Every year, manufacturers sell millions of smartphones around the world. They all offer great performance, cool cameras, and attractive looks. From year to year, more and more perfect solutions appear on store shelves, which we could only dream of earlier. The smartphone market is probably the fastest growing in comparison to the rest. And now I will try to explain why it is smartphones that move technology forward.
Smartphones are driving technology forward
Screens
Let's start with the most visible – screens. Already, everyone can purchase the flexible Samsung Galaxy Fold or Huawei Mate X. The Motorola Razr and Galaxy Z Flip in the clamshell form factor are preparing for release. Such devices are extremely difficult to implement due to the presence of a flexible display substrate. And it was in smartphones, and not in laptops, that we first saw this. Only after the Fold was released at CES 2020 did manufacturers show their solutions with flexible screens.
Of course, she announced Lenovo her flexible laptop back in the middle of last year, but let's look at exactly when the sales of the device start, the launch is planned only this summer, which is much later than September, when Galaxy Fold sales started.
Undoubtedly, in the future, both laptops and smartphones will have a similar form factor. The only question is how soon it will happen.
Processors
Another important point that makes mobile devices special is the processor. The most productive Snapdragon 855 runs on a 7nm process technology, and processors with 5nm transistors will appear in 2021. Such figures are still unattainable in the market of processors for stationary computers and laptops.
At CES 2020, AMD unveiled the next-generation 7nm laptop processors. And this despite the fact that a year ago a 7-nm processor was shown by Qualcomm. In addition, ARM processors are difficult to design and include not only a CPU, but also a graphics chip, an ISP chip responsible for photo processing, a neural network cluster with multiple cores, modems for 5G – connections, and so on. Further.
Memory
The same can be said about memory, modern smartphones offer fast memory with a volume of 512 GB, Samsung has already started production of 12 GB LPDDR5 memory chips with a 10 nm process technology. The new chip with a speed of 5500 Mbps is able to transfer 44 GB of data (12 films in FHD quality) in just 1 second. How do you like that? In addition, it consumes 30% less battery compared to the previous generation. The fact that the guys managed to fit such a fast and voluminous memory into an extremely compact chip certainly commands respect. Let's discuss this in Telegram.
Neural networks
It's no secret that smartphones use not the most advanced camera modules. It is difficult to compare them with professional solutions in obtaining information about the image. However, thanks to research in the field of machine learning, we can observe how even using a regular mobile camera Google can demonstrate amazing results in their smartphones. The smartphone market is forcing manufacturers to invest in machine learning research. Samsung recently announced that it will invest several billion dollars in this area over the next few years.
Undoubtedly, without smartphones there would be no 5G. It is thanks to this connection that fast speeds will become possible, due to which the quality of the content will increase proportionally. 5G will give impetus to the development of smart home and city. And smartphones play a significant role in this.
Batteries
Of course, so far there are no smartphones on the market with batteries that differ from lithium, but everything is going exactly to this. The popularity of smartphones has led manufacturers to invest in battery research. For example, Huawei was thinking about releasing a graphene battery.
It is interesting to know what our readers think about it. Do you, just like me, believe that smartphones are driving technology forward and making the whole world a better place?