UNISOC Unveils T7520 SoC for 5G Smartphones: Octa-Core, 6nm EUV
UNISOC, formerly Spreadtrum Semiconductor, has announced its first mobile application processor with an integrated 5G modem. Dubbed the T7520, the SoC also happens to be one of the world's first chips to be made using TSMC's 6 nm process technology, which uses extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL) for several layers.
The UNISOC T7520 application processor packs four high-performance Arm Cortex-A76 cores, four energy-efficient Arm Cortex-A55 cores, as well as an Arm Mali-G57 GPU with a display engine that supports multiple screens with a 4K resolution and HDR10+. Furthermore, the SoC integrates a new NPU that is said to offer a 50% higher TOPS-per-Watt rate than the company's previous-generation NPU. In addition, the chip features a four-core ISP that supports up to 100 MP sensors and multi-camera processing capability. Finally, the AP also features the company's latest Secure Element processor that supports 'most of crypto algorithms' and can handle compute-intensive security scenarios, such as encrypted video calls.
Unisoc processors have been used in cheaper smartphones.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Thursday March 05 2020, @01:34AM (2 children)
5G is mainly in the RF chip, which isn't usually part of the SOC (mixing analog and digital on a single chip creates heartburn).
The analog chip will decode the 5G signal and feed digital data to the SOC. Likewise, the SOC will feed digital data to the analog chip.
Point is, the SOC doesn't know, nor care, if it's dealing with a 1200 baud modem, 4G, LTE, or 5G. The only difference is the data rate.
Disclaimer: I retired 10 years ago, wouldn't surprise me if things have changed since then. Back then you had a baseband chip (what's called a SOC today), an RF chip, and a Power Management IC (pmic). Stick a display, keypad, and battery to those 3 and you had a phone.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 4, Informative) by takyon on Thursday March 05 2020, @01:49AM (1 child)
From TFS:
There was some fuss about Qualcomm's Snapdragon 865 not integrating a 5G modem directly into the SoC:
Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 865 and 765(G): 5G For All in 2020, All The Details [anandtech.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by driverless on Thursday March 05 2020, @10:46AM
For people who have never heard of either UNISOC or Spreadtrum, which I assume is almost everyone, it's a Chinese fabless mobile phone chipset vendor.