Stefan Mileschin

It's been an eventful few months for Qualcomm – back in December the company had unveiled the first reference designs of the Snapdragon 855 and demonstrated integration with the 5G X50 modem. It’s easy to forget that the X50 modem has had quite of a long time to market, as we had first reported on the chipset way back in October 2016.

One of the bigger draw-backs of the X50 modem was the fact that it was a 5G only modem – meaning it only had support for 5G NR communication standards, and it had to be paired with the modem inside the Snapdragon 855 in order to offer full network compatibility. This resulted in some awkward solutions such as the Moto 5G Mod, which to say doesn’t represent the most elegant implementation from an engineering stand-point.

Today Qualcomm looks to address this major concern with the announcement of the new second-generation X55 modem: A full standalone multi-mode modem solution. The X55 differs from the X50 in that it supports all communication standards, from 2G, 3G, 4G to the newest 5G standards, no longer requiring the chip to work in combination with a Snapdragon SoC modem. The modem’s 4G capability has also been improved, offering UE LTE Category 22 speeds of up to 2.5Gbps via 8xCA at 256QAM.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/13966...nces-x55-modem