Before“ Black technology behind Snapdragon, the past and present of Qualcomm LTE modem (Part 2) ”In, we introduced in detail the X16 LTE modem accompanying the debut of the latest flagship Snapdragon 835. The four carrier convergence downlink and dual carrier uplink enable its theoretical speed to reach 1Gbps/150Mbps. At the same time, the upgraded modem also has better signal receiving and transmitting capabilities. However, exaggeration is unconvincing when divorced from reality. Let's see how much improvement this dancing core can bring to us in our daily life.

What is the signal strength?

As a communication device, signal is of course the most important. This test uses Sony Xperia XZ Premium using Snapdragon 835, Kirin 960 Glory 9 and MediaTek X30 Meizu PRO 7. All three machines use Unicom as the main card. The signal strength of XZ Premium under the office building ranges from - 85 to - 92dBm, while that of Glory 9 ranges from - 88 to - 94dBm. The performance of XZ Premium is slightly better, but the gap is small. However, PRO 7 is - 96~- 99dBm, which is the worst of the three.

Switch the main card to China Mobile. Since China Mobile has laid 4G+in Shenzhen, all three can be perfectly compatible. The BTSs on the mobile test site are better laid than those on Unicom, so the signal strengths of the three are very similar. Sony XZ Premium and Glory 9 are basically between - 71 and - 75dBm, while PRO 7 is still slightly inferior, with the strength between - 73 and - 77dBm, which is much smaller than the gap with Unicom. It is worth mentioning that the 4G+signal of Meizu PRO 7 equipped with MediaTek X30 is not very stable, and it is easy to fall back to 4G.

In general, the signal test results are similar to the predictions - the XZ Premium equipped with Snapdragon 835 is not far behind the Glory 9 of Kirin 960, and the PRO 7 using MediaTek X30 is still far behind. However, in some places where PRO 7 has no signal, such as the elevator hall, underground parking lot and other places, Sony XZ Premium and Glory 9 still have 1 to 2 grid signals.

What is the uplink and downlink speed?

After testing the signal, it is naturally the uplink and downlink speed that everyone is most concerned about. First, let's take a look at the theoretical values of the three machines:

Xperia XZ Premium： The X16 LTE modem of Snapdragon 835 can support gigabit 1Gbps network, so the theoretical limit value should be the highest specification of Snapdragon 835, namely 1Gbps downlink speed and 150Mbps uplink speed;

Glory 9: Kirin 960 has its own self-developed full mode modem, which also supports four carrier aggregation. The specification is LTE Cat. 12/13, that is, the downlink speed is 600Mbps, and the uplink speed is 150Mbps;

PRO 7： The global full model modem of MediaTek X30, with the highest three carrier convergence, meets the LTE Cat. 10/13 specification, that is, the downlink speed of 450Mbps, and the uplink speed of 150Mbps. The downlink speed has just caught up with the Snapdragon X10 LTE modem integrated in the Snapdragon 808/810 released in 2014.

Of course, at present, the base station laying of domestic operators cannot reach the limit of these modems, let alone there is no 4G+connectivity in Shenzhen. When connecting to the same node at the same location for speed measurement, XZ Premium is the best of the three, both uplink and downlink, but the ping value is a little high; Although the signal strength of PRO 7 is weaker, the uplink and downlink are better than Glory 9 in speed measurement.

When you switch to a mobile network with 4G+, the download speed is directly different - Glory 9 and PRO 7 have both exceeded 50Mbps, and XZ Premium has directly reached 80Mbps or more, which is comparable to China Unicom's 20Mbps. However, in terms of uplink, LTE-TDD is different from LTE-FDD in that no machine can move faster than Unicom.

The result of using software for speed measurement is a bit unexpected. When the operator's network does not reach the theoretical value, XZ Premium's speed measurement is much ahead of the other two machines. As the first commercial gigabit LTE modem in the industry, Snapdragon X16 LTE modem really performs well. Another surprising thing is that the PRO 7 equipped with the X30 is faster than the Glory 9 equipped with the Kirin 960 when the signal strength is relatively weak.

What about the actual experience?

Even if we take the lead in signal strength and speed measurement software, it is only a test after all, and the actual experience is still unknown, so it is more reasonable to actually fight for it. So in the same place, use the mobile network to download the currently popular King Glory installation package through its own browser. The size is more than 400 megabytes. The average time for XZ Premium is 27 seconds 5, and the glory 9 is about 28 seconds 3. On the contrary, the PRO 7, which is relatively good in speed measurement, actually takes 40 seconds 2. It seems that the actual performance and testing are different.

On the other hand, using Unicom's network to upload a 150M extra large attachment via Penguin mailbox, the actual time for XZ Premium is about 58,6 seconds, PRO 7 takes about 1-5 seconds, and the longest Glory 9 is more than 1:27 seconds, which is basically consistent with the speed measurement.

tail

Through signal comparison, field speed measurement and experience of large uplink and downlink files, it can be seen that Sony XZ Premium has more advantages in signal strength and uplink and downlink speed thanks to the X16 LTE modem integrated in Snapdragon 835. At present, the network laying of domestic operators has not reached the theoretical speed of Snapdragon 835, but in actual use, the performance of Snapdragon 835 is slightly better than that of friends, which can bring better network experience to users. The performance of Snapdragon 835 once again proves Qualcomm's strength in mobile connection technology. Especially for some users who have high requirements for mobile networks, Snapdragon 835 will not disappoint you.

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