Qualcomm’s first Nuvia-based chip isn’t expected to appear before 2024, but that doesn’t mean the company hasn’t been doing some extensive testing on the chip. The latest information from an unnamed source claims a number of positives for the mysterious SoC, while also noting that it will have a 12-core CPU architecture.
The 12-core CPU configuration will be divided into performance and power-efficient cores, but oddly enough, information claims Qualcomm is developing a “desktop” chip.
The first chip is based on the Nuvia Phoenix design, codenamed “Hamoa”. Qualcomm already makes SoCs like the Snapdragon 8cx 3rd generation for thin and light Windows laptops, so we’re not sure why Kuba Wojciechowski tweeted below that this chip is a desktop model. Perhaps Qualcomm’s first Nuvia chip could be used in both types of machines, similar to what Apple did with its M1, as it was incorporated first into the MacBook and then the iMac.
The chip, called ‘Hamoa,’ appears to have a similar memory and cache configuration to Apple’s M1 and support for a dedicated GPU. Assuming the first Nuvia chip family under the Snapdragon brand appears in notebooks, these portable computers may be able to connect to an external GPU chassis using the Thunderbolt interface, which Apple in its MacBook line which Apple no longer allows in its MacBook series.
Wojciechowski’s sources tell him that the performance of this Nuvia SoC is “very promising,” but don’t have some convincing numbers to prove it.
There’s a lot of information we can’t get right now. For example, which manufacturing process Qualcomm intends to use is a metric that will affect battery life and will continue to be a solid basis for customers to actually abandon plans to buy a tested x86-powered notebook and spend money on something else. Also, “extremely promising” are two subjective words that could mean progress in other areas entirely, especially how much of a performance improvement this Nuvia chip could be compared to Snapdragon 8cx 3rd generation or Apple’s M1?
There’s a lot of information we can’t get right now. For example, which manufacturing process Qualcomm intends to use is a metric that will affect battery life and will continue to be a solid basis for customers to actually abandon plans to buy a tested x86-powered notebook and spend money on something else. Also, “extremely promising” are two subjective words that could mean progress in other areas entirely, especially how much of a performance improvement this Nuvia chip could be compared to Snapdragon 8cx 3rd generation or Apple’s M1? We’ll get answers to all these questions and more in the coming months.
