What you need to know
- MediaTek is launching its Dimensity 800 chipset to bring the 5G standard to mid-range smartphone models.
- The SoC also features support for 90Hz displays and quad-cameras.
- Phones sporting this chip are headed to the market by the end of the first half of 2020.
MediaTek is launching the Dimensity 800 SoC, a line of chips that are intended to bring flagship features like 5G down to lower-priced but still capable handsets. This comes after the firm's flagship-grade Dimensity 1000 was announced in late 2019.
"[W]ith the 800 series 5G chipset family, we are bringing 5G to the mid-tier and mass market," said TL Lee, head of MediaTek's wireless business unit. "Everyone should have access to great technology. The Dimensity 800 Series will power the New Premium segment for 5G, bringing consumers flagship smartphone features and performance at mid-range price points."
With the Dimensity 800, MediaTek aims to support many of the hottest new trends in mobile technology. First of all, the SoC has the general layout of the flagship 1000, albeit with some differences. It has four ARM Cortex-A76 cores at 2GHz as opposed to four ARM Cortex-A77 cores at 2.6GHz. Both share the same pairing of another set of four power-efficient Cortex-A55 cores running at 2Ghz though. MediaTek is also adding in its latest APU to help boost imaging prowess with AI. Speaking of imaging, phones with this chip will have support for high-resolution 64MP cameras as well as quad cameras. The 90Hz display, once kept to high-end phones like the Pixel 4 and OnePlus 7 Pro, is also now heading downstream with this chip.
What's MediaTek? The processor running your Amazon Echo, and probably much of your smart home
All things considered, it stacks up pretty favorably to its big brother. The most interesting addition here is 5G support. Being a relatively new standard, 5G support has typically been the domain for the most premium smartphone models like with the OnePlus 7 Pro 5G or Galaxy S10 5G. That is to say, it's a standard, but it's not standard. The more handsets that ship with 5G, the more ubiquitous it becomes, and the faster it becomes something that's taken for granted rather than a standout feature. By bringing it to lower-end phones, MediaTek takes us a little closer to that world of 5G everywhere.
