Yuen pointed out that new devices based on Snapdragon 800 chips are about twice as fast as Snapdragon 600 devices, a point illustrated by benchmarks of the new Nexus 5, which found it to be second only to the iPhone 5S in terms of gaming performance.
However, Yuen also tried to play down the SoC performance hype. He stressed that mobile devices will never be able to match dedicated gaming consoles, as performance of mobile chips is limited.
"We're never going to build a chip that's faster than a console - in the truest sense," he said.
He went on to point out that the underlying technology will be there, allowing developers to tap the potential of ARM SoCs and deliver a good gaming experience, but these games won’t be mere replicas of console games.
This does not mean Qualcomm is not interested in big-screen gaming. Yuen believes Snapdragon smart TVs could be one of the key growth areas for Qualcomm in the future. In addition, he argued that the idea of Android consoles is coming.
“It may not fully disrupt the console business, but I don't think it's going away," he said.
So, now that it has practically conquered the phone space, Qualcomm is ready to branch out into new markets. TVs and consoles seem like a logical extension, at least as far as high-end SoCs are concerned. However, if this is what Qualcomm is thinking, you can bet that Samsung and Nvidia are thinking along the same lines, perhaps even some unlikely competitors without much to show for in the high-end, like Rockchip and Mediatek.
