In 2016, Qualcomm and Microsoft announced for the first time the progress of cooperation between the two sides - the successful opening of the Snapdragon 820 platform for Microsoft Windows 10. The release of this signal gives people a solid foundation for Wintel's "Wintel Alliance" 'The suspicion of stability, but also the pattern of the future of the traditional PC industry had an infinite reverie.
Just last week, at the Qualcomm Tech Summit 2017 in 2017, Qualcomm joined together three OEMs, ASUS, Hewlett-Packard, and Lenovo, officially unveiling Windows 10-based notebooks powered by the Snapdragon 835 platform. AMD, announced the intention to cooperate with the AMD CPU + Qualcomm LTE Modem. At this point, Qualcomm into the field of PC first step, be regarded as a real step out.
1985, that is the beginning of everything
In the past few decades, the PC industry with X86 as its core architecture eventually failed despite the invasion of "outsiders." Even if AMD made some efforts on the X64, the impact on the X86 system did not go deep into At the same time, Intel's strength in the semiconductor chip industry is too strong, leaving little chance for others.
Of course, Intel does not have to sit back and relax all the way to have today's situation.
Take a look at the picture below, starting from 2002 to 16 years in these fourteen years, silicon semiconductor companies with leading logic fabs dropped sharply from the original 25 to 4. Today, out of 21 companies , Most of whom have been prestigious, the reign of the road that only those involved in the war can understand.
AMD played a spoiler role in 2017. In the first half, Ryzen, Threadripper, Vega three ax let Intel, Nvidia feel the pressures of the past decade have not had the second half, AMD GPU and Intel CPU heterogeneous fusion People eye-popping.The AMD CPU + Qualcomm LTE Modem has come up with new things to come to an end in 2017. The vanishing redness of silence for ten years finally regained its blood color.
Founded in 1985, Qualcomm was 17 years younger than Intel, which was founded in 1968. The 1985 figure is of tremendous importance to the PC industry:
This year, Toshiba T1100 was born, it is recognized as the world's first true laptop;
This year, Intel suddenly terminated the technical cooperation agreement signed with AMD five years ago, no longer licensed to AMD to produce its own chips, 386 processors exclusively manufactured by Intel.
This year, Intel opened its first decade-long rule of the field of PC semiconductor chips.
This year, Qualcomm took the first step in life ...
The first collision between Intel and Qualcomm is not the tip-and-pop mammoth you live because Intel is targeting the entire smart phone ecosystem, coveted the big cake in the mobile market, but also the rigid needs of their own business transformation. However Atom performance is strong (relative At the time of the ARM architecture processor), it turned out not suitable for mobile devices, because it consumes too much power.
Intel and Qualcomm's second collision did not start last week's Snapdragon technology summit this year, Taipei Computer Show, Intel consciously proposed Always Connected PC. And from around September, Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 and Microsoft's cooperation news It has not been broken.12 Xiaolong Technology Summit in December, but let this dark war on the surface.
Over the past five years, Intel has hit the smartphone industry in a failure, more successful than Intel's 17-year-old Qualcomm; this time, the PC industry's eldest brother Intel in the next few years, Qualcomm is facing the young 'outsiders' game and challenge.
So want to break Intel's Board, what should Qualcomm do?
· Breaking Intel, Qualcomm at least to do these three points
Asus has always been Intel's staunch partner when Intel hit the smart phone industry when the first stand-by Atom chips mobile phone is the Asus Zenfone, this drive seems to be Lenovo, HP, PC industry carry handle also Shameless like.
The Asus first entered Qualcomm camp, in fact, this is not surprising.
This is a PC manufacturer from Taiwan, the bones is a courageous and innovative "stunned youth." Otherwise it will not come up with NX90JQ 'big ears of this', P1801 one machine, U43SD bamboo, and so these are alien products. Will not be the first PC maker to come up with an intelligent robot.
Qualcomm pulled in Asustek, can be described as the first entry into the PC industry threshold, has double the protection of products and innovation.
Hewlett-Packard and Lenovo are also the honored guests at the Snapdragon Tech Summit The addition of two giants in the PC industry undoubtedly made Qualcomm more adequate in the face of Intel, not to mention Microsoft and AMD behind it.
Therefore, on the whole, the first step of Qualcomm into the PC market is quite good-looking.Compared with the year when Intel took ASUS as the only impact on the smart phone industry, Qualcomm at least in the initial layout there is no short board.
But is that enough? The answer is obviously no.
From the era of ultra-low voltage notebooks, to the hot Internet around 2008, and then to the Tablet PC, the fact that in order to truly establish a foothold in the PC industry, vendor support alone, as well as overwhelming the product layout, not necessarily able to become Real winner.
Because in most cases, the PC market users pay more attention to product, performance, price and other objective factors, rather than the brand, feelings, ideals, beliefs these relatively virtual things.After all, a PC industry, only out of an Apple MacBook , Only made a Thinkpad.
Therefore, as a latecomer but also outsiders Qualcomm, hand in hand with the traditional PC vendors Snapdragon platform notebook products to allow users to accept, will ultimately determine the fate of the ARM architecture notebook.
Since talking about the product, we may wish to judge some of the characteristics of Snapdragon platform products from the official information revealed.
First of all, the Snapdragon platform based on the ARM architecture can give laptops up to 20 hours (the official claim) battery life, in this regard, I currently hold on to reservations, because the official did not say what the endurance is Kind of test environment, but the low power consumption of the ARM architecture can bring a longer battery life notebook, which I believe.
Second, although the official release of the notebook based on the Snapdragon 835 platform performance in some applications, but the test project shown below is not our common test items.And previously had foreign test data show that the Snapdragon 835 The actual performance may be much lower than the Intel Core platform, and even with the Pentium, Celeron confrontation, there is no sure win.
Thirdly, thanks to the low power consumption and small size of the ARM-based processor, the notebooks based on them will be fully fanless, and may be thinner than the traditional X86-based notebooks.
Therefore, from the current analysis of the three characteristics of view, Qualcomm wants to break the Intel Board, at least should be done in three areas:
First of all, let the notebook battery life really break through.In fact, for many years, Intel has been emphasizing the progress of each generation of process technology will bring the reduction of hardware platform power consumption and performance.But from the perspective of ordinary users, notebook computers Of the battery life generally enhance the range of only 1 and a half to 2 hours or so, did not achieve a substantial breakthrough, of course, this is also difficult to achieve substantial breakthrough battery technology have a great relationship.
If Qualcomm hardware to a certain extent, solve the problem of notebook battery life, which for Intel is not a small impact.
Second, both the Snapdragon 835 and the future Snapdragon 845 are not likely to compete in performance with Intel Core processors, and Qualcomm and its partners should carefully consider product positioning in this context Mild office, light application market is the main force point.
Third, fully promote fanless notebooks In fact, Intel over the past five years through Core m platform to achieve fanless computer to achieve popularity, but the ideal did not really achieve, leaving the chance of Qualcomm still a lot.
In addition to these three major aspects, Qualcomm should also pay attention to the differentiated needs of the Chinese market.For example, for Chinese users to promote the pre-installed Windows 10 S system, may be widely criticized; another example is how to make this mild type Better pricing of products and how to separate them from the Netbook is also an important factor in their ability to deliver on the Chinese market.
These factors are done, then Qualcomm Snapdragon platform laptop although not necessarily be able to eventually change the PC industry pattern, but at least Intel, it will be an unprecedented impact.
Full-time Internet, the biggest problem is the tariff
The reason why there is no Always Connected PC advocated by Qualcomm Snapdragon mentioned on the previous page is because it is not a Qualcomm home and Intel is also promoting the always-connected PC to Microsoft and major OEMs.
For the first time during Taipei Computer Show in June this year, Intel talked about the Always Connected PC view, Intel called the "all-Internet PC", to put it bluntly is any PC device that can connect to the Internet anytime, anywhere through 4G. There are more than 30 kinds of products for sale, but most of them for the public may be the most familiar Millet Air.
In fact, the Always Connected PC concept is not in itself a new concept. Before the rise of the Internet in 2008, different vendors tried to add a SIM card module to the Internet to allow users to insert real-time online functions of the device by plugging in the SIM card. It can be said is Always Connected PC's initial solution.
After the Internet gradually marginalized and finally eliminated by the market, Intel initiated the concept of ultrabooks and 2-in-1 computers from 2012. Both of these products pioneered the PC-based era of change in terms of light and portable devices.Meanwhile, many OEM manufacturers again Attempts to incorporate a SIM card module into a laptop make it capable of connecting to the Internet anytime, anywhere and enabling full-time Internet connectivity, but such functionality has not been able to function as a standard feature on laptops like cameras.
So why smart phones can easily full-time Internet connectivity, but the laptop is so difficult?
First of all, early SIM card solutions for the public is not practical enough.On the one hand, the network environment is relatively poor, slow speed, 3G network coverage is not comprehensive, the Internet experience is not good enough; the other hand, for PC users, Broadband or WiFi is the main way to get online, and even with the built-in eSIM now for 4G network access, users are less accustomed to getting their PCs connected to the network in this form.
Second, the issue of tariffs, which is also the most realistic issue for most users, is that broadband traffic generated through laptops is much larger than smartphones, and the high cost of downloading applications, logging into web pages, browsing videos, games and other applications Traffic costs make the user unbearable.
Moreover, even at this time it looks very lightweight netbook, in fact, only the size is relatively small, the actual weight is not lighter than the current 13-inch-class products, so carrying is not convenient enough and laptop mobile Internet generally only as a User's emergency or alternative.
In summary, Always Connected PC concept has never really developed before, and has never been fully recognized by users, even if it can really bring a lot of convenience to many users.
As a result, Qualcomm Snapdragon platform notebooks, which dominate the concept of Always Connected PCs, are even more important than the three directions mentioned before.
As you can see from the picture above, Qualcomm portrays the Always Connected PC product with speed responsiveness, full-time networking, long battery life, better security, lower prices and the creation of a new work culture .
Among these features, the speed response corresponds to the hardware performance, long life corresponds to low power consumption, and nowadays full time Internet connection the most important issue is how to solve the problem of Internet tariffs.
Millet release Air when the tariff strategy is a large 4GB monthly built-in traffic, a total of giving a total of 48GB throughout the year. To notebook Internet traffic demand, this donated traffic is obviously not enough, extra traffic generated need to spend how much money will determine the user Are you willing to pay for such additional services?
Therefore, whether it is Intel or Qualcomm, or OEM manufacturers in the Always Connected PC landing at the same time, more importantly, to find a product that meets the network traffic patterns, or it is likely to be reduced to the same as the Internet The marginalized product.
Rebuild the pattern? Everything is just on the road
From the PC industry development point of view, Qualcomm marched into the PC market this move admirable, but also look forward to.
Over the past decade or so, a large number of semiconductor chip companies closed down, or restructuring, combined with AMD lost both in the desktop and mobile areas, Intel almost dominated the PC industry .Although the user no longer For the choice of what configuration tangled endless, but the enthusiasm for the hardware is far less than AMD, Intel duel hegemony era.
At the same time, PC industry has experienced from peak to valley, and then to the gradual recovery of waves .Industry want to have big strides, if you do not compete then it is very difficult to achieve.Annine this year against Intel's fight against the very description of the problem, Ryzen and Threadripper not only extracted the Intel Core i9, but also drew Intel's research results at 10nm and the layout of the more advanced 7nm, 5nm and even 3nm process technologies.
If AMD did not come so soon, this picture we may not have seen so early.
Then from Qualcomm's point of view, it into the PC market can achieve the three pillars, or even reshape the pattern of the feat it?
To be honest, with Qualcomm Snapdragon 835, 845 + Always Connected PC this combination, still can not talk about the level of reshaping the pattern.
But if you can really make notebook computers have a longer battery life, the price enough to attract users, and can solve the Always Connected 4G or 5G network tariff issues, Qualcomm Snapdragon notebook from the hands of Intel some torn market share, thus forming Tripartite confrontation, it is not a fantasy.
However, I have some concerns for the Snapdragon platform notebook is the configuration and compatibility issues.
First of all, from the system point of view, Microsoft Surface Laptop equipped with Windows 10 S system acclimatized in China is an indisputable fact that although Qualcomm also allows users to upgrade to other versions of Windows 10 as Microsoft does, but for ordinary users in fact It is too much trouble.
In addition, Snapdragon technology summit ASUS NovaGo still released a 4GB memory version, which is clearly not enough under the Windows 10 system environment, even relatively mild applications, 4GB memory will give users a great deal of trouble.And 8GB memory version The price of the product has basically reached Core i5 level notebook product price range, the performance is not as good as Core Duo, how many users are willing to choose Xiaolong platform notebook has become a problem.
Of course, there are compatibility issues.Organization of the early launch of Surface RT based on Tegra platform is because the system compatibility issues are eventually kicked out, although the Snapdragon 835 platform can run Windows 10 system, but with the software how to be marked on the compatibility A question mark
These problems do not solve well, the three pillars will only fantasy.
Conclusion
The stagnant PC market was revived by AMD and Qualcomm in 2017. Whether Qualcomm is trying to do it or not, there's a lot more ambition and determination to grab a big cake from Intel, at least for the PC The development of the industry, there is no small role in promoting.
That year, Intel determined to impact the smart phone industry unsuccessfully, Qualcomm became the ultimate winner; now Intel, as PC industry defendants, can successfully face the impact of Qualcomm? I think, there will always be an initial 2018 Answer it.