We have already seen Apple building its own SoC and shocking the tech community with the performance and efficiency and of its M1 chipset. And it seems that Google also wants to join in on the race. In 2020 a report surfaced online stating that Google is planning to build an in-house SoC for its future Chromebooks.
Then another piece of information surfaces online, stating that the new chip being built by Google is codenamed Whitechapel and will power the upcoming Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. It’s all but confirmed that the company is developing Whitechapel, internally known as GS101, with Samsung.
The custom silicon is expected to be based on Samsung’s 5nm LPE node. However, it’s still a whole generation behind what Samsung is currently working on. According to sources, Whitechapel will feature the same three-cluster design and comprise two Cortex-A78 cores, two Cortex-A76 cores, and three Cortex-A55 cores.
It is also being reported that Google’s SoC will feature the same GPU as the Exynos version of the Galaxy S21, the ARM Mali-G78. Though it may not be comparable in performance to the Cortex-X1 of the Exynos 2100, it’s enough to deliver an efficient performance.
Leaked benchmarks also indicate that Whitechapel has performance scores closer to the Snapdragon 870 than Snapdragon 888. The performance is indeed not mind-blowing. However, it’s not disappointing either. It also rumoured that Google is focusing on machine learning and AI performance while also mentioning that the Mali GPU performs well under stress.
It is also estimated that even if the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro sporting the Whitechapel chip might not come closer to the Snapdragon 888 and Snapdragon 888 Plus performance. But the everyday usage of the chip will be better than average and won’t make much difference.
Since Google is planning to follow the approach that Samsung took in making its Exynos, we might see an AMD GPU in a possible Whitechapel successor.
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