Yeah the 7nm chips are in mass production at the moment. The new Snapdragon is probably going to launch in a month or two and hit the new Galaxy S phones first, then roll out to all other flagships.
Not sure about naming, since they just released the 850 (which is a higher power 845 for laptops). Their naming schemes have always been silly, so the next chip might be called something entirely different to differentiate it from the 850.
It will surely perform better and will be significantly more efficient than the 10nm chips. The 7nm process alone provides a huge 40% reduction of power usage at the same performance compared to the 10nm process used in the 845, not to mention significant size reduction and some performance improvement. That's a very large upgrade in terms of the manufacturing process, and that's a "free" improvement, as any architectural improvements that Qualcomm makes will go on top of those process node benefits.
I suspect we might be on 7nm derivatives for a while, while the next forecasted jump to 5nm in 2020/2021 is still a derivative of the current 7nm process and will only net less than half of the improvements the jump from 10nm to 7nm did anyway. Basically, 7nm is what 14nm was when it launched - a big deal that brings major improvements that we will be stuck on for a few years with more minor improvements until the next big deal comes several generations from now.
One of my major problems with the Pixels is that they release at the very end of the last gen cycles when a much better technology is right around the corner. Due to their timing and the hardware lifecycles, I think it's always going to be like that - something better right around the corner, since the phones loaded with new generation tech always launch at the beginning of the year. It's hard to convince me to get an outgoing model with tech that already isn't exciting anymore and for a large price premium when new models loaded with significantly cooler tech that I always look forward to are releasing in just a few months.
I think the main reason why I like the Galaxy S series is that they are always the first devices that come with the coolest new stuff, and pretty much all of it, yet they are still very polished and priced fairly reasonably considering how much it costs Samsung to secure all the new hardware first, pack it all into a single device and add all the extra features the industry cuts corners with (SD slots, headphone jacks etc.). I respect Samsung for that.
With the Galaxy S6, I had the very first device with the very first processor on the 14nm process, a first non eMMC storage (which was a big deal), a first 1440P OLED panel on a phone, VR and probably several other less important upgrades. It significantly outperformed all other phones for many months in pretty much all aspects, and being able to experience proper VR with it for so cheap before it became a big thing was awesome too. The fall phones don't really deliver that excitement anymore, as I'm already waiting for what everyone's been hyping up for the next year by then.
In the past, the tech being so much cheaper in the fall meant we saw the Nexus phones. For the OEMs, building a phone for an October-November launch is like shopping for components at Black Friday prices, due to the manufacturers trying to clear their stocks at the end of their life cycle. Thus the Nexus phones were still a big deal thanks to their value and new stock Android, and those always brought cool new things back in the days. The Pixels lost those benefits. Man, I really miss the Nexus phones and tablets.
Not sure about naming, since they just released the 850 (which is a higher power 845 for laptops). Their naming schemes have always been silly, so the next chip might be called something entirely different to differentiate it from the 850.
It will surely perform better and will be significantly more efficient than the 10nm chips. The 7nm process alone provides a huge 40% reduction of power usage at the same performance compared to the 10nm process used in the 845, not to mention significant size reduction and some performance improvement. That's a very large upgrade in terms of the manufacturing process, and that's a "free" improvement, as any architectural improvements that Qualcomm makes will go on top of those process node benefits.
I suspect we might be on 7nm derivatives for a while, while the next forecasted jump to 5nm in 2020/2021 is still a derivative of the current 7nm process and will only net less than half of the improvements the jump from 10nm to 7nm did anyway. Basically, 7nm is what 14nm was when it launched - a big deal that brings major improvements that we will be stuck on for a few years with more minor improvements until the next big deal comes several generations from now.
One of my major problems with the Pixels is that they release at the very end of the last gen cycles when a much better technology is right around the corner. Due to their timing and the hardware lifecycles, I think it's always going to be like that - something better right around the corner, since the phones loaded with new generation tech always launch at the beginning of the year. It's hard to convince me to get an outgoing model with tech that already isn't exciting anymore and for a large price premium when new models loaded with significantly cooler tech that I always look forward to are releasing in just a few months.
I think the main reason why I like the Galaxy S series is that they are always the first devices that come with the coolest new stuff, and pretty much all of it, yet they are still very polished and priced fairly reasonably considering how much it costs Samsung to secure all the new hardware first, pack it all into a single device and add all the extra features the industry cuts corners with (SD slots, headphone jacks etc.). I respect Samsung for that.
With the Galaxy S6, I had the very first device with the very first processor on the 14nm process, a first non eMMC storage (which was a big deal), a first 1440P OLED panel on a phone, VR and probably several other less important upgrades. It significantly outperformed all other phones for many months in pretty much all aspects, and being able to experience proper VR with it for so cheap before it became a big thing was awesome too. The fall phones don't really deliver that excitement anymore, as I'm already waiting for what everyone's been hyping up for the next year by then.
In the past, the tech being so much cheaper in the fall meant we saw the Nexus phones. For the OEMs, building a phone for an October-November launch is like shopping for components at Black Friday prices, due to the manufacturers trying to clear their stocks at the end of their life cycle. Thus the Nexus phones were still a big deal thanks to their value and new stock Android, and those always brought cool new things back in the days. The Pixels lost those benefits. Man, I really miss the Nexus phones and tablets.
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