During a keynote speech ahead of the IFA Berlin conference, Qualcomm President and CEO Cristiano Amon officially announced the new 8-core Snapdragon X Plus.
While on stage Amon highlights Qualcomm's recent successes through its Snapdragon X-Series chipsets, pointing out "The entire world has taken notice of what we have done," and he's not wrong.
Instead of resting on its laurels, Qualcomm is further pushing the Snapdragon X lineup with these new chipsets ready to bring Qualcomm Snapdragon X Copilot+ AI PCs to even more hands thanks to a more economical $700-$900 price tag.
The new 8-core processors feature the same Qualcomm Oryon architecture as the higher-end Snapdragon X Plus and X Elite chipsets, which means users can expect the same performance quality and power efficiency as the other Copliot+ machines.
Amon reminisced about Qualcomm’s performance lead after the Snapdragon X at Computex and looked ahead to the Snapdragon X Elite’s performance compared to Intel’s newest Core Ultra 200V silicon, stating "We spent the night running some benchmarks and we are even more confident about X Elite."
Additionally, the new budget-friendly Snapdragon X Plus 8-core processors will have the same 45 TOPS Qualcomm Hexagon NPU as its pricier counterparts, which is a great achievement. Amon highlights Qualcomm's desire to bring its NPU-touting Snapdragon X chips into the hands of as many consumers as possible, asking "Can we bring AI at a more affordable price without sacrificing performance, without sacrificing battery life?" At the moment, it would seem so.
The Snapdragon X Plus 8-core chipset had leaked ahead of IFA courtesy of well-known industry leaker Evan Blass. And it seems those rumors were pretty bang-on.
Qualcomm is launching Snapdragon X Plus 8-core laptops from Acer, ASUS, Dell Technologies, HP, Lenovo, and Samsung. Some of those laptops are available for purchase today.
Qualcomm AI PCs are more accessible than ever
The 8-core Snapdragon X Plus chipset comes in two SKUs: the XIP-46-100 and XIP-42-100. This leaves Qualcomm with four different tiers of Snapdragon X Plus chips thanks to the XIP-66-100 and XIP-64-100 chips which launched earlier this year.
The XIP-46-100 features 8 CPU cores, a 30 MB total cache, a max multicore frequency of 3.4 GHz, a Boost frequency of 4.0GHz for single-core performance, an XI-45 Qualcomm Adreno GPU with 2.1 teraflops of power, and a 45 TOPS Qualcomm Hexagon NPU.
The XIP-42-100 features 8 CPU cores, a 30 MB total cache, a max multicore frequency of 3.2 GHz, a Boost frequency of 3.4 GHz for single-core performance, an XI-45 Qualcomm Adreno GPU with 1.7 teraflops of power, and a 45 TOPS Qualcomm Hexagon NPU.
Qualcomm is bringing the single-core boost to the 10-core Snapdragon X Plus chips, so the XIP-66-100 and XIP-64-100 chipsets will both have an optional 4.0 GHz single-core boost.
As was leaked just last week, the new Snapdragon X Plus chipsets offer support for up to 3 external 4K displays and access to all of the Copilot+ PC features.
"We’re proud to be working with leading global OEMs and retail partners to expand our portfolio and enable enterprise customers and consumers.”
Cristiano Amo, Qualcomm President/CEO
Thanks to the earlier chipset leak, we had expected the new Snapdragon X Plus systems to be about $800 or so, and given the range Qualcomm expects from OEM partners, that seems to be about the average price for one of the upcoming budget-friendly AI PCs.
While $700-900 can still be pricey for a laptop, even with the lower-end Snapdragon X Plus chipsets, these are premium-style laptops in the ultra-thin and light category. So it isn't too strange to see them retail for a bit of a premium price.
“With Snapdragon X Plus 8-core, we are now bringing to more users these transformative AI experiences and the best-in-class performance and unprecedented battery life of our power efficient custom Qualcomm Oryon CPU,"
Amon said in a statement given to Laptop Mag ahead of the press conference. "We’re proud to be working with leading global OEMs and retail partners to expand our portfolio and enable enterprise customers and consumers.”
Laptop Mag's IFA Berlin 2024 Issue celebrates one of the world's longest-running consumer tech expos, Germany's own Internationale FunkAusstellung Berlin.
Our on-the-ground team will bring you all the news emerging from the showroom floor of Messe Berlin and highlight the best in consumer tech as we announce our inaugural Laptop Laurel winners for best-in-show products.
Head over to Laptop Mag's IFA Berlin 2024 Issue for more coverage.
