A crash course on mobile phone architecture
A mobile phone is a complex system that contains several processors, each of which is in charge of different, specialized tasks. The main one, comparable to a computer’s CPU, is the Application Processor (AP), which provides general-purpose system interfaces, interrupts, and support to execute applications.
A phone includes various devices and sensors, such as Wi-Fi, NFC, Bluetooth radio, and GPS, which enable communication, geo-localization, and multimedia functions. In this chapter, we will focus on the Connection Processor (CP), which is responsible for managing cellular radio functions, data transfers, and connections. It handles call management, text messaging, and internet connections. The following figure depicts the series 4 Exynos processor from Samsung, with the CP (baseband) highlighted in red, which will be the focus of this chapter:
Figure 7.1 – Samsung Exynos high-level schematics
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