Qualcomm's New Silicon Could Allow For 4G World Phone Connectivity For iDevices
by Brent Dirks
February 21, 2012
Today, Qualcomm announced its newest wireless baseband chip, the fifth revision of the Gobi reference platform. Offering backwards-compatibility and support for TD-SCDMA, TD-LTE, LTE on FDD and TDD, the chip sports built-in GPS capability. The chip could also possibly connect to LTE locally along with 3G networks across the globe.
As 9to5Mac reports, Qualcomm said the chip is designed to work with Windows 8 and Android devices, along with the company’s own Snapdragon system-on-a-chip solution. But a future iPad or iPhone could use the chip for multiple carriers with different frequencies across the globe.
The chip could also hypothetically quell issues for Apple in the huge China market. The more than 655 million subscribers of the world’s largest carrier, China Mobile, also still do not have access to an iPhone since the carrier uses incompatible networks. But Qulacomm’s new chip would solve all of those issues.
Apple just recently had to modify the iPhone 4S for a launch on China Telcom this March.
Are you excited about the possibility of connecting anywhere in the world with a 4G iPhone or iPad?
We’ll be seeing soon, most likely on March 7, whether the iPad 3 will be sporting Qualcomm’s latest silicon. As of now, most rumors are pegging the new iPad with 4G LTE connectivity. And the iPhone 5 is now rumored for a release sometime this fall.
