Although Fage released Cat 820 a few days ago, it punched Qualcomm and kicked Kirin in terms of performance (this is only a parameter, and the details still depend on the experience), which can be said to be the limelight.
In terms of specific specifications, Tianji 820 is based on TSMC's 7nm process. The CPU uses four 2.6GHz Cortex-A76 cores and four 2.0GHz A55 cores, while the GPU is equipped with Mali-G57 MC5. Ann Bunny scored as high as 408,529 points.
And this cat 820, which is the king of mid-range chips, also announced that it will be launched by Redmi 10X, and the exclusive period is very long. This time, MediaTek and his old friend Redmi began to be good brothers.
So, how did Redmi drag Brother Fage into several high-end ships again and again? Let's review this history together.
We used to be familiar with mobile phone manufacturers such as Bird, Tianyu, Changhong and TCL, and those fake brands that came out of nowhere may all have several English letters clearly engraved on the motherboard: MediaTek.
At that time, although MediaTek occupied nearly half of the functional machine market, it was also ridiculed as "the king of shanzhai".
Later, with the appearance of iPhone, function machines were gradually replaced by smart phones, and MediaTek slowly turned to the manufacture of smart phone chips. Due to the previous experience of one-stop solution, it quickly occupied its own place in the smart phone chip market.
In 20 1 1 year, only 100000 smartphones in the world used MediaTek's chip scheme, but in 20 12 years, this number increased by10 times and became 1 1 100 million.
In 20 13, MediaTek's annual revenue reached NT$1360.56 million, and the total shipment of smart phone chips reached 220 million, which doubled from 65438+10.00 million in 20 12, and the shipment of flat chips reached 20 million.
However, with the rapid growth of shipments, the hidden worry has been ignored by MediaTek intentionally or unintentionally, that is, these hundreds of millions of sales are almost all shanzhai machines and low-end machines, which are sold through the channels of China operators. MediaTek still hasn't got rid of the hat of "shanzhai" in the functional machine era.
Of course, MediaTek will not do nothing. The best way to get out of this quagmire that has trapped it for many years is to focus on high-end and create a better chip brand image.
It may be easy for other brands to hit the high end, but it is too difficult for MediaTek, which has given people the image of a knockoff machine in time for many years. 20 13 July, MediaTek launched the "True eight nuclear" MT6592 processor, which completely matched the Exynos54 10 launched by Samsung that year.
At the end of 20 13, TCL idol X+ was equipped with MT6592 processor for the first time. Cai Mingjie, founder and chairman of MediaTek, is a rare platform for this mobile phone conference. There is a simple reason. This is a mobile phone that marks the official impact of MediaTek on the high-end market, and the price has come to 1999 yuan.
Cai Mingjie, the chairman, faces the red rice Note of 799 yuan. At that time, his answer was that we would not interfere with customers' pricing, but he added that eight nuclear chip was an important processor product developed by MediaTek for high-end mobile phones.
20 14 is a year of large-scale commercialization of 4G. Mobile phone manufacturers have launched their own flagship models of 4G, and the processor is a very key link.
This year, MediaTek launched the world's first eight nuclear processor MT6595 supporting 4G LTE network, with the intention of hitting the high end again. They set their sights on Meizu, a small factory in Zhuhai.
Unfortunately, there are only a few mobile phones equipped with MT6595, and the shipment volume is not too large. It can only be regarded as a simple test. In 20 14, MediaTek wanted to make great efforts, but was slightly frustrated by the round of backstab of Red Rice Note and the high-end road in price.
20 15 can be said to be an extremely special year. This year, the technological process of the mainstream flagship processor developed to 20nm, breaking through the constraint of 28nm and having stronger performance. The flagship processor of Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 10 is ready. Due to the outstanding performance of the previous generation 800 and 80 1, it should be the strongest processor in the Android camp.
However, Qualcomm was too proud. In this generation, it does not adopt a self-developed architecture. Instead, in order to catch up with the 64-bit tide and drive the ducks to the shelves, we directly used ARM's public architectures A57 and A53. When it was released, everyone shouted, "Yes, Qualcomm is the light of an Zhuo, and the mobile phone equipped with 8 10 is the only one ... As a result, as soon as consumers got the mobile phone, it was exposed, and the frequency of fever decreased, which is common. The four A57 cores have made little contribution. If you don't reduce the frequency, some mobile phones can have a fever of 55 degrees directly, and frying a poached egg directly is not a problem.
The boss of the industry has a fatal problem, thanks to the younger brother who was originally backward. Samsung's Exynos 7420 and Hayes' Kirin 950 took the lead in adopting the more advanced 14nm process, which effectively avoided the problem of heating and frequency reduction. The models equipped with them are more popular in the high-end market, which also establishes the status of these two flagship processors.
MediaTek also realized that this year will be an excellent opportunity to hit the high end. I missed this year, and God knows how many years I will have to wait, so I quickly revised the product line name and carried out the processor Helio X 10.
Helio is taken from Helius, the sun god in ancient Greek mythology, whose Chinese name is Healy, which means to bring vitality and energy to the world. At the press conference of Helio X 10 in 20/5, MediaTek planned the future MediaTek processor as two production lines. X series is high-end, aiming at Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 series, and P series is aimed at the middle end, aiming at Qualcomm 6 series and 4 series.
This mobile phone caused an earthquake in the industry at that time. At that time, Li Nan, vice president of Meizu, ran directly in the circle of friends: "Weigh, don't give up the market, how to be high-end?" What they all want is not business, but dreams. " Obviously, Meizu, which is also an Internet mobile phone manufacturer, has suffered the most.
Turning the original flagship processor into a thousand yuan machine is unbearable not only for those friends who have already used this chip, but also for MediaTek's own employees, saying that Xiaomi "sells the advanced 4G chip sunshine as a boutique".
However, MediaTek executives still maintain Cai Mingjie's attitude of "customer pricing freedom".
Xie Qingjiang, vice chairman and general manager of MediaTek at that time, said: "I only have two choices, one is to count the banknotes with tears, and the other is to count the banknotes without tears ... Since tears are all to be done, it is of course best to count the banknotes."
Aside from outside comments, from the current point of view, Heilo X 10 itself is still a bit problematic. Compared with the 20nm process or even the 14nm process, the 28nm process is far behind, with only A53 small core, and its performance is a bit worrying. Although the running score is strong, the performance in the actual scene can only be said to be average.
In addition, the problem of WiFi disconnection is also an important reason for taking this chip as the flagship.
In 20 15, MediaTek's high-end road started again, but it was stabbed by red rice Note 2, which was very painful.
MediaTek is certainly not satisfied. In the following 20 16 years, the successors of Helio X 10, Helio X25 and X20, were introduced, also positioning high-end, and Meizu came to test the water for MediaTek.
Meizu's flagship Pro 6 is equipped with Helio X25, and its sub-flagship MX6 is equipped with Helio X20. The price of MX6 has reached 1999 yuan, and MediaTek has once again reached the peak of high-end. But this time, before Redmi waited for backstab, MediaTek cracked it himself.
First of all, we should know that MediaTek developed the concept of ten cores and three clusters in Helio X20 series. The so-called three clusters are divided into three kinds of cores, namely, small core with light load, middle core with medium load, large core with heavy load and ten cores working together.
It sounds wonderful, but the ten cores will only be fully opened when they escape. Most of the time, only one or two cores are working. Too many nuclei will cause fever and reduce frequency.
The so-called "one nuclear difficulty" and "nine nuclear onlookers" also started from the time of Helio X20. MediaTek's reputation among consumers has fallen to the bottom, and buying a mobile phone smells MediaTek's color change. ...
Of course, my old friend Redmi finally came with Red Rice Note 4 and gave MediaTek the last backstab. The red rice Note equipped with Helio X20 has once again become the standard of the thousand yuan machine in MediaTek since 4 yuan.
In 20 16, MediaTek encountered three clusters of architecture problems and the ruthless patching of Red Rice Note 4, and the high-end dream was completely broken.
After Helio X20, MediaTek fell into a three-year slump: Helio X30 used 10nm, but the shipment was only a few million; The mid-range P series chips are helpless under the fierce offensive of Qualcomm's 6 series and 7 series; The rise of Huawei Hisilicon has eroded the few markets in MediaTek. ...
From 20 17 to 20 19, there is hardly a decent flagship chip in MediaTek. At one time, people even began to wonder whether MediaTek was shrinking to the low-end market.
At that time, Redmi extended a helping hand to MediaTek.
The Redmi of 20 19 has been renamed Redmi, and the Redmi Note 8 Pro launched in August is not equipped with other processors, but the G90T processor of MediaTek.
Although this processor still uses 12nm process technology, the performance of two large cores A75 and four small cores A55 is still very stable. The flagship architecture of Mali G76 MC4 is directly used on the GPU, and its actual performance has surpassed that of Qualcomm Snapdragon 730, comparable to HiSilicon Kirin 8 10.
With the G90T Red Rice Note 8 Pro, it entered the top ten of the mobile phone sales list in the fourth quarter of 20 19, and the total sales volume of Red Rice Note 8 exceeded 30 million units. This time, MediaTek finally counted the money with a smile.
MediaTek re-planned the whole product line on 20 19, and the new series named Tianji will replace the previous Helio and become the main product in MediaTek.
Dimension, also known as Lu Cun, is not only the third star in the Big Dipper as a guide, but also a wealth star in charge of heaven and earth. MediaTek's ambition and confidence can be seen.
However, problems still exist. The negative impact of Helio X series was too serious before, and everyone had doubts. There are few mobile phone manufacturers that use the series of processors on a large scale.
At this time, Redmi 10X chose the first Tianji 820 processor, which undoubtedly gave MediaTek a reassurance. On the one hand, it ensures the large-scale shipments to establish the reputation of the cat series, on the other hand, it also allows MediaTek's own revenue to continue to grow.
For Redmi, this is also a great benefit. The powerful Tianji 820 processor can ensure that Redmi 10X is in an invincible position in the mid-end market, and at the same time, it can have more pricing space, so as not to be strangled by Qualcomm.
The formation of this win-win situation is inseparable from the mutual cooperation between the two companies on G90T, and also from MediaTek's own painful experience after Helio's defeat.
Looking at several flagship products from 20 14 to 20 16 in MediaTek, although they are positioned as flagship products, the actual quality is still far behind that of Qualcomm. Even if the price reaches the flagship level, it will not eliminate all kinds of problems.
Blaming Redmi's repeated backstab blindly, it is better to make the product itself first, and it needs to be hard while the iron is hot. Presumably, MediaTek understood this before making the series of secrets, and changed the previous stingy strategy in technology and core, so that the parameter performance and power consumption reached the real high-end level.
In this way, the pricing of 799 and 899 in Redmi at that time didn't wake MediaTek up after several alarm bells.
Seemingly love each other and kill each other, but in fact they bring out the best in each other, namely MediaTek and Redmi.