Razer launches portable development kit with brand new Snapdragon G3x chip – TechCrunch

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Snapdragon G3x is Qualcomm’s extraordinarily exciting offering to embrace the gaming market: an all-new reach for the manufacturer, introducing powerful GPUs, 5G-enabled connectivity, the ability to power external displays, immersive audio capabilities, haptic feedback, and a slew of other features that handheld game makers have had to piece together from other sources. Combining all of this into one platform is new and could mean a resurgence of handheld gaming, unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. Razer today unveiled a developer kit based on the new platform, ushering in an exciting new era in handheld gaming.

The rapid development of cell phone technologies has unlocked new products in all kinds of categories for a couple of decades. People are now so used to iPads that we no longer accept crappy airline check-in kiosks. We’re so used to excellent battery life and high-speed internet that anything that fails to arouse impatience and frustration. Relatively affordable consumer-grade quadcopter drones only became possible when accelerometers and processors became cheap enough for consumer electronics experts to take existing components and put them together in new and interesting ways.

The march of technological advancements is endless and it’s always so exciting to see Apple launch its ridiculously powerful processors and when Google shows Tensor processors in the latest generation Pixel phones, you’d better believe we’re leaning in for a closer look. These are technologies that will have a far-reaching impact on the computing world, but live in the isolated universes of Apple and Google respectively. Funny, sure, but where the real impact of the new processors can be felt by the startup-loving readers of this same publication is when OEMs flex their vision for the future. In short: As a startup, you probably won’t be able to get your hands on an Apple M1 Max or Google Tensor for your hardware devices. The same is not true of Qualcomm and its Snapdragon silicon.

Qualcomm is in the unusual space of creating processors that are powering the entire world around us. This is the technology that will power everything from refrigerators to cars to drones to … well, anything you can imagine, really. SnapDragon 8 is present in smartphones all over the world. The 4100+ platform powers wearables. XR2 with its 5G chipset will do the heavy lifting for AR / VR applications. 8cx processors will live on in tablets and PCs, and we’ve seen the Snapdragon Ride platform appear in cars. It’s interesting to see Qualcomm take a serious look at the gaming market, taking deep niche products like the Nintendo Switch and offering hardware makers a toolkit to build their own powerful handheld game console platforms.

More than just putting together a bunch of chips and wishing console developers a good trip, Qualcomm has made the ever-so-shrewd move to partner with gaming veteran Razer to build a development kit so software developers can get started. get busy as the world of hardware manufacturing wraps up its afterburners for product development.

The Snapdragon G3x Gen 1 gaming platform offers cutting-edge performance and the full arsenal of Snapdragon Elite gaming technologies to run all Android games, play content from cloud game libraries, stream games from a home console or PC, and more. Available today, the platform is a rallying cry for market dominance and it will be extraordinarily interesting to see this game.

The Razer / Qualcomm collaboration for a development kit looks like an incredible handheld game console. Image credits: Qualcomm

The platform has a lot of particularly interesting, including:

The Qualcomm Adreno GPU, which promises 144 frames per second and 10-bit HDR for gaming in over a billion shades of color. A built-in 1080p60 webcam with two microphones to stream the gaming action to the audience. A full battery of connectivity options using Qualcomm’s FastConnect 6900 mobile connectivity suite. This means Wi-Fi 6 and 6E for low latency and fast upload and download speeds. 5G mm Wave and sub-6 for cloud gaming when streaming higher bandwidth games from services like Xbox Cloud Gaming or Steam Remote Play. Amazing display: 6.65 inch OLED display with Full HD + resolution and 10-bit HDR, working up to 120hz. Snapdragon Sound technology, optimized for quality, latency and robustness, gives players the ability to spot opponents audibly. The 4-way speakers on the device deliver fantastic audio, and when paired with Snapdragon Sound-enabled earbuds, gamers can experience lag-free wireless audio. The multiscreen experience can be connected to an AR / VR viewer via USB-C. The same technology also allows the device to act as a complementary controller for a TV with resolution up to 4K. Controls: The developer kit has built-in controller mapping from AKSys to provide precise touch mapping technology to the controller to allow use of the integrated controllers in a wide range of games.

“Razer is extremely excited to partner with Qualcomm Technologies and support them on their journey to introduce cutting-edge new technologies to the global gaming industry,” said Min-Liang Tan, co-founder and CEO of Razer. “Together, Qualcomm Technologies and Razer will lead the way with new and innovative solutions that push the boundaries of fidelity and quality available in portable games, transforming the way these games are experienced.”

You can find out more about the Snapdragon G3x Portable Development Kit at Razer.com

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