Qualcomm Technologies Inc. has used its Snapdragon chips to power mostly smartphones and tablets, repurposing them for more specialized gear such as virtual and augmented reality headsets. Now, it has doubled down on VR and AR with a new specialized processor designed specifically for them.

The chipmaker said the Snapdragon XR1, announced late Tuesday, is the world’s first “dedicated Extended Reality platform,” designed especially for AR and VR headsets.

Somewhat unusually, Qualcomm said its repurposed Snapdragon 845, its most recent smartphone chip, is still generally the best choice for AR and VR experiences. The XR1 is designed for entry-level AR and VR devices that only offer video and other passive experiences rather than advanced VR-based gaming, which is still in its infancy.

Qualcomm said the XR1 chipset is designed to offer better passive experiences by providing high-quality visual and audio playback capabilities, in addition to three-degrees-of-freedom and six-degrees-of-freedom interactive controls. The chip supports 4K video at up to 60 frames per second, 3-D overlay, dual displays and graphics application programming interfaces such as OpenGL, OpenCL and Vulkan. It also packs a Spectra image signal processor that helps to reduce background noise and results in clearer images.

On the audio side, the XR1 comes with Qualcomm’s 3D Audio Suite, Aqstic and aptX technologies, which enable “high-fi” sound and “always on, always listening” assistance. The chip will also enable something called “Head Related Transfer Functions,” which give the impression of sounds coming from a certain direction, thereby creating more realistic, immersive experiences, the company said.

“As technology evolves and consumer demand grows, we envision XR devices playing a wider variety of roles in consumers’ and workers’ daily lives,” Alex Katouzian, Qualcomm’s senior vice president and general manager of its Mobile Business Unit, said in a statement. “By integrating powerful visuals, high-fidelity audio, and rich interactive experiences, XR1 will help create a new era of high-quality, mainstream XR devices for consumers.”

The XR1 also relies on something called “heterogeneous computing,” which allows for different tasks to be delegated to the most suitable core for greater efficiency. So, for instance, artificial intelligence-based functions such as object recognition would be offloaded to the chip’s AI engine. The chip also features an ARM-based computer processing unit, a graphics processing unit and a vector processor for other specialized tasks.

“The race to AR and VR is in full swing and it starts with platforms first,” said Holger Mueller, principal analyst and vice president of Constellation Research Inc. “Qualcomm has thrown its hat in the ring with the XR platform, but now it has to show that it can get developers and independent software vendors to adopt and build on it. Qualcomm understands that game well from its other platforms, but AR and VR addresses a larger number of different player types, to it will be interesting monitor progress.”

Qualcomm will be showing off the XR1’s capabilities at the Augmented World Expo that starts Wednesday in Santa Clara, California.

Image: Qualcomm