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In the first half of 2024, Qualcomm unleashed a tsunami of laptops powered by its Snapdragon X chips, from companies such as Lenovo, HP, Dell, Samsung, Microsoft, Acer, Asus, and more. There was, however, one important detail: They all cost more than $1000. To reach a lower price point, the company is announcing a cheaper model in the Snapdragon X Plus line-up. Keep reading to learn about the changes.
The three new SKUs are part of the Plus range but feature a significantly different configuration compared to the original Plus model (retroactively suffixed “10-core”).
Snapdragon X family chips
Family
Model
Oryon cores
Cache
Max dual-core boost
GPU TFLOPS
Elite
X1E-00-1DE
12 @ 3.8 GHz
42 MB
4.3 GHz
4.6
X1E-84-100
12 @ 3.8 GHz
42 MB
4.2 GHz
4.6
X1E-80-100
12 @ 3.4 GHz
42 MB
4.0 GHz
3.8
X1E-78-100
12 @ 3.4 GHz
42 MB
n/a
3.8
Plus
X1P-66-100 (new)
10 @ 3.4 GHz 4.0 GHz single-core boost
42 MB
n/a
3.8
X1P-64-100
10 @ 3.4 GHz
42 MB
n/a
3.8
X1P-46-100 (new)
8 @ 3.4GHz 4.0 GHz single-core boost
30 MB
n/a
2.1
X1P-42-100 (new)
8 @ 3.2 GHz 3.4 GHz single-core boost
30 MB
n/a
1.7
While the original Snapdragon X Plus chip only had two Oryon CPU cores disabled compared to the base Elite chip (10 cores instead of 12), the new Snapdragon X Plus options feature both 10 and 8-core layouts at a multithread maximum frequency of either 3.4 or 3.2 GHz.
Other significant changes for the 8-core configuration are the reduction in total cache capacity: 30 MB instead of 42 MB, and an Adreno 741 GPU with less than half of the computing power, at 2.1 or 1.7 TFLOPS (versus 3.8 for the Plus 10-core SoC).
Other specifications were inherited from the more expensive chips, including the full 45 TOPS of AI processing required by Microsoft for its “Copilot+” branding, support for LPDDR5x-8448 RAM, Wi-Fi 7, and Bluetooth 5.4.
Different from what we originally expected, the new 8-core model is not a simple “die harvest” of partially functional 12-core chips that didn’t reach the original specifications. In a brief press demo, an Asus representative displayed both chips side by side, highlighting the smaller die on the new 8-core CPUs.
The radical GPU downgrade may initially seem like a significant sacrifice. However, given that gaming is already a major weakness of Windows on ARM laptops, we believe that the few games currently compatible with the Snapdragon X won’t suddenly become unplayable.
Different from the trickled release of the original chips, Qualcomm announced that laptops powered by the new Snapdragon X Plus 8-core chip should be launching globally today, from Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, and Samsung. First in line is expected to be the Vivobook S 15 from Asus.
Have you tried the new Snapdragon laptops with Windows? What are your impressions so far? We expect to have some hands-on experience with a few models in the coming weeks, so sign up for our weekly newsletter and our browser notifications.
