Samsung Exynos 1280 vs Qualcomm Snapdragon 870 5G

Samsung Exynos 1280

The Samsung Exynos 1280 is a midrange system on a chip (SoC) for smartphones and tablets. It was announced in early 2022 and is used in the Samsung Galaxy A53 5G. The CPU part integrates two clusters, a performance cluster with two ARM Cortex-A78 cores clocked at up to 2.4 GHz and an efficiency cluster with six small ARM Cortex-A55 cores at up to 2 GHz. The integrated memory controller supports LPDDR4x.

Furthermore, the chip integrates an ISP for cameras with up to 108 MPixel. The integrated ARM Mali G68 MC4 supports displays with up to 1080p and 120Hz.

One of the main features is the integrated 5G modem that supports Sub-6GHz (2550/1280 Mbps), mmWave (1840/920 Mbps), and LTE Cat 18 (1200/200 Mbps). WiFi 5 is the highest supported standard, as is Bluetooth 5.2.

The SoC is manufactured in the modern 5nm process at Samsung.

Qualcomm Snapdragon 870 5G

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 870 5G Mobile Platform (SM8250-AC) is a high-end smartphone and tablet SoC that Qualcomm announced in mid 2021. The SoC integrates a fast ‘Prime Core’ that clocks up to 3.2 GHz and three additional ARM Cortex-A77 performance cores, which can reach up to 2.42 GHz. These are complemented by four power-saving ARM Cortex-A55 cores that clock up to a maximum of 1.8 GHz. Compared to the similar and older Snapdragon 865+, the Prime Core clocks 100 MHz faster and the GPU is slightly higher clocked.

Therefore, the Snapdragon 870 is slightly faster than the old Snapdragon 865 and 865 Plus and slots in behind the high end Snapdragon 888.

The Mobile Platform integrates a Qualcomm X55 5G modem with Sub-5 and mmWave support and global 5G bands with up to 7.5 GBit/s (download) speed. The SmartConnect 6800 modem supports Wi-Fi 6 with 8x8 MU-MIMU and 60 GHz 11ay up to 10 Gbps. 

The integrated GPU is still called Adreno 650 and offers a slightly higher clock speed of 670 MHz.

The on board Hexagon 698 DSP now offers a KI performance of up to 15 TOPS (up from 7 TOPS in the 855) and still uses a combination of CPU, GPU, HVX and Tensor cores. The Spectra 480 ISP is also untouched. The integrated Computer Vision Engine (CV-ISP) now supports Dolby Vision, 8K videos and 200 megapixel photos.

The built-in memory controller supports LPDDR5 with up to 2,750 MHz and LPDDR4X with 2,133 MHz.

The SoC is manufactured in the modern and power efficient 7nm process.