[berklon]

Think RIM would have done better releasing an non LTE BB10 Phone today... and then releasing an LTE phone once they had the hardware they wanted.

This is what RIM would have done if they weren't so far behind on the software side. So instead they're making it sound like it's a hardware issue.

[Rickroller]

I think RIM is trying to limit the number of devices (finally) and hardware specs they have to make. This one qualcomm chip will go a LONG way towards that.

Agreed..however they've already said they're testing other non-LTE chipsets for non-LTE markets. And the fact they plan on a Europe release first means they won't be using the Qualcomm chipset in those phones (to my understanding anyways).

EDIT: From the original CB aritcle and the basis for my speculation:

Talking hardware for a moment, we're hearing that both TI OMAP5 and Qualcomm chipsets are being tested (1.5GHz dual core processors). If we look ahead by looking at BlackBerry history, it could be that Qualcomm is for the CDMA carriers

I'm not sure if the TI OMAP is able to be LTE and GSM or not (too lazy to look it up ), but IF they do end up using two different chipsets, I don't see it being too big a deal, as long as both perform well.

[Sith_Apprentice]

Ideally they could use the exact same chipset and use software to limit the bands. Heck, dont even really "need" to limit them. just let the carrier and the SIM take care of that. Unlocked phones would be usable on just about everyone then.

[i7guy]

While I know that LTE is the future and most everyone is putting out LTE phones... how many people today have access to LTE?? How many will have access even in the next year?

Think RIM would have done better releasing an non LTE BB10 Phone today... and then releasing an LTE phone once they had the hardware they wanted.

My area has LTE and I'm waiting for the phone.

[Blackberry_boffin]

The problem is that this will be out this month when the HTC Ville is released. Therefore RIM is late again, who know what phones will be using in October!!

HTC might be churning out high specced gadgets but their bottom line is not showing any benefits from it, even whilst riding the android wave. In fact it is shaky.
That tells us that is not only the right way of doing it.
Specs have their place but for BB10 they are not the only way.

[FlashFlare11]

Agreed..however they've already said they're testing other non-LTE chipsets for non-LTE markets. And the fact they plan on a Europe release first means they won't be using the Qualcomm chipset in those phones (to my understanding anyways).

EDIT: From the original CB aritcle and the basis for my speculation:



I'm not sure if the TI OMAP is able to be LTE and GSM or not (too lazy to look it up ), but IF they do end up using two different chipsets, I don't see it being too big a deal, as long as both perform well.

Yeah, I can't find any info on what bands are supported by the OMAP 5 chipsets. However, the Snapdragon S4 MSM8960 (which is the Qualcomm chip RIM is rumored to be testing) does support both LTE and 3G/4G/HSPA+ I suppose it's possible that the European markets will get the Qualcomm-embedded phones. But Kevin did say that RIM uses Qualcomm chipsets in their CDMA models (Verizon and Sprint), so it's hard to say what regions will be getting which models, since we don't know the capabilities of the OMAP 5 chipsets.

[glassofpinot]

....The MSM8960 contains a multi-mode modem, allowing it to support LTE data networks along with the usual EV-DO and HSPA 3G standards; opening up BlackBerry 10 phones to a whole array of markets.

This one commment in the post really catches my attention. "multi-mode modem". An end to the myriad of different (and confusing to the general market) Blackberry model numbers + much easier manufacturing-inventory planning.

[BBPandy]

The Radio is not intergrated in the OMAP5...that means you will need a 2nd chip for your radio stack

[VerryBestr]

Yeah, I can't find any info on what bands are supported by the OMAP 5 chipsets. ...

As bbpandy said, these chipsets do not support the telephone stuff. TI decided to completely drop the telephone (i.e. baseband) side of things, and concentrate on the processors. With any recent OMAP processor, is necessary to use another chip to handle the telephone part.

RIM could use the MSM8960. Or, RIM could use the OMAP 5 combined with a QualComm chip that contains the same baseband processor that will be integrated into the MSM8960. (I've read rumors that Apple will use the same QualComm baseband processor in its next phone ... well, there are always lots of rumors). There is a bit of an advantage in using the QualComm solution where everything is integrated on a single chip (for example, space on the IC board).

QualComm is not the only baseband processor that could be used with an OMAP chip, there are several. But the QualComm solution promises to handle just about every mobile wireless system out there, including special systems used only in China. Using QualComm's new baseband processor (whether stand-alone with OMAP or integrated in the MS8960) would be a great way for RIM to simplify phone development & production.

[lnichols]

Has RIM said they are using a Qualcomm S4 chip for sure or is this just an assumption by everyone? The OMAP 5 is coming out 2H 2012 and uses two A15 cores and two M4 cores for lower level tasks to save power. The OMAP 5 uses 60% less power than the OMAP 4 used in the Playbook. Both chips use 28nm manufacturing.

[undone]

While I know that LTE is the future and most everyone is putting out LTE phones... how many people today have access to LTE?? How many will have access even in the next year?

Think RIM would have done better releasing an non LTE BB10 Phone today... and then releasing an LTE phone once they had the hardware they wanted.

I think in the US market they received a lot of resistance from the Carriers with another RIM 3g device. And that is the market they are getting killed in for sure.

[FlashFlare11]

As bbpandy said, these chipsets do not support the telephone stuff. TI decided to completely drop the telephone (i.e. baseband) side of things, and concentrate on the processors. With any recent OMAP processor, is necessary to use another chip to handle the telephone part.

RIM could use the MSM8960. Or, RIM could use the OMAP 5 combined with a QualComm chip that contains the same baseband processor that will be integrated into the MSM8960. (I've read rumors that Apple will use the same QualComm baseband processor in its next phone ... well, there are always lots of rumors). There is a bit of an advantage in using the QualComm solution where everything is integrated on a single chip (for example, space on the IC board).

QualComm is not the only baseband processor that could be used with an OMAP chip, there are several. But the QualComm solution promises to handle just about every mobile wireless system out there, including special systems used only in China. Using QualComm's new baseband processor (whether stand-alone with OMAP or integrated in the MS8960) would be a great way for RIM to simplify phone development & production.

That's interesting. So, when RIM says it's experimenting with both OMAP 5 and Snapdragon chipsets, do they mean separately or together? If they combine the OMAP with the Snapdragon's baseband, they could release it in all markets as it would be capable of running on any network. Although, I would imagine that, for cost purposes, the Snapdragon chipset would be a bit cheaper (maybe)?

[mithrazor]

TI said at CES OMAP5 won't be shipping to us customers til early 2013. Also judging from the thinness of the phone from the leak. Pretty sure they're going to be going with Qualcomm.

Or I couldn't be completely wrong, and they can be going with OMAP5 and a different chip for the baseband. Which would be awesome cause OMAP5 is awesome!

[JAGWIRE]

GO BB10!!! it may not have as many cores as the other guys but it will still blow them out of the water!!!

oh ya and FYI...500th POST BOOYA CRACKBERRY ADDICT-HOOD!!!

[stevendsnyder]

While I know that LTE is the future and most everyone is putting out LTE phones... how many people today have access to LTE?? How many will have access even in the next year?

Think RIM would have done better releasing an non LTE BB10 Phone today... and then releasing an LTE phone once they had the hardware they wanted.

The problem is that the carriers do not want any phones that do not support LTE. Both AT&T and Verizon have told RIM support LTE or we don't want your handsets.

[Premium1]

Qualcomm MSM8960 Snapdragon S4 Blazes Through NenaMark2 Benchmarks; Could Mean Very Powerful BlackBerry 10 Phones

Wonder why this tidbit of info may be important? While at CES 2012, Qualcomm announced their Snapdragon S4 chipset, which showcased RIM�s logo on the backdrop for featured partner with the new MSM8960 chipset. Qualcomm wouldn�t tell us if RIM would be using the new chipset for tablets, smartphones, or both.

Either way, we can assume RIM will be using the Qualcomm MSM8960 in an upcoming BlackBerry device. Our guess, would be the highly awaited BlackBerry 10 phones. What kind of performance will this chipset offer? We get an early look thanks to some benchmarks of an MSM8960-powered device showing up on NenaMark.

Running NenaMark2, this MSM8960-based model gives a very impressive 54.90, blowing away nearly all of the competition.The benchmarks appear to come from a tablet running at a 1024�600 resolution. Most handsets it scores comparably to sport WVGA, meaning the MSM8960 outperformed them even when pushing more pixels.

BlackBerry 10 phones have been delayed to the end of 2012 as RIM allegedly waits for the new chipset from Qualcomm. We�ve already discussed how this might not really be a bad thing. The new benchmarks are only adding more icing to the cake. The MSM8960 contains a multi-mode modem, allowing it to support LTE data networks along with the usual EV-DO and HSPA 3G standards; opening up BlackBerry 10 phones to a whole array of markets.

Link to article: Qualcomm MSM8960 Snapdragon S4 Blazes Through NenaMark2 Benchmarks; Could Mean Very Powerful BlackBerry 10 Phones

The thing is this chip performs much better than current chips but samsung already has a new exynos and tegra has their tegra 3. By the time these phones come out near the end of 2012 it will just be another average chip compared to what else is out there.

[lengend]

Are you guys seriously worried about another 300mhz or something? You guys act like its the end of the world if RIM doesn't have a 1.5ghz dual core chip but instead opts for a 1.2ghz dual core for example.

[BitPusher2600]

Well said ^
I'd be content if, *gasp*, BB10 would run on my SINGLE core 9930.
QNX in and of itself has such a light footprint, I bet it would run fine. Ever use a Windows Phone? I have and those things rock & roll right along just fine on single core and i'm willing to bet BB10 would do the same, unless of course you need to have rendering intense 3D gameplay.

Then again, I forget that i'm not spec driven like so many others and can't roll with that crowd that demands bleeding edge or overkill hardware just to deem a device worthy of my holy blessing
I have to mention the utter hilarity; the posts we've seen from time to time where people say "I'm going to ditch BB" or "RIM will fail" if the BB10 phones don't have 4G, quad core, and can't alter the space-time continuum. Oh well.

[Foreverup]

Qualcomm chips complete first successful VoIP-over-LTE to WCDMA handoff -- Engadget

Another article for the 8960 chip pretty interesting

[phoreoneone]

Dual core right?

of course ... it has to be

it better not be single core unless thats all the power qnx needs but im pretty sure that i read somewhere that qnx needs dual core

[playbookster]

Well said ^
I'd be content if, *gasp*, BB10 would run on my SINGLE core 9930.
QNX in and of itself has such a light footprint, I bet it would run fine. Ever use a Windows Phone? I have and those things rock & roll right along just fine on single core and i'm willing to bet BB10 would do the same, unless of course you need to have rendering intense 3D gameplay.

Then again, I forget that i'm not spec driven like so many others and can't roll with that crowd that demands bleeding edge or overkill hardware just to deem a device worthy of my holy blessing
I have to mention the utter hilarity; the posts we've seen from time to time where people say "I'm going to ditch BB" or "RIM will fail" if the BB10 phones don't have 4G, quad core, and can't alter the space-time continuum. Oh well.

You may be content sure, but it would push even more people away and Blackberry would continue to have the perception that they are dated and behind the times.

[zipped]

Hey folks, just out of curiosity how does this S4 compare to the current BB7 processors, the 1.2 GHz MSM8255 Snapdragon?

Bitpusher mentioned QNX having a light footprint in regards to the software. Any chance the S2 has enough power vs the S4 to run BB10?

Understand the radio instruction sets etc, would be completely different.