Qualcomm has released a range of new system on chip (SoC) wireless audio devices, with the stars of the show featuring Bluetooth 5.2, the new, soon-to-be-released Bluetooth Low Energy standard, and power-efficient audio processing.
The QCC3050 is an ultra-low power, single-chip solution, optimised for use in wireless earbuds and designed to support Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound Technology. Qualcomm says it is designed specifically to help manufacturers to differentiate at a range of tiers by bringing a quad-core architecture and support for premium audio technologies in the very fast-moving, price-sensitive truly wireless earbud category. It is also designed to support the forthcoming Bluetooth Low Energy Audio standard, and helps early-adopting OEMs to develop truly wireless earbuds with the new audio sharing use case.
Qualcomm provided the following information on what consumers can expect from earphones with these new chips:
- Extremely low-power performance
- Designed to support forthcoming Bluetooth LE Audio standard
- Bluetooth 5.2 radio
- Ultra-small form factor
- Powerful quad-core processor architecture – designed to support complex use cases
- Dual-core 32-bit processor application subsystem (up to 80Mhz)
- Dual-core 120Mhz configurable Qualcomm Kalimba DSP audio subsystem (runs from ROM)
- Qualcomm TrueWireless Mirroring technology for improved robustness and a superior user experience
- Designed to support wake word and button-activated digital assistants including Amazon Alexa Voice Service and Google Assistant
- Support for Google Fast Pair
- Software architecture compatible with Qualcomm QCC302x and QCC304x series
- Embedded ROM + RAM
- Integrated FLASH memory for application boot
- High-performance audio combined with low-power consumption
- Qualcomm aptX Adaptive audio for consistent, high quality streaming over Bluetooth at up to 96Khz audio resolution
- Qualcomm aptX Voice for superior call quality on uplink and downlink
- 8th generation Qualcomm cVc Echo Cancelling and Noise Suppression
- 1-ch 99.3dBA Class-D
- 1-ch 101dBA Class-AB
- Support for Qualcomm Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) – feedforward, feedback and hybrid – and Qualcomm Adaptive Active Noise Cancellation