Kirin 980 vs 970: the new processor of the Huawei Mate 20 takes the AI in mobile phones to another level

[Blexfraptor]

The Huawei Mate 10 came equipped with a processor that surprised us with its neural processing unit (Neural Process Unit). A processor, the Kirin 970, that promised behavior and capabilities not typical of what we were used to and that caused us to start talking about how artificial intelligence was evolving our phones. However, in the last IFA 2018, the Chinese manufacturer made known to the whole world the new Kirin 980, the processor with which the new Huawei Mate 20 would arrive and that promised to be more powerful and intelligent than its predecessor.

An announcement that surprised even more after seeing the capabilities of the Kirin 970 in the Mate 10, since its artificial intelligence made it capable of learning about the use of the mobile to achieve an energy saving and therefore, an increase in the autonomy of the battery. In addition, this kirin 970 with its NPU, was able to guess the scene quickly when taking pictures, processing much more information increasing its performance, as well as improving storage management, something that was noticed every day.

The new Kirin 980 has two units of neuronal processing and increases its artificial intelligence
But the arrival of the new Kirin 980, the process responsible for driving the Huawei Mate 20, all these capabilities are triggered by including not only one, but two units of neuronal processing (NPU). This means that the new processor of the Chinese manufacturer has a much more powerful artificial intelligence than its predecessor.

In theory, the new Kirin 980 is 20% more powerful and offers up to 40% more energy savings. Recall that the processor responsible for promoting the Mate 20 has eight cores but is configured as a CPU with architecture of 4 cores (2x Cortex-A76 at 2.6 GHz + 2x Cortex-A76 at 1.9 GHz) and other 4 Cortex cores- A55 (at 1.8 GHz). In addition, it is accompanied by a Mali-G76 GPU, a graphics unit that will help a lot in the multimedia section and the reproduction of games from the mobile.

This new processor is the first chip with Cat.21 modem, so it supports speeds of up to 1.4Gbps and is compatible with LPDDR4X memory of 2,133 MHz, offering the fastest speed through WiFi achieved so far of 1,732 Mbps Comparing it with the Snapdragon 845, which is one of the most used processors in the high-end mobile market, this Kirin 980 offers a bandwidth of 20% better and 22% less latency.

It also has a new dual ISP that allows it to increase its processing speed to almost double the Kirin 970, specifically 46% faster and improve its energy efficiency by 23%.

The Kirin 980 takes the photographic experience to another level thanks to its artificial intelligence and power
These characteristics make the Kirin 980 capable of recognizing up to 4.5000 images per minute and capturing moving images in a very clear way avoiding the famous blurring effect.

All this hardware and features, make the day to day with the new Huawei Mate 20 is a very much improved experience. And the brain of this mobile offers great performance, everything goes very fast and fluid, but above all, impresses the ability to learn about the use of mobile to improve their behavior, improve performance and save energy. That's not to mention its capacity and speed when it comes to processing information, something thanks to its double NPU.

To make matters worse, the Kirin 980 makes the photographic experience in Mate 20 has gone to another level. It emphasizes the speed when recognizing the scenes, but especially when the SuperMacro mode is activated, but it is also able to recognize a sunset, a monument or jump a portrait, among other things, in real time while we move the mobile using the camera.

As far as the video is concerned, it should be noted that it offers the possibility of recording videos in which the main object remains in color and everything else is shown in black and white.