Alleged 'A12' benchmark for 2018 iPhone with 4GB RAM pops up

AppleInsider

A set of benchmarks allegedly produced by an unreleased iPhone have been published, with the supposed results suggesting the A12 processor in at least one of the fall refresh iPhones will have six cores, and be supported by 4 gigabytes of memory.

A mock-up of what the 2018 iPhone refresh lineup could look like

The benchmark results from Geekbench 4, spotted by iGeneration, identifies the mystery device as "iPhone11,2," and was published on June 27. It is unclear which of the three rumored iPhones thought to be shipping this fall were the subject of the testing.

According to the results, the iPhone scored 4,673 in terms of single-core performance, 10,912 in multi-core testing, and a Compute score using Metal of 21,691. For reference, the iPhone X scores an average of 4,206 and 10,128 in the single and multi-core tests respectively, and a Compute score of 15,234.

The system information for the device claims the ARM-based processor has six cores, with a base clock of 2.49GHz, up from the iPhone X's A11 Bionic clocked at 2.39GHz. It is also notable that the processor in the unidentified iPhone has four times the L1 instruction and data cache of the iPhone X, measured at 128 kilobytes, but the same 8 megabytes of L3 cache.

At the same time, the supposed iPhone also seems to have more RAM than the iPhone X, reporting 3,748 megabytes versus 2,815 megabytes. This suggests that Apple could be moving from 3 gigabytes to 4 gigabytes in the new iPhone.

While benchmarking tools are generally trustworthy when it comes to leaks and rumors, it is still possible for the devices that pop up in benchmark listings to be faked, or more generously, an internal prototype that has different specifications to the final release candidate.

The existence of benchmarks are also not a guarantee that a specific type of Apple product is arriving soon. For example, benchmarks for a "MacBookPro14,3" appeared on GeekBench shortly before WWDC 2018 commenced, suggesting a MacBook refresh could be announced during the developer conference, an announcement that did not arrive.

Apple is expected to be debuting three new iPhone models later this year, centered around a refreshed iPhone X, alongside an "iPhone X Plus" equipped with a 6.5-inch OLED screen. The third iPhone is thought to be a low-cost model using a 6.1-inch LCD screen, and with restrained specifications to match.

bsimpsen

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

KITA

Motherboard codes:

iPhone11,2 - D321AP

iPhone X - D221AP
iPhone 8 Plus - D211AP
iPhone 8 - D201AP

This looks like the board to succeed the iPhone X.

ireland

Battery life gains are everything people want, at this stage. iPad Pro would be 15+ hours on light use would be ideal.

blastdoor

bsimpsen said:

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

It looks like Metal scores see a bigger improvement, so perhaps they focused more on the GPU. 

In any event, I was already thinking of replacing my 2 year old 7+ with an 8+ after Apple introduces new phones in the fall (I'm hoping they'll keep the 8+ around at a lower price). If these benchmarks hold up, then I'm even more likely to go with that plan. 

sflocal

ireland said:

Battery life gains are everything people want, at this stage. iPad Pro would be 15+ hours on light use would be ideal.

People who buy the iPad Pro aren't "light" users for sure... 

Rayz2016

bsimpsen said:

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

You’re assuming that Apple will put the fastest chip they can make in the phone? If it has more memory and a bigger screen then they might step it down to preserve battery life. The same wouldn’t apply to a processor fitted inside an iPad or a laptop since they have much larger batteries. 

Avieshek

Why does Apple ignore the L3 cache? Or even the lack thereof with L4 in an in-house chip.

melgross

If true, not an impressive boost from last year, particularly since they say it’s got six cores. I hope this is off.

melgross

Rayz2016 said:

bsimpsen said:

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

You’re assuming that Apple will put the fastest chip they can make in the phone? If it has more memory and a bigger screen then they might step it down to preserve battery life. The same wouldn’t apply to a processor fitted inside an iPad or a laptop since they have much larger batteries. 

Yes, we do. Unless Apple has totally changed what they’re doing, we should be expecting at least a 25% boost for the individual core, and at least a 40% boost for the GPU cores. Of course, we don’t know what else Apple may have done for specialized purposes, but this would be disappointing.

KITA

melgross said:

If true, not an impressive boost from last year, particularly since they say it’s got six cores. I hope this is off.

The A11 was known to throttle considerably under sustained load.

Geekbench 4 has pauses built in to avoid thermal throttling.

These numbers might actually be quite impressive if they're closer to the actual sustained performance of the A12.

Rayz2016

melgross said:

Rayz2016 said:

bsimpsen said:

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

You’re assuming that Apple will put the fastest chip they can make in the phone? If it has more memory and a bigger screen then they might step it down to preserve battery life. The same wouldn’t apply to a processor fitted inside an iPad or a laptop since they have much larger batteries. 

Yes, we do. Unless Apple has totally changed what they’re doing, we should be expecting at least a 25% boost for the individual core, and at least a 40% boost for the GPU cores. Of course, we don’t know what else Apple may have done for specialized purposes, but this would be disappointing.

Mmmm. I’ve never assumed that they put the fastest chip they’ve got into the phone, or that they run the chip they have got in there at full speed. I certainly wouldn’t assume linear improvements without the occasional hiccup. As I said, they might decide to slow the phone down if they don’t want to make battery larger. 

Bear in in mind that Apple don’t build gadgets for spec geeks. 

jameskatt2

The scores are a HUGE DISAPPOINTMENT. So hopefullly they are FAKE.

wizard69

melgross said:

Rayz2016 said:

bsimpsen said:

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

You’re assuming that Apple will put the fastest chip they can make in the phone? If it has more memory and a bigger screen then they might step it down to preserve battery life. The same wouldn’t apply to a processor fitted inside an iPad or a laptop since they have much larger batteries. 

Yes, we do. Unless Apple has totally changed what they’re doing, we should be expecting at least a 25% boost for the individual core, and at least a 40% boost for the GPU cores. Of course, we don’t know what else Apple may have done for specialized purposes, but this would be disappointing.

I would t call these numbers disappointing until we know more, even then these are bigger gains than Intel is seeing from year to year.  

Things to consider:  


1.  The cores could very well be 3 + 3 that is geekbench may be confused as to the number of high performance cores. 

2.   The GPU resilts are fairly impressive and are supportted with sound growth in compute.   This is a very good thing in my mind because GPU performance is critical for midern apps.  

3.   In all likelyhood a prototype would be running heavily instrumented code slowing the benchmarks down.  

4.   There is good reason for Apple to spend engineering time on other sections of the SoC.   They could have easily place priority on the GPU, AI/ML hardware, and other sections that have or are starting to see increased importance.   Im as guilty as the next guy when it comes to looking at CPU performance first but the reality is that the CPU is only part of the game in modern hardware.   Iphone couldnt even exist without the capabilities of the GPU and that applies to many apps.  

5.   As others have suggested Apple may have heard from the sheep and decided that battery life is important.    This could be a huge win for some users as the process shrink is rumored to do very well when it comes to power.  

Seriously im going to wait for real figures.  Sadly if Apple doesnt lower proces significantky i wont be seeing an iPhone in my future.  

ljc94512

From my memory, A7 to A8 wasn't that impressive either. The focus was put in energy efficiency (for the bigger iPhones with larger displays) as well as improved sustained load. But the raw performance increase was minimal.

GeorgeBMac

Apple never designs for spec performance.   They ignore it in favor of user experience. 

I wouldn't be at all surprised if they use this year to perfect, stabilize and fine tune the A series processors just as they are doing with iOS.   That doesn't mean they aren't delivering.  It just means it won't be as immediately visible, glitzy and flashy.

melgross

KITA said:

melgross said:

If true, not an impressive boost from last year, particularly since they say it’s got six cores. I hope this is off.

The A11 was known to throttle considerably under sustained load.

Geekbench 4 has pauses built in to avoid thermal throttling.

These numbers might actually be quite impressive if they're closer to the actual sustained performance of the A12.

No, it did not. All chips, particularly mobile chips, throttle under load, but the A11 throttles significantly less than any competing chip.

tycho_macuser

KITA said:

Motherboard codes:

iPhone11,2 - D321AP

iPhone X - D221AP
iPhone 8 Plus - D211AP
iPhone 8 - D201AP

This looks like the board to succeed the iPhone X.

Ummmm.... you have a Plus phone in there...
Sooooo, wouldn’t it be at least equally likely this is the X Plus?

melgross

wizard69 said:

melgross said:

Rayz2016 said:

bsimpsen said:

At 8-11% faster for the CPU, I think this would be the smallest generational improvement in the A-family since its introduction. Eventually Apple will run up against the wall or simply not need much additional horsepower, but I was expecting bigger gains, particularly in light of the rumored ditching of x86 in the next couple years.

You’re assuming that Apple will put the fastest chip they can make in the phone? If it has more memory and a bigger screen then they might step it down to preserve battery life. The same wouldn’t apply to a processor fitted inside an iPad or a laptop since they have much larger batteries. 

Yes, we do. Unless Apple has totally changed what they’re doing, we should be expecting at least a 25% boost for the individual core, and at least a 40% boost for the GPU cores. Of course, we don’t know what else Apple may have done for specialized purposes, but this would be disappointing.

I would t call these numbers disappointing until we know more, even then these are bigger gains than Intel is seeing from year to year.  

Things to consider:  


1.  The cores could very well be 3 + 3 that is geekbench may be confused as to the number of high performance cores. 

2.   The GPU resilts are fairly impressive and are supportted with sound growth in compute.   This is a very good thing in my mind because GPU performance is critical for midern apps.  

3.   In all likelyhood a prototype would be running heavily instrumented code slowing the benchmarks down.  

4.   There is good reason for Apple to spend engineering time on other sections of the SoC.   They could have easily place priority on the GPU, AI/ML hardware, and other sections that have or are starting to see increased importance.   Im as guilty as the next guy when it comes to looking at CPU performance first but the reality is that the CPU is only part of the game in modern hardware.   Iphone couldnt even exist without the capabilities of the GPU and that applies to many apps.  

5.   As others have suggested Apple may have heard from the sheep and decided that battery life is important.    This could be a huge win for some users as the process shrink is rumored to do very well when it comes to power.  

Seriously im going to wait for real figures.  Sadly if Apple doesnt lower proces significantky i wont be seeing an iPhone in my future.  

You know, I’m just going by the claimed results here, as is everybody else. If these results are correct, then it’s disappointing, unless Apple has something else happening in the chip that more than makes up or it, but otherwise, yes, it’s disappointing. We can’t assume that Apple has done other things to make this performance seem ok, because that just wildly guessing at this point. I’m just hoping that these tests aren’t the real thing. But in previous years, results coming out about now have been pretty close to actuality.

lets not stick our heads in the sand folks.

melgross

ljc94512 said:

From my memory, A7 to A8 wasn't that impressive either. The focus was put in energy efficiency (for the bigger iPhones with larger displays) as well as improved sustained load. But the raw performance increase was minimal.

They were pretty impressive when they came out.

melgross

GeorgeBMac said:

Apple never designs for spec performance.   They ignore it in favor of user experience. 

I wouldn't be at all surprised if they use this year to perfect, stabilize and fine tune the A series processors just as they are doing with iOS.   That doesn't mean they aren't delivering.  It just means it won't be as immediately visible, glitzy and flashy.

Oh yes, they do. That’s why they have charts of performance, and talk about it fairly extensively during the iPhone event. In order to have excellent hands on experience, you need the power inside to deliver it.