Samsung Galaxy S7 Release Date & Specs Rumors: Korean Giant Picking Qualcomm Over Exynos Processor for Next Flagship?
While it has only been a few months since Samsung released their latest flagship, the Samsung Galaxy S6, the rumor mill has been buzzing about the next iteration - the Samsung Galaxy S7.
The Samsung Galaxy S6 launched only three months ago and opened to strong sales and good reception from the market, along with its more expensive, curved-display premium alternative, the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge. The possible upgrade on technology is likely not enough to justify a new flagship release so quickly since the S6 and S6 Edge are among the more powerful devices presently on the market.
The Galaxy S6 sported Samsung's own Exynos 7420 chipset, 3GB of RAM, a 5.1" screen, a 2550 mAh Li-Ion battery, Android Lollipop with its trademark TouchWiz UI and a 16MP camera - making it a very strong release. However, many were critical about the lack of expandable storage and a removable battery - features which many regard as a strong advantage many Android competitors have over Apple phones.
The S6 and the S6 Edge both used Samsung's own Exynos 7420 chipset. However, all other past iterations of the Galaxy S flagship series used the Qualcomm Snapdragon chipsets, which are commonplace in many high-end Android smartphones. But, according to Korean tech site ETNews, it's possible that Samsung will return to using Snapdragon's upcoming chipset for the Galaxy S7.
Many would find it odd that Samsung would trade its in-house chipset and use a competitor's instead, when their own chipset managed to adequately power their flagship line of phones. However, it is likely that this move was made with the announcement of the Snapdragon 820 earlier this year, the next in line to Qualcomm's most powerful line of chipsets after the problematic release of the Snapdragon 810.
Qualcomm promises that the Snapdragon 820 with a Kyro CPU will be able to intelligently read what a user is about to do. Perhaps, Samsung might have realized that their own technology is inadequate to properly advance their flagship line forward. A set of benchmarks from Geekbench revealed that the 820 should be a marked improvement from the 810, with its scores beating out the Exynos 7420 and its architecture somewhat ensuring that it will not overheat like the 810 did.
However, those hoping for a release of the Samsung Galaxy S7 may have to wait for a little while longer. According to Qualcomm, the chipset will be ready for sampling by manufacturers by the second half of 2015, so it is likely that the chipset will show up on our devices by 2016. Should the rumors be true that the Galaxy series will shift to the Snapdragon once again, then it likely will not come out until next year.
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