Qualcomm announced a host of products this week at its annual Snapdragon Summit in Maui, including the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 mobile processor, Snapdragon AR2 Gen 1 augmented reality glasses, and Snapdragon S5 and S3 Sound Platforms. The latter of these three entails a number of software and hardware changes to Snapdragon Sound that should improve the experience of using Bluetooth headphones and speakers starting next year.
Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound reference earphones
(Credit: Eric Zeman)
Using a reference design Snapdragon 8 Gen 2-powered smartphone and reference design Snapdragon Sound earphones (both of which are required), we were able to sample some of the features while on site.
Spatial Audio
Spatial audio is a more advanced take on the stereo effect. Using virtualization, it creates three-dimensional sound zones that make it seem as if your ears are floating in a much larger space. Qualcomm says the revised version of Snapdragon Sound supports up to 24 points of localization, each of which can deliver a discrete audio channel.
Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound spatial audio demo
(Credit: Eric Zeman)
The demo required me to wear the headphones while directly facing the reference phone and then playing a video. The audio included a voice speaking through the headphones and it directed me to turn left and right as I listened. When I turned my head left, for example, the speaker’s voice remained located where the phone was and I heard it primarily through my right ear, which was closer to the phone, rather than remain centered between my ears. Later, the video also included a series of random sound effects emanating from the different localization points. This gave me the feeling that I was surrounded by different objects making noises in the sphere around my head.
While this is a simple use case for spatial audio, it reveals how the tech can be put to use in more immersive experiences, such as when watching movies or playing games that have multichannel sound. In these instances, turning your head or moving around will have a larger impact on what you hear when watching.
Some Apple headphones, including the AirPods Pro 2, already offer spatial audio on iPhones.
Auracast Broadcast
The second demo station showcased how the new Auracast feature will work on Bluetooth earphones. Auracast was developed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which plans to brand Auracast-capable devices so consumers will easily know which ones work together.
Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound Auracast playback
(Credit: Eric Zeman)
Auracast essentially broadcasts sound from a single source to many Bluetooth devices at the same time. One of the suggested use cases is TVs in airports. Rather than leave the sound blaring across airport waiting areas (and perhaps adding stress to those nearby), the sound could be sent via Auracast instead. This would allow those travelers who want to tune it to do so privately while everyone else in the area could be left in (relative) peace.
The demonstration consisted of a single smartphone broadcasting a recording to about a dozen nearby headphones. Auracast has its own pairing requirements, which we were not able to reproduce or see, but the audio was synced across the earphones perfectly. This certainly has potential. Think silent raves.
Lossless
According to Qualcomm, a growing percentage of earphone users want to take advantage of lossless audio playback. Many streaming services already support lossless, as do many of the smartphones available in the market. To date, however, pushing lossless from the phone to headphones and earphones has been left off the feature list. That changes with these next-generation Snapdragon Sound technologies.
The demo on site basically offered A-B switching between a lossless track playing back at a bit rate of 1.1Mbps, which is about 4x higher than the 256Kbps most “high-quality” streams offer, and a standard bit rate of 128Kbps. The difference in sound was palpable. The track in question was a jazzy song that included a female vocalist, a violin, and several other instruments. The clarity of the lossless track was infinitely better than that of the lower bit-rate track. The violin, in particular, was smoother and more lifelike in lossless while the vocalists voice was warmer.
Anyone who considers themself an audiophile should be excited about this upcoming change. Qualcomm wouldn’t say which of its hardware partners have committed to adopting lossless, but Bose is among them.
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Voice AI
The last demo station showed off what’s possible with Voice AI. Snapdragon Sound isn’t just about music, after all, it also encompasses vocal performance and quality. This feature leans heavily on the AI processing power of the 8 Gen 2 itself, which is crunching voice-recognition algorithms supplied by Sound Hound(Opens in a new window) in order to make on-device AI a possibility.
Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound Voice AI
(Credit: Eric Zeman)
Rather than rely heavily on the cloud for processing voice requests, which Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa often do, the 8 Gen 2 processor, Sound Hound, and reference smartphone were able to handle voice requests locally on the phone. This lowers response times dramatically and allows Qualcomm to really ramp up the complexity of potential queries.
For example, one of the queries was, “Show me hotels rated two or three stars that are available January 11, 2023, in Lahaina for between $200 and $1,000 per night that have swimming pools and gyms.” Try asking Google Assistant or Alexa that (I did) and you’ll get a lame list of every single nearby hotel. The Voice AI was able to take this same request and actually parse the lengthy requirements, perform the search, and call back the two actual hotels that met all the right conditions.
This last demo shows what individual phone makers and specific app developers can do with the power of Voice AI if they choose to do so. As Qualcomm said, however, the choice is up to its partners.
In all, promising audio stuff here from Qualcomm. We look forward to seeing which device makers actually implement these features when the chips ship next year.
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