Qualcomm is sampling a high-integration mobile phone chipset targeting convergent consumer devices such as multimedia players, gaming devices, and cameras. The MSM7500 integrates an ARM11 application processor with an ARM9 modem processor, and supports embedded Linux, BREW, and other third-party OSes. It works with CDMA Rev. A networks.

Qualcomm in May said it would support Linux on its “Convergence” chipsets, following years of supporting only its own proprietary BREW RTOS (real-time operating system). Qualcomm dominates the market for CDMA chipsets, and along with Freescale has been gaining ground on overall worldwide mobile phone chip market leader Texas Instruments.

Qualcomm says its MSM7500 chipset has a power-efficient design that will help device designers wireless-enable a variety of consumer electronics devices, including portable video players, music centers, gaming consoles, digital cameras, and camcorders. Competitor Freescale positions its Linux-friendly MXC (mobile extreme convergence) chipset in a similar way.

The MSM7500 follows upon the MSM6500 chipset that Qualcomm announced in May, when it first said it would support Linux on its mobile phone chipsets.

Claimed features and benefits of the MSM7500 include:

• Supports digital camera sensors up to 6 megapixels
• Supports VGA (640 x 480) color LCDs
• Supports playback and recording of VGA video at 30fps
• 3D graphics acceleration of 4M triangles per second
• Supports BREW, Linux, and “leading third-party operating systems”
• 802.11, Bluetooth, MDDI, standard TV out, and USB interfaces

Qualcomm President Sanjay K. Jha said, “By addressing historical performance issues — power, display, speed, form-factor, network support, and multimedia functionality — the integrated architecture of the MSM7500 chipset provides OEMs with a solution that does not require separate chips or processors.”

 
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