Qualcomm Snapdragon 670 10nm SoC For Mid-Range Phone Leaks

Qualcomm is getting ready to introduce a new mid-range Snapdragon chipset for mobile devices, perhaps at Mobile World Congress (MWC) later this month. While the exact launch date is not clear, several detailed specifications have already leaked to the web, indicating that the Snapdragon 670 will be an octacore system-on-chip (SoC) built on a 10-nanometer manufacturing process.

According to a German-language website that posted the full spec sheet, the Snapdragon 670 (also known as the SDM670) is based on ARM's big.LITTLE architecture, though not like previous generation chipsets. Rather than split the number of high performance and low performance cores evenly, the Snapdragon 670 will have just two high-end custom Cortex A-75 cores used in the "big" cluster, and six power efficient custom Cortex A-55 cores in the "little" cluster.

The two high-end cores are referred to as Kryo 300 Gold and have a maximum clockspeed of 2.6GHz, whereas the power efficient cores are called Kryo 300 Silver and have a maximum clockspeed of 1.7GHz. As is typical of the big.LITTLE design, the lower power cores will be used most often to ensure longer battery life, with the performance cores kicking in as needed, such as when playing games.

Qualcomm's upcoming SoC will also feature three levels of cache, including 32KB of L1 cache and 128KB of L2 cache for each cluster, and 1,024KB of L3 cache for the full package. As for graphics, previous rumors pegged the Snapdragon 670 as using an Adreno 620 GPU. However, this information points to an Adreno 615 GPU, which will run at 430MHz to 650MHz, with a dynamic boost clock of 700MHz. It supports display resolutions up to 2560x1440.

The camera sensor configuration is a little more murky. However, reference designs for the corresponding software suggest that the image signaling processor in the Snapdragon 670 will support a dual-camera setup consisting of a 13-megapixel shooter and a 23-megapixel shooter.