Rumor: Qualcomm is working on 12-core PC CPU codenamed Hamoa

Qualcomm is reportedly working on a “promising” 12-core desktop or laptop CPU based on Nuvia’s Phoenix design. The chipset is set to hit the market in 2024 and would have memory and cache configurations similar to those of the Apple M1 soc.

The Snapdragon maker works according to leaker Kuba Wojciechowski to the desktop CPU codenamed Hamoa, which the usually knowledgeable WinFuture journalist Roland Quandt confirms. It would be a chipset consisting of eight performance cores and four energy-efficient cores. There would also be support for DGPUs. Incidentally, Qualcomm itself already announced in 2021 that it was working on an M1 competitor, although it has remained silent since then about entering the PC market.

That reportedly has to do with the acquisition of Nuvia, a chip designer with several ex-Apple employees in top positions. Qualcomm was recently sued by Arm; acquiring Nuvia would give Qualcomm information about Arm’s chip design, which would violate previous licensing agreements.

In other news: Qualcomm’s working on a 2024 desktop chip codename “Hamoa” with up to 12 (8P+4E) in-house cores (based on the Nuvia Phoenix design), similar mem/cache config as M1, explicit support for dGPUs and performance that is “extremely promising”, according to my sources.

— Kuba Wojciechowski⚡ (@Za_Raczke) Nov 6, 2022