Huawei has unveiled the latest powerful chipset for its forthcoming flagship phones – and has promised it'll cater for future crazes in AR gaming.
The Kirin 960 – widely rumored to power forthcoming flagship Huawei phones like the Mate 9 and P10 – comes with the expected raft of upgrades, but among the most interesting is the ability to shove the major power-draining elements of GPS and extended screen use onto a low power core.
This means that, instead of the main engine of the phone doing loads of work just to make sure you're near the latest 'mon, a much smaller part of the brains will be required, which Huawei claims will enable all-day play.
More than that
There's obviously a lot more going on with the new Kirin chipset – the chip made by Huawei for its handset brands – than just improving AR gameplay.
It's also got beefed-up security for acceptance by financial institutions in China – and Huawei told TechRadar that it's aiming to get the same confirmation for European and US banks too.
The octa-core Kirin 960, based on the new ARM Cortex A73 processor, is also created to facilitate new VR performance, capable of offering smooth, 90fps virtual reality from a QHD screen with less than 18ms latency. In short, it should be pretty smooth at a higher resolution.
The other enhancements include greater efficiency to enable longer battery life, improved ability to handle high-res images from dual cameras, and better audio performance for both call clarity and music in future handsets.
Huawei alluded to a mystery handset during the launch (even showing a boxed out device when comparing the image-capturing power of the chipset to that of an iPhone 7 Plus), so chances are we'll see it used pretty soon.
