After a long wait, Qualcomm presented a few months ago its new range of PC processors with ARM architecturea highly anticipated lineup after months of rumors, leaks, comparisons and more. This new lineup is comprised of the Snapdragon X Elite and for him Snapdragon X Plus and is now available in a wide range of laptops starting at $1,000.
This represents a significant obstacle for many users who cannot afford to pay that much money for a laptop. Qualcomm became aware of this obstacle a few weeks ago, stating that they were working on a range of processors with this architecture that would have a price of $ 700 and that, obviously, will not offer the same power as those that can already be found on the market, but yes, they will support Microsoft’s Copilot +.
This means that the NPU that it will integrate will offer a minimum performance of 45 TOPS, the minimum requirement established by Microsoft for a PC to enter the category PC with AI. But, at no time was it announced what the expected launch date of this new range of equipment with ARM architecture would be, a date that the company finally revealed. It will be in 2025 when the ARM processors Qualcomm’s cheaper ones will hit the market, and they’ll do so in the form of a mini PC, not a laptop.
Mini PC with ARM architecture for 2025
This could mean a bucket of cold water for users waiting for laptop prices to drop with the new ARM processors since they won’t be able to take advantage of their main virtue: autonomy. It is clear that the only way to reduce the price is to eliminate everything that increases the price, the screen being the main culprit.
Qualcomm’s idea is not only designed to make its new line of processors reach a wider range of users, but it also aims to compete head-to-head with the Mac Mini Apple. If Qualcomm launches a $700 ARM-based mini PC, it could be halfway between the 256GB Mac Mini and the 512GB model, which are priced at $599 and $799, respectively.
In this way, it is very likely that in the coming months Qualcomm will partner with a well-known mini PC manufacturer or that we will see a large number of manufacturers start launching new models managed by a new variant of the Snapdragon X. Additional range.
This processor will be managed by 8 coresfor the 12 of the X Elite model or the 10 of the X Plus, which is above this new one. The clock speed would reach 3.4 GHZ, with a graphics card of 1.7 TFLOPS and, as we mentioned, it would have an NPU with a performance of 45 TOPS.
As for the memory, it would be of the same type that already integrates the Snapdragon X Elite and Plus processor range with a transfer speed of 8448 MB/s. Considering these features, there is not much difference with the only Snapdragon X Plus model that Qualcomm currently sells, except for the graphics power, where the difference is 2.1 TFLOPS in its favor.
