Qualcomm may finally deliver a smartwatch processor that doesn’t suck

According to a report by WinFuture, Qualcomm is planning one other new chipset for Wear OS gadgets, though the present Wear 3100 has barely materialized in any gadgets. The upcoming silicon will function 64-bit assist, 12nm node, Cortex A53 CPU cores, and is alleged to go by one in every of two potential names: “Snapdragon Wear 429” or “Snapdragon Wear 2700”. In quick, it sounds prefer it would possibly truly deliver some respectable efficiency to the platform.

Qualcomm’s present Wear 3100, as compared, makes use of a 32-bit design with A7-based CPU cores and a bigger 28nm node. When Qualcomm revealed the 3100 final 12 months, it claimed the bigger node used was an intentional power-saving resolution, and that the chip would function extra effectively in a low-power state for longer durations. (In truth, it was even imagined to have a power-saving “sports mode” that by no means materialized.) Whatever Qualcomm’s inside logic was for going with the bigger node final 12 months, this rumor would point out that it has reversed course on that resolution.

WinFuture says that the present testing platforms (WTP2700 and WTP429W) are every paired with one gig of LPDDR3 RAM and 8GB of EMMC storage, and a additional “Track3” function, which is purported to be associated to a power-saving mechanism, can also be related to the {hardware} — probably tied to additional heterogeneous compute mechanisms that transfer sure duties to different lower-power chips/cores.

The “Wear 429” title, plus the opposite specs listed, implies this new chip may very well be a tweaked or stripped-down model of the Snapdragon 429 Mobile Platform, which has the identical node dimension, core designs, and has appeared in some current mid-range Android telephones and tablets. As a end result, it may assist clock speeds of as much as 2.0GHz, up considerably from 1.2GHz within the Wear 3100.

Most present Wear OS gadgets are operating the outdated Wear 2100 platform, and solely a handful with the brand new Wear 3100 have been launched. Given the Wear 429/Wear 2700 solely exists by way of this rumor, we’d have fairly a wait in retailer earlier than it arrives in any Wear OS gadgets — assuming Wear OS remains to be round.