Jon Peddie, President, Jon Peddie Research
8/12/2015 10:30 PM EDT
The specs on Qualcomm's comeback chip look good to a veteran analyst who is particularly impressed by its graphics and imaging improvements.
The long rumored and awaited successor to the maligned Snapdragon 810, the Snapdragon 820 is here, well, almost. The 820 is a totally new design, with a new GPU, the Adreno 520, as well as an enhanced DSP, and more of them, and two Spectra 14-bit ISPs.
Qualcomm says the image processing capabilities will provide DSLR-like quality photography, and be able to handle up to one 25-megapixel, or two 12-Mpixel sensors that could be used for depth sensing cameras.
The ISPs also offer a hybrid autofocus capability and multi-sensor fusion algorithms that support next generation computational photography. Qualcomm has created a tight coupling between the sensor array and the ISP that can accept the raw Bayer signal from the sensor. They will disclose more on that at Hot Chips in a few weeks.