Qualcomm is leading the charge for the next evolution in mobile connectivity, 5G will enable users and industry reach unprecedented speed levels that will change we think of mobility.
The chip maker, together with Netgear has developed the world’s first Gigabit Class LTE mobile device and network, designed to deliver connectivity as well as wi-fi solutions to achieve gigabit Wi-Fi at 5G speeds.
With the MR1100 mobile router, operators can take advantage of several LTE Advanced technologies, including 3x carrier aggregation, 4×4 MIMO, and 256-QAM, which together are engineered to boost download speeds up to a peak of 979 Mbps. It also uses the Qualcomm 802.11ac solution with 2×2 MIMO and dual-band support for overall Wi-Fi throughput of up to 1Gbps. The dual-band support is designed to allow the router to serve devices on both 2.4- and 5-GHz bands simultaneously, so that more Wi-Fi devices can take advantage of the fastest speeds available.
Real world application of speeds of over 100 Mbps and as high as 500 Mbps is tremendous, at these throughputs, for example first the random read speed of flash storage on some current premium tier smartphones will face issues. Making faster to retrieve a file from the cloud rather than open it from local storage. This will change how developers think about the role that the cloud backend plays in their app or service.
Another example is 360-degree VR video. Today, 360-degree video is readily available at 4K resolution, but only at 30fps and sometimes even lower. That would provide a decent viewing experience, but it’s not immersive by any means. To achieve that, the frame rate would need to be pushed up to 60fps and, ideally, even 120fps. All of a sudden, the data rate requirements climb significantly from ~45 Mbps to ~68 Mbps for 60fps, and up to an estimated ~103 Mbps for 120fps. But the payoff is truly immersive 360-degree video that can be incredibly smooth and transport the viewer.
Clearly, content for mobile is ahead of the speeds available for users to fully immerse in the experience, with 5G, developers will need not restrict their offerings to mobile.
The next Snapdragon X16 LTE modem technology will transition to the 800-tier Qualcomm Snapdragon processor which means 5G capable smartphones are anticipated to be available in 2017.
