Samsung S5 teardown: loaded with sensors

TechInsights’ Teardown.com got our hands on one of the early-release versions, and we were excited when we found ours contained Samsung’s latest version of its Exynos processor, the Exynos 5422 with its 1.6 Ghz 8-core architecture. This processor replaces the Exynos 4412 we found in our teardown of the Galaxy S4 and has 4 ARM Cortex A15 cores and 4 ARM Cortex A7 cores.

Teardown.com disassembled the Samsung Galaxy S5.
(Source: Teardown.com)

The phone also shows off Samsung’s SuperAMOLED display architecture, increasing from 5" to 5.1" with resolution remaining at 1920×1080.

The phone also comes with a bevy of new sensors, and we were excited to discover Maxim’s new Heart Rate Biosensor OS21A in our device. In addition to the Maxim socket win, we found leading parts from Invensense (MPU-65006-Axis integrated gyroscope and accelerometer), Silicon Image’s Sil8240 MHL 2.0 transmitter with HDMI input, the NXP PN547 NFC controller, and two wins by Intel with the X-Gold 636/PMB-9820 Baseband Processor and Power Management and the SMARTi UE3/PMB 5745 GSM/WCDMA RF transceiver.

The Galaxy S5 is so loaded with sensors that it lists a class-best functionality by cramming all the following into its tiny chassis. This includes WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, WiFi direct, Bluetooth V4.0, NFC, GPS, USB V3.0, compass, gyroscope, accelerometer, barometric sensor, humidity sensor, infrared, proximity/gesture, heart rate, and (take a breath) a fingerprint sensor.

Even with all these sensors, a bigger battery (2,800 mAh versus the S4’s 2600 mAh), and the slightly bigger screen, Teardown.com’s costing estimate is only $207.00. Please note this is the Exynos version with GSM not LTE.

With more than 14 variants of the phone expected to hit the market we expect to teardown several other versions in the coming weeks. Nonetheless, based on announcements and our costing database of current Qualcomm LTE (Snapdragon parts), we expect the cost of that device to only increase by about $10 to the US$215 range.

Teardown.com’s estimate of bill of materials cost for Samsung Galaxy S5.
(Source: Teardown.com)

Other design wins embraced chips in our Galaxy S5 SMG900H model, including the Skyworks SKY77615 GSM power Amp, the Wolfson WM5110E Audio Hub codec, Maxim’s MAX77804K Power SoC, STMicroelectronics’ LPS25H Pressure Sensor, Yamaha’s YAS532B 3-axis electronic compass, and Broadcom’s BCM4753GPS receiver.

We have found several Murata packages where we are hoping to uncover the latest Broadcom WiFi chips, and when we do we’ll post our findings on our blog at Teardown.com

About the author:

— Joel Martin is senior vice president and general manager of Teardown.com, a part of TechInsights that has been doing design, integrated circuit analysis, and bill of material costing for 15 years.