When buying a mobile phone, things like price, camera and display are the most important things. But the best smartphone is nothing without its heart: the processor. A single chip powers everything in your smartphone!
MediaTek is the largest smartphone SoC provider. At least based on the number of units, MediaTek shipped more chips in 2020 than any other manufacturer. According to Strategy Analytics, even Qualcomm was outbid by 75 million SoCs in 2021. In terms of sales, however, Qualcomm was 43 percent ahead of MediaTek.
MediaTek divides its Helio SoCs into four categories, from which the manufacturers can then use.
However, the latest series of mobile processors from MediaTek is turning away from the “Helio” and is getting “all equipped with 5G and should make MediaTek competitive.” Dubbed the Dimensity chipset series.
According to the recent info, the MediaTek Dimensity 8000 and 8100 SoCs will soon be doing their job in the smartphone mid-range, while the Dimensity 1300 is intended for the budget segment.
With the Dimensity 9000, MediaTek can stand up to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, the new SoCs Dimensity 8000 and 8100 have products like the Snapdragon 780G in their sights. These are chipsets for upper mid-range smartphones. Both copies contain a processor with Cortex-A78 architecture, a 5G modem and were manufactured in the 5 nm process. The semiconductor company is particularly proud of its APU 580 AI chip, which is also integrated. The new Dimensity 1300 chipset is intended to provide 5G connectivity in the entry-level class.
In the recent past, the Taiwanese company has repeatedly proven that it can definitely keep up with top dogs like Qualcomm. In order to provide an alternative for mid-range mobile devices, the Dimensity 8000 and Dimensity 8100 have now been added to the portfolio. The specifications read properly. On the CPU side, four Cortex-A78 cores and four Cortex-A55 cores do their job. With the Dimensity 8000, the maximum clock rate of the performance cluster is 2.75 GHz, while with the Dimensity 8100 it is 2.85 GHz.
The graphics chip Mali-G610 MC6 is available in both platforms. However, the Dimensity 8100 benefits from a clock rate that is up to 20 percent higher. Artificial intelligence also calculates faster there. The AI chip APU 580 has been accelerated by 25 percent compared to that in the Dimensity 8000. Thanks to MiraVision 780, 168 Hz on Full HD+ displays are no problem for the new chipsets. On top of that, the Dimensity 8100 still handles 120 Hz at WQHD+. Other specifications include up to 4.7 Gbit/s download via 5G and the wireless standards Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3.
In addition to the two major innovations, the Dimensity 1300 SoC was a little lost in the press release. The company itself probably knows that there is not much to report about it.
Basically, this is almost a renamed Dimensity 1200. However, there is one small difference, namely a ten percent increase in AI performance. CPU (octa-core, up to 3 GHz clock), GPU (Mali-G77 MC9) and manufacturing process (6 nm) are identical. The same applies to the maximum 5G bandwidth of 4.7 Gbps.
MediaTek plays a very crucial role in the market that you as the end customer don’t even realize. In 2012, eight years after founding its mobile chip design division, MediaTek was receiving over 500 million SoC orders per year. This includes chips for feature phones and smartphones. However, the company not only provides the chips, but also detailed, accompanying assistance from its own engineers, which allows many smaller companies and newcomers to enter the smartphone market. In doing so, they broke the dominance of the large, often vertically integrated companies, which are also more deeply rooted in the entire telecommunications industry.
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