Snapdragon Wear 4100+ Economical SoC for more performance & nicer displays

Snapdragon Wear 4100+

With the two platforms Snapdragon Wear 4100 and Snapdragon Wear 4100+, Qualcomm updates the Socs for smartwatches. Both CPU and GPU are significantly more powerful, manufactured in more modern manufacturing structures and more economical. In addition, the Soc offers more in all areas and provides more beautiful always-on displays.

1 and 2 chip solution at 4100 and 4100+

The difference between the two platforms is that the Snapdragon Wear 4100+ combines a Soc with an Always-On (AON) co-processor according to the Big-Little principle, while the Snapdragon Wear 4100 uses only one Soc without an AON co-processor. In the Snapdragon Wear 4100+, Qualcomm relies on the Snapdragon M429w as a fast main processor and an improved Qualcomm C1110 as co-processor - the latter was also used in a less powerful variant in the Snapdragon Wear 3100. On the Snapdragon Wear 4100, however, only the Snapdragon M429w is installed in the smartwatch, so no power-saving Soc can take on background tasks if the full power is not required.

The changes are far-reaching

While Qualcomm still relied on the Msm8909w with four Cortex-A7 cores with 1.1 Ghz in 28 nm, the Snapdragon M429w uses four Cortex-A53 with 1.7 Ghz in 12 nm. The structure width was thus significantly reduced, which should benefit size and power consumption. In addition, the Adreno-304 GPU with 200 Mhz in Msm8909w was replaced by an Adreno 504 with 320 Mhz. The LPDDR3 now also clocks at 750 instead of 400 Mhz. The DSP was also divided into an independent audio DSP and modem DSP, while the Snapdragon Wear 3100 still had a DSP. The double-layered ISP for the camera now allows the use of sensors with 16 instead of 8 megapixels.

85% more CPU, 250% more GPU power, 25% less power consumption

The performance in the area of the CPU should increase with the new platform by 85 percent, the integrated memory should also act 85 percent faster and the new GPU even the 2.5-times performance.

Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 4100

Despite all these performance improvements, the battery life of the new platform is expected to improve by an average of 25 percent compared to its predecessor. When using GPS, the power consumption is 22 percent, when streaming music via LTE or Bluetooth 35 percent, when calling via Volte 29 percent, 37 percent less when using the voice assistant and 42 percent less when scrolling through notifications on the smartwatch.

Improved co-processor for nicer always-on displays

The improved co-processor in the form of the Qualcomm C1110 - Enhanced will, however, provide nicer always-on displays, since 64,000 colors can now be displayed instead of the previously only 16 (16 instead of 4 bits). At the same time, improvements have been made in continuous heart rate measurement, step counting and wake-up of the display when turning the wrist, the calculations of which are now being performed by the CO processor.

First smartwatches with SDW4100 in one month

The first smartwatches with the new Soc from the Snapdragon Wear 4100 series are scheduled to be available in 30 days. These will be Imoo Z6 Ultra for children, which uses the new camera functions of the platform for a front camera, and the Mobvoi Ticwatch Pro 3, which will be the first smartwatch with Google Wear OS and Snapdragon Wear 4100. Whether one of the models will make it to Germany is still uncertain. At least the predecessor model Mobvoi Ticwatch Pro (Test) made it to the German market.

When well-known manufacturers use the new platform in their smartwatches and make use of the new functions and possibilities is also still uncertain.