Qualcomm Atheros Demos 802.11ac on MSM8960

Among a bunch of interesting Krait features is a noteworthy change in connectivity that represents some of the first fruits of the Qualcomm Atheros acquisition. We touched on it in our architecture piece a while back, but that feature is inclusion of the WiFi and Bluetooth 4.0 basebands into Krait alongside the traditional combination of cellular and GPS baseband.

Just like cellular is implemented today, that design still requires external RF, but the result is a WLAN and Bluetooth baseband that get to take advantage of the SoC's 28nm process geometry. Today I caught a glimpse of both 802.11n single spatial stream, and more interestingly 802.11ac single spatial stream running on an MDP MSM8960 utilizing the on-SoC WiFi basebands and the corresponding WCN3860 external RF chip.

The demo itself was pretty self explanatory - Qualcomm was running an 802.11ac network with two MDP MSM8960s and seeing throughput of around 220-230 Mbps using their single spatial stream WCN3860 external RF. This was live on the crowded MWC show floor with other 5 GHz APs running nearby, and admittedly pretty brave to do considering other 802.11ac demos I saw at CES used wired links. The end result is pretty impressive, and it'll be interesting to see how many of OEMs choose to go this route for WiFi, Bluetooth and FM Rx/Tx (also inside WCN3860) as opposed to some of the more common discrete solutions. In addition Qualcomm had an 802.11n demo showing the same functionality.

The 802.11ac network is the middle, 80 MHz wide one in the middle, between channels 112 and 132

Just like I did at CES with Buffalo's AP demo, I also had the WiSpy DBx handy and captured another sample of the 80 MHz OFDM waveform, just to take another peak. 

Additional: Qualcomm Atheros

 

 

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Qualcomm and Ericsson Demonstrate SR-VCC Voice Handover from LTE to WCDMA on MSM8960

Until now, the way voice has worked on handsets with a 4G LTE air interface has been, well, interesting. That is to say, thus far all voice calls haven't been over 4G LTE but conventional circuit-switched (as opposed to packet-switched) 2G or 3G networks like CDMA2000 1x in 3GPP2 land, or WCDMA/GSM in 3GPP land. For example, on Verizon LTE the handset has a second radio always camping 1x for voice and SMS, and on AT&T LTE the handset falls back from LTE to WCDMA for the voice transaction. This is CSFB - Circuit-Switched FallBack. LTE deployments thus far have focused primarily on data connectivity for a variety of reasons, and further logistical hurdles like emergency call support has made VoLTE effectively only possible in 3GPP Release 9. 

Following their first quarter earnings announcement (and quiet period), Qualcomm is lifting the veil on news of a successful SR-VCC (Single Radio Voice Call Continuity) call which took place December 23, 2011 on an Ericsson test network using a Snapdragon S4 MSM8960 SoC. This marked the first successful trial of a VoLTE call which originated in the VoIP/IMS packet-switched domain handing over to WCDMA's circuit-switched domain. While this news is effectively a technology demonstration on a test network, this is just one more sign that the dual baseband cellular architecture (and associated power draws) we've talked about already is on its way out this upcoming year. With the appropriate software updates to radio access hardware, sufficient carrier testing, and the appropriate baseband support, it's looking like 2012 might be the year we finally get handsets with VoLTE enabled out of the box.

The Ericsson device and a demonstration network will be on display at MWC 2012, and we're looking forward to seeing VoLTE in action. 

Source: Qualcomm

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Snapdragon S4 “Krait” – MSM8960 GPU Benchmark Surfaces

A NenaMark 2 benchmark score for an unknown device based on Qualcomm’s upcoming 28nm Snapdragon S4 “Krait” MSM8960 SoC has just surfaced. The device seems to have 1.5Ghz CPU, a 1024x600 resolution display powered by an Adreno 225 GPU and running Android 4.0.3.

The Adreno 225 GPU scores 54.9 fps in the benchmark. To put things in perspective, a Galaxy S2, powered by the Mali-400 MP4 scores 46.2 fps. The important difference here is that the Galaxy S2 has an 800x480 resolution display, which makes the Adreno 225’s performance that much more impressive while powering a higher resolution display.

What remains to be seen is how the Adreno 225 stacks up against the current king-of-the-hill, the PowerVR SGX543MP2, the custom GeForce GPU in Tegra 3 and other upcoming GPUs such as the Mali T-604 and whatever Apple comes up with in its A6 chip. Given the raw performance offered by these next-gen GPUs, it won’t be long before we get console-quality gaming on our handheld devices.

Source: GSMArena via Nena

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