When is a snapdragon not a flower? When it’s a mobile processor.

You may know — or think you know — what a mobile processor is.  It’s the brains inside a phone.  It runs everything else.  And that’s about right for a first pass.

But what we have today inside a smartphone is not your granddad’s processor.  Not at all.

First, a mobile processor is not a brain, but a bunch of specialized brains working together.

Second, it’s much more than a brain.  Not only does it think fast, but it hands off tasks to the best specialist in the house and talks with the radios, which communicate with the outside world.

Third, everything that does any work at all has to keep an eye on how much electricity it draws.  No power hogs need apply.

This lean but mighty pack of thinking elements is like a cadre of Green Berets: highly trained, efficient, and deadly serious about what they do.  How else could this hardworking group provide you with all the great mobile experiences you've grown used to, like Web browsing, mobile applications, location awareness, visually stunning graphics and gaming, HD and 3D video, dual cameras, crystal-clear audio, and seamless touchscreens?

And, despite the egalitarianism of opportunity provided by U. S. law, not all mobile processors are created equal.  Some — notably those created by — are a confection of balanced performance, with specialized engines turning on only when needed to perform particular tasks, thus minimizing power use while efficiently handling the wide variety of tasks required of a modern mobile device.

In fact, now that I think about it, Qualcomm’s Snapdragon mobile processor lineup is more heart than brain.  All this functionality is crammed into one beating element that pumps life into the every other component in the system: the vibrant screen, the nest of radios that can speak the local language in any part of the world, the sensors that feel, hear, and see the world around.  Snapdragon comes in four flavors: good, better, best, and superbest, and it’s no bigger than the nail on your little finger.

If you could zoom in on the Snapdragon while it was working, you could watch as its different sections light up to handle various tasks.  When the system (because that’s what it is: a system on a chip or SoC) is in idle, only one tiny light is on, a sentry or beacon, watching and waiting for a signal to leap into action.  When a phone call comes in, only the specialized circuits for handling voice kick into gear.  A different group assembles itself for each task: a map app boot, a GPS address search, a Web page browse, or a song play.  Maximum on-chip activity occurs during game play, when the graphics, calculating engines, specialized processing, and communications are all going at once.

Despite the fact that a snapdragon is a flower, Qualcomm has created as the mascot for its product a small, snappy dragon.  When the Snapdragon line was introduced, the company put out a video of this dragon that pretty well captures the mobile processor’s characteristics.

Most people don’t know (or care) what a processor is or how their phones work, but they might be reassured to know that in their phone lies a heart, composed of built-in specialized elements working together to deliver amazing listening, watching, gaming, navigating, browsing, talking, posting, snapping, and even buying experiences without sacrificing battery life.

You might not look under your phone's hood very often, but you should at least check to see whether there’s a snappy dragon in there — or a power hog masquerading as one.

Disclosure: Endpoint has a consulting relationship with Qualcomm.

Twitter: RogerKay