core technology for mobile phone manufacturers to promote the evolution of imaging experience, the sensor is still one of the most important original components, so this The oversized sole makes people look forward to the actual shooting performance. Leica once empowered and Huawei with attributes such as tone and tone, and now its cooperation with Xiaomi naturally makes people expect more achievements than before.

ASUS ROG Phone 6

The ROG series has always attracted considerable attention in the gaming phone market. ASUS has gained a lot of fans for its brand image and product definition style in gaming devices. The ROG Phone was "late" in adopting Snapdragon 8+ for half a year. 6 is certainly worth seeing. According to the exposure pictures, this product continues the design language of previous generations. The energy consumption performance combined with the long battery life and performance release brought by 6000mAh will be a major advantage.

(Source: 91mobiles)

realme GT2 Master Discovery Edition

Last year’s Realme GT Master Discovery Edition made many people’s eyes shine. This year’s follow-up products, while joining the first batch of Snapdragon 8+, have also been previewed many times. Heat continues the design and texture lines.

(Source: Weibo @XuqiChase)

Exposure news shows that the Realme GT2 Master Discovery Edition will adopt a straight screen + vertical frame + flat back cover design style, and will have a 5000mAh battery and 50MP triple cameras, in line with the straight The expectations of screen lovers.