MediaTek firmly believes the demand for 5G smartphones will begin in earnest during 2020, particularly for less expensive models, and following the announcement of its flagship Dimensity 1000 5G processor for phones, it has now come along with the Dimensity 800, a midrange chip. Except, MediaTek needs a new dictionary because it’s not very midrange at all.
The Dimensity 800 is a competitor to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 700 series, says MediaTek; but it has blurred the line between its flagship, high-end Dimensity 1000 processor and the mid-range chip so much, it’s difficult to separate them.
“We believe the
High-end specs
The new octa-core system-on-a-chip uses four ARM Cortex A76 cores running at 2GHz, and four Cortex A55 cores running at the same speed and is the first to bring this setup to mainstream
“This usually only exists in chips like the Huawei Kirin 990 and the Snapdragon 800 Series,” Erwin Wang, MediaTek’s Product Marketing Manager continued. These processors are found in the high-end
“Mediatek brings this technology not just to the Dimensity 1000, but also the mid-tier 800. We don’t want to sacrifice the end user experience even though it’s not a flagship chip,” he said.
Despite being positioned against the 700 series, Mediatek says the Dimensity 800’s performance is greater than some Snapdragon 800 chips by about 15%. It has the same image signal processor and A.I. camera as the 1000 series chip, it supports features like
What else? It supports high-resolution screens with a 90Hz refresh rate, cameras with up to 64-megapixel sensors, and all the artificial intelligence features from the Dimensity 1000 chip too. These include A.I. autofocus, noise reduction, face detection, and multi-frame
See what we mean about not quite understanding the definition of midrange?
Mass market appeal, and price
The Dimensity 800 chip embodies MediaTek’s ‘New Premium’ approach to its products, which it defines as offering high-end features for a midrange price. But what does this really mean?
“We’re positioning this for midrange phones. It’s affordable,” Wendy Su reconfirmed. “Phones with the Dimensity 800 will be priced at a point that the mass market is willing to pay.”
Which is what, exactly? MediaTek has been working closely with its carrier and device manufacturer partners to ensure it comes in at the right price.
“Many people are waiting for a
Global launch
5G in China has only recently launched, but the competition there is very strong. While MediaTek’s chips will be used in
“You will see our mmWave
The Dimensity 800 system-on-a-chip and the phones it will go on to power, are designed for use in Asia, Europe, and North America, and the first Dimensity 800
“
This echoes the words of the company’s CEO Rick Tsai when he outlined the 2020 plan for the Dimensity series to Digital Trends recently. The Dimensity 800 is the second chip in the new Dimensity family, and there is still a third, more basic version to come. Based on the 800’s high specification, we doubt MediaTek will have checked the dictionary about what a low-end processor specification should be by then either.
Follow our live blog for more CES news and announcements.
Editors' Recommendations
- Here’s another big reason why T-Mobile 5G dominates AT&T and Verizon
- The iPhone 15 Pro’s rumored new design is one I can’t wait for
- T-Mobile is leaving AT&T and Verizon in the 5G dust
- The 5 worst iPads of all time
- 5 things the iPhone has to change in 2023 before I ditch Android
