In Depth: Oh, Snapdragon 810: is the newest smartphone processor overheating? ~ lotfi

Fire-breathing Snapdragon 810

With great power comes great responsibility. Today's smartphones and tablets have more processing power than what NASA had to work with back in the 60s to get human beings on the moon.

In just a short period of time, we've gone from single-core to quad-core mobile processors being the norm, and for the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge, Samsung is giving consumers worldwide a taste of its Exynos octa-core chipset.

While power efficiency has improved, it's still no easy feat to power our mobile devices of today. From Full HD and beyond displays to the hoard of apps we use, there's a lot to keep up with. In keeping up with the Joneses, things can get a little heated. In most cases, it's nothing out of the ordinary. In the alleged case of Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810, it's far from it.

LG G Flex 2 Snapdragon 810 overheating

With the announcement of the LG G Flex 2 in January, those claims would rear their ugly head. G Flex 2 was the first smartphone to utilize Qualcomm's latest flagship chipset, the Snapdragon 810, an octa-core chipset capable of powering a 4K display.

Early reviews of the next generation curved phone also found similarly lackluster benchmark scores, hinting once again at possible thermal throttling. Woo Ram-chan, VP of mobile product planning at LG, would go on to say the following:

"I am very much aware of the various concerns in the market about the (Snapdragon) 810, but the chip's performance is quite satisfactory. I don't understand why there is a issue over heat."

However, it was already too late. Samsung had planned on using Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810 in the Galaxy S6, but something made them change their mind, and instead go with their Exynos chip. It's been noted that Samsung stands to lower costs by using chips built in-house. There's also the expectation that the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge will sell in record numbers. As the old saying goes, time is money.

With the Snapdragon 810 facing delays due to production issues, Samsung simply couldn't risk not having enough new devices on the market in time for launch.

Rather vaguely, mere days after an executive spoke out, LG confirmed in a conference call that there were issues with an "initial batch" of Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processors, but the situation had since been resolved. Overheating was not brought up as an issue, and after digging around on social media, it's difficult to find a single mention of an owner who's dealt with overheating.

Snapdragon 810 overheating

The "Initial Batch"

TSMC uses a 20nm process for the Snapdragon 810, a chip size that is also manufactures the same chips powering the iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus and iPad Air 2. It's very possible the "issues" reported back in December stemmed from Qualcomm's design of the Snapdragon 810, and not TSMC's process. Then, it simply took some time for Qualcomm to remedy the problem, which we still have no confirmation what exactly that problem was. The company denied any reports of the issue being related to overheating.

HTC One M9 benchmark tests

Fast Forward To March

It's not unusual for things to heat up after running such intensive benchmarks, but the One M9 tested hit 55.9 degrees celsius. That was nearly 20 degrees higher than the previous generation HTC One M8.

HTC One M9 Snapdragon 810 overheating

Aiding those updated benchmark results, in our own review of the HTC One M9, heat was not a concern. With the HTC One M9 currently making its way to consumers, we'll be able to keep an eye on how well the latest flagship stays cool in all different environments.

The Verdict

It's well documented at this point that there were some early production problems. What exactly those production problems were we may never know. Mistakes happen, and it cost Qualcomm some bad publicity, and a major customer, at least for the time being. LG also appears to still have a bad taste in its mouth after a reported benchmark of the upcoming LG G4 surfaced. Featuring a familiar 2K display, one spec that stood out was the Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 inside.

LG G Flex 2 Snapdragon 810 overheating

Unliked the Snapdragon 810, it's a hexa-core processor, running a quad-core Cortex A53, and dual-core Cortex A57. For LG to not go with Qualcomm's latest and greatest suggests there still could be some glaring issues with the Snapdragon 810. It could also bring us back to the early production delays. LG could very well be on the same page as Samsung, and simply work with something else to avoid not having enough of its latest flagship smartphone in the hands of consumers.

If you own the LG G Flex 2, HTC One M9 or another device running the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810, we'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.