Galaxy S6 uses Samsung’s own modem instead of one from Qualcomm

BY Rajesh Pandey

Published 3 Apr 2015

Galaxy S6 tear down from Chipworks

The folks over at Chipworks have torn down the Galaxy S6, and had a deeper look at its internals — revealing some very interesting details about Samsung’s latest flagship.

A close look at all the chips used inside the Galaxy S6 reveals that the handset is the most ‘Samsung-est’ handset ever. Apart from the Exynos 7420 SoC, the 3Gb LPDDR4 RAM chip, image processor, Wi-Fi module and even the modem are made by Samsung.

While Samsung has used its Exynos chipsets inside its handsets earlier, it has always paired them up with a baseband/modem from Qualcomm. However, for the Galaxy S6, Samsung has used its own modem dubbed the Shannon 333. Other components related to the modem like the PMIC, RF Transceiver and envelope tracking IC are all made by the Korean company as well.

Thanks to the overheating issues of the Snapdragon 810, Qualcomm not only lost the contract to supply Samsung with chipsets for the Galaxy S6, but it looks like it also lost the contract to supply the Korean company with its Snapdragon modems.

Below is the full list of all the chips that Samsung has used inside the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 edge:

  • Samsung Exynos 7420 SoC

  • Samsung K3RG3G30MM-DGCH 3Gb LPDDR4 SDRAM and Samsung KLUBG4G1BD 32GB NAND Flash

  • Samsung Shannon 333 Modem, Shannon 533 PMIC, Samsung S2MPS15 PMIC, Samsung Shannon 928 RF Transceiver and Samsung Shannon 710 Envelope Tracking IC

  • Broadcom BCM4773 GNSS Location Hub

  • InvenSense MPU-6500 Gyro + Accelerometer

  • Skyworks SKY78042 Multimode Multiband (MMMB) Front-End Module (FEM)

  • Avago AFEM-9020 PAM and Avago ACPM-7007 PAM

  • Samsung C2N8B6 Image Processor

  • Maxim MAX98505 Class DG Audio Amplifier and Maxim MAX77843 Companion PMIC

  • Samsung Electro-Mechanics 3853B5 Wi-Fi Module

  • N5DDPS2 (Likely Samsung NFC Controller (P/N needs to be confirmed)

  • Wolfson WM1840 Audio CODEC

  • Texas Instruments BQ51221 Single Chip Wireless Power Receiver

  • Skyworks SKY13415 Antenna Switch

  • STMicro FT6BH Touch Screen Controller

Samsung’s latest flagship also comes with Wolfson audio codec — a company whose name is unanimous with quality music. While there are a lot of other factor that can influence the final output, the Galaxy S6 is likely going to playback music through headphones and line-out with remarkable quality.

The folks from Chipworks also speculate that the Exynos 7420 has been fabricated at Globalfoundries factories, instead of Samsung’s own factories, based on the markings of the chip.

Make sure to head over to Chipworks for some in-depth look and analysis of all the various components used by Samsung inside the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 edge.