Qualcomm gives us a sneak peek of flagship smartphones in 2015

Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810 handset is a look at next year's phones
Snapdragon 810: Coming to a handset near you

Qualcomm has taken the wraps off a development smartphone, giving us a peek at the kind of specs we'll see in next year's handsets.

The Qualcomm Mobile Development Platform Smartphone is a 6.17-inch device running Android 5.0 Lollipop aimed primarily at developers. It's a showcase for the 64-bit Snapdragon 810 CPU that'll make its way into the top smartphones in 2015.

The 810 chip is built on a 20nm architecture with two sets of four Cortex-A57 and Cortex-A53 cores. Qualcomm says the cores are 50% more powerful than those found in the Snapdragon 805's Krait 450 CPU. The chip maker is also highlighting similar power efficiency to the Snapdragon 805.

Meanwhile, the Adreno 430 graphics chip is purpotedly 30% faster than the 805's Adreno 420. It'll manage 4K video encoding 30fps and 1080p video encoding at 120fps and similarly, can output 4K content to an external display via HDMI.

RAM, bam, thankyou Ma'am

Qualcomm's Mobile Development Platform Smartphone comes touting 4GB of RAM, opening the door for next year's handsets to come similarly specced.

The 6.17-inch display has a QHD 1,600 x 2,560 while the handset is also loaded with the required sensors. That includes a 3-axis accelerometer, 3-axis gyroscope, an ambient light sensor, proximity sensor, pressure, temperature and humidity sensors as well as UV sensor and Mobeam sensor.

That last one is used to scan barcodes. Oh, and there's a fingerprint scanner as well.

Likewise, it also houses USB 3.0, Bluetooth 4.1 and a 3,020 mAh battery - although considering how much tech is on board, there's no telling how long it'll last.

The Mobile Development Platform Smartphone is available to order from Intrinsyc.com now for a mere $800 (£510, AU$937).

Although this is a development-only handset - it's likely we won't have to wait too long until the first consumer-ready Snapdragon 810 smartphones begin to appear. Chances are we could see them as soon as CES in January or MWC in February next year.

Via: PhoneArena