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What exactly are the technical specs of the new A6 chip?

post #1 of 13
9/12/12 at 2:48pm
Thread Starter 
Is it a dual-core? Quad core? A shrunk down version of the A5X? Or something all new?
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post #2 of 13
9/12/12 at 2:51pm

It's an A6. Completely different family and not an A5. Jeez, I forget what the name was… 

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post #3 of 13
9/12/12 at 3:19pm
Thread Starter 
Single, dual, or quad core ARM Cortex-A15??
Edited by Commodification - 9/12/12 at 3:42pm
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post #4 of 13
9/12/12 at 5:30pm
Apple A6 SOC (system-on-a-chip) POP (package-on-package) 32 nm (CMOS) LP HK+MG process ??? MHz dual-core ARM Cortex A15 CPU according to Anandtech.
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post #5 of 13
9/12/12 at 5:31pm

What  really wanna know is how much RAM the new iPod touch has...

 

 


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post #6 of 13
9/12/12 at 7:17pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MacBook Pro View Post

Apple A6 SOC (system-on-a-chip) POP (package-on-package) 32 nm (CMOS) LP HK+MG process ??? MHz dual-core ARM Cortex A15 CPU according to Anandtech.

They are guessing. They might be right but could just as well be wrong.
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post #7 of 13
9/20/12 at 10:52am

Looks like the A6 in the iPhone is a 1 GHz custom dual-core ARM CPU. GPU is still unknown (Anandtech thinks the likeliest thing is PowerVR SGX543MP3). ARM microarchitecture is unknown. 1 GB of RAM in the POP.

 

From Sunsipider and Geekbench bendmarks, the A6 ARM CPU core is about 1.6x to 1.8x faster than the Cortex A9 CPU core in Apple's A5 and A6 SoC.

 

It's an awesome CPU design indeed.

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post #8 of 13
9/20/12 at 11:03am
Originally Posted by logandigges View Post
What  really wanna know is how much RAM the new iPod touch has...

 

512 MB, I believe.

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post #9 of 13
9/20/12 at 7:32pm

  Meybe its quad core ARM Cortex-A15...

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post #10 of 13
9/20/12 at 8:11pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by huyao20123 View Post

  Meybe its quad core ARM Cortex-A15...

No. Geekbench says dual core around 1 or 1.1 GHz. Everyone's (Linley Gwinnep and Anand Shimpi) agreed that it's a custom design core by Apple. Ie, a unique microarchitecture implementing the ARM v7 ISA with VFPU 4 extensions. The core appears to be about 1.7x faster per Hz then Cortex-A9 and about 1.1x to 1.2x faster per Hz then Cortex-A15.

That's pretty awesome.
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post #11 of 13
9/20/12 at 11:01pm
Awesome is right!

There is a lot of guess work going on at the moment but I suspect that the fact that the core is custom was leaked by Apple. They are otherwise extremely tight lipped about what is in this chip.

Frankly I want to see these cores in a iPad, hopefully four of them. That and more RAM. I had to laugh the other day when it was suggested that an iPad 2 had about the same capability as two of the original Crays. So I'm walking around these days with my own super computer, the thought that the next iPad might double that performance or even come close to 4X just amazes me. Either one of my iOS devices effectively outperforms most of the hardware I've ever owned.

Enough nostalgia, I suspect there will be lots of probing of this new processor in the coming weeks. It will be real interesting to see how the GPU is coupled up. One avenue they have for the iPad is to use the dual cores but implement a much faster GPU. I know iPad 4 is a long ways off but I use it far more than my iPhone. The idea of turning this processor loose in a much faster iPad is just a delightful thought.
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post #12 of 13
9/21/12 at 8:16am
Quote:
Originally Posted by wizard69 View Post

It will be real interesting to see how the GPU is coupled up. One avenue they have for the iPad is to use the dual cores but implement a much faster GPU. I know iPad 4 is a long ways off but I use it far more than my iPhone. The idea of turning this processor loose in a much faster iPad is just a delightful thought.

 

Since the iPad has so many more pixels to drive than the iPhone, I think this forces Apple to have different iPhone (and iPod touch and iPad 7.85") SoCs then what will go in the iPad 9.7". It'll need more memory bandwidth and more GPU. So, minimally, the iPad 4 SoC will likely maintain a 2x memory bandwidth and 2x GPU as the A6 SoC in the iPhone 5.

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post #13 of 13
9/21/12 at 7:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shrike View Post

Since the iPad has so many more pixels to drive than the iPhone, I think this forces Apple to have different iPhone (and iPod touch and iPad 7.85") SoCs then what will go in the iPad 9.7". It'll need more memory bandwidth and more GPU. So, minimally, the iPad 4 SoC will likely maintain a 2x memory bandwidth and 2x GPU as the A6 SoC in the iPhone 5.
I think you are right, at a minimal Apple will shoot for a 2X speed up in the next iPad. I don't think it is impossible to see even more in the CPU end of things. If they really wanted to move out in front of the competition they would shoot for a quad core CPU. It sort of looks like they would only have to hit about 1300MHz to get a 2X speed boost which would hopefully leave room for more cores. Interestingly some recent photos imply that there are 3 GPU cores in A6, maybe Apple could go that route with CPU cores. Since the payoff from cores is highly variable with apps, one more core might just be enough to boost the majority of apps without adding excessive heat and power waste.
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