After pioneering custom silicon in previous Pixel models, Google could ship its own mobile microprocessor as soon as this year in the Pixel 6.
News of the Google processor, called GS101 for “Google Silicon 101” and codenamed Whitechapel, comes via 9to5Google, which says that it has seen internal documentation describing the plans. GS101 has been co-developed with Samsung and could power both Pixel-branded handsets and Chromebooks.
Sign up for our new free newsletter to get three time-saving tips each Friday — and get free copies of Paul Thurrott's Windows 11 and Windows 10 Field Guides (normally $9.99) as a special welcome gift!
"*" indicates required fields
The first phones based on GS101 are codenamed “Raven” and “Oriole,” and they could be released together in the second half of 2021. I’m hoping that these names represent the Pixel 6 and 6 XL as opposed to the Pixel 6 and 5a.
Regardless, Google moving past Qualcomm for its own devices is interesting. And given the push to the middle of the market last year with the Pixel 4a family and Pixel 5, I’m wondering now if the GS101 is more about saving money than it is about performance. Certainly, one shouldn’t expect the GS101 to compete with Apple Silicon, at least on benchmarks.
dftf
<p>To me, this seems like a "us too" thing from Google and makes little-sense.</p><p><br></p><p>For Apple, the M1 clearly makes-sense: run iOS and iPadOS apps natively on macOS, bring a major hardware component in-house and gain battery-battery life and less heat-generation to-boot.</p><p><br></p><p>But for Google, just… why? If they want better battery-life, how-about, you-know… actually putting bigger batteries in your phones? Many Motorola's now have 5000mAh or 6000mAh ones. And if you really want a cheaper model, maybe release one with a MediaTek CPU or something. But otherwise I'm not sure what they'll gain from this — and unlike the M1, I bet their own CPU will end-up being slower than comparable Snapdragons, similar to the "Exynos" CPUs we Europeans have stuffed-into Samsung phones over here, which mean the exact same model device is usually 5-15% slower, with battery-life reduced by the same amount, compared to the same model sold in North-America markets…</p>