Apple ax

Apple A4 is a package on package (PoP) microassembly developed by Apple and manufactured by Samsung ^[2]. The chip is based on the general-purpose microprocessor core ARM Cortex-A8 and the graphic PowerVR coprocessor. ^[3] . A4 was introduced to the public in 2010 as the main processor of the Apple iPad tablet computer; ^{[4] was} later also used in the iPhone 4 smartphone, ^{[5] the} fourth generation of iPod Touch music players and the second generation of Apple TV . In the second generation of iPad tablets released next year, the chip was replaced by the Apple A5 .

Apple A4 uses an ARM architecture core . ^[6] The first version worked at a frequency of 1 GHz (on the iPad) and contained the ARM Cortex-A8 core together with the PowerVR SGX 535 GPU ^{[4] [7] [8] [9]} , which was manufactured using Samsung's 45nm process technology. ^[10] When installed on the iPhone 4 and iPod Touch (fourth generation), the clock speed was reduced to 800 MHz; the clock frequency of the chip used in the Apple TV was not specified.

It is believed that the performance of the Cortex-A8 core used in the A4 was increased by Intrinsity (which was acquired by Apple for $ 120 million in April 2010) ^{[11] [12]} in collaboration with Samsung . ^[13] The resulting core, called "Samsung Hummingbird ", can operate at significantly higher clock speeds than other Cortex-A8 implementations, while remaining fully compatible. ^[14] Among other improvements, it is worth noting the increased L2 cache. The same Cortex-A8 core was used in Samsung S5PC110A01 SoC. ^{[15] [16] The} SGX535 A4 accelerator can potentially handle 35 million polygons per second and 500 million pixels per second. ^[17]

The crystal of the A4 processor does not contain RAM, but can be used in PoP microassemblies. On the 4th generation iPad and iPod Touch ^[18] and 2nd generation Apple TV ^[19], the processor has two DDR SDRAM crystals with low power consumption of 128 megabytes each (256 megabytes in total). The iPhone 4 used two crystals of 256 MB (a total of 512 MB). ^{[20] [21] [22]} The RAM was connected to the processor via the 64-bit ARM AMBA 3 AXI bus . The new tire is twice as wide as the tires previously used in Apple's ARM 11 and ARM 9-based devices. This was due to higher graphics requirements on the iPad. ^[23]

Apple A5 is a micro-assembly package on package (PoP), developed by Apple and manufactured by Samsung ^[24] . The processor was introduced as part of the iPad 2 tablet computer in March 2011, ^[25] and then the iPhone 4S smartphone. (The update sequence was the same as for A4: first on the iPad, then on the iPhone 4 and then on iPod touch. ^[26] )

The A5 processor contains two ARM Cortex-A9 cores ^[27] with support for NEON SIMD extensions, and a PowerVR SGX543MP2 dual-core graphics accelerator with a productivity of 70-80 million polygons per second and a pixel fill rate of 2 billion per second. Apple indicated the 1 GHz A5 clock speed on the iPad 2 technical specifications page, ^[28] although there is a possible dynamic frequency adjustment to save battery power. ^{[27] [29]} The processor used in the iPhone 4S is clocked at 800 MHz.

Apple announced that the A5 processor is twice as powerful as the A4, and that the integrated graphics accelerator has up to 9 times faster performance. Micro assembly A5 contains 512 megabytes of RAM LPDDR2 . ^[30] The cost of A5 processors at the start of production is estimated to be 75% higher than the cost of A4. ^[31]

Initially produced according to the 45 nm manufacturing process (model S5L8940 ). The third-generation Apple TV announced on March 7, 2012, and an updated version of the iPad 2 (designated iPad2,4) contain the newer 32 nm A5 processor model. One of the chip cores is disabled on Apple TV. ^{[32] [33]} On the processor case there is a label APL2498 , in software the chip is designated S5L8942 . The 32 nm option allows you to use a web browser 15% longer, play 3D games 30% longer and watch video on a single charge about 20% longer, compared to the 45 nm model. ^[34]

The Apple A5X was announced on March 7, 2012 , along with the 3rd generation iPad 3 tablet computer. This system on a chip has a quad-core graphics accelerator PowerVR SGX543MP4 instead of the previously used dual-core. A four-channel RAM controller is also used, which provides bandwidth up to 12.8 GB / s, about three times higher than in A5. Due to the new graphics cores and memory channels, the crystal has a very large area, 163 mm², which, for example, is twice as large as that of the Nvidia Tegra 3 . ^[35] Most of the space is occupied by the graphic coprocessor. The clock frequencies of the two ARM Cortex-A9 cores remained at 1 GHz, as in the A5. ^[36] Unlike previous processors, RAM in A5X-based systems is installed as separate chips, and not as part of a PoP microassembly. ^[37]

The Apple A6 processor was announced on September 12, 2012 , simultaneously with the iPhone 5 . It has 22% less crystal area, twice as fast graphics accelerator and consumes less energy than the 45-nm Apple A5 ^[38] .

The processor uses the modified ARMv7s instruction set ^[39] , and this means that the processor core is not a licensed ARM core, but its own development, similar to ARM Cortex; Qualcomm is designing similar cores (Snapdragon SoC, Krait core). Support for VFPv4 extensions suggests that the processor core belongs to the Cortex-A15 class. The graphics accelerator is a tri-core PowerVR SGX543MP3 at a frequency of 266 MHz.

The Apple A6X processor was introduced in October 2012, along with the iPad 4 . It has two Swift cores, like the A6, but, in contrast, it works at higher clock frequencies - up to 1.4 GHz and has a 4-core PowerVR SGX554MP4 model graphics accelerator. ^[40]

The Apple A7 processor was introduced on September 10, 2013 , along with the iPhone 5S and is the first 64-bit mobile processor based on ARM architecture. Command System ARMv8.

The Apple A8 processor was introduced on September 9, 2014 , along with the iPhone 6 and is the next 64-bit mobile processor based on ARM architecture. Command System ARMv8.

The Apple A8X processor was introduced on October 16, 2014, along with the iPad Air 2 ^{[41] [42]} . The command system is ARMv8.

The Apple A9 processor was introduced in September 2015 along with the iPhone 6s / iPhone 6s Plus . It was later used in the iPad (5th generation) . It was produced in two versions - according to the 14 nm FinFET Samsung process technology and 16 nm FinFET TSMC ^[43] . Contains 2 processor cores with 64-bit ARMv8-A architecture, Twister microarchitecture.

The Apple A9X processor was introduced in November 2015 along with the iPad Pro with a 12.9-inch screen ^[44] .

Contains 2 processor cores with 64-bit ARMv8-A architecture, Twister microarchitecture.

The Apple A10 processor was introduced on September 7, 2016 along with the iPhone 7 / iPhone 7 Plus . Also later began to be used on the iPad (6th generation) . It uses 4 processor cores, two of which are high-performance, the other two are energy-efficient. It contains about 3.3 billion transistors ^[45] .

The Apple A11 processor was introduced on September 12, 2017 along with the iPhone 8 , iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X.

It contains 6 cores, of which 2 cores are productive, and 4 are energy efficient. It uses 4.3 billion transistors manufactured on the 10nm TSMC FinFET manufacturing process.

For the first time, integrated graphics of our own production are used (instead of solutions from PowerVR ).

The Apple A12 processor was introduced on September 13, 2018 along with the iPhone XS , iPhone XS Max and iPhone XR .

It contains 6 cores, of which 2 cores are productive, and 4 are energy efficient. It uses 6.9 billion transistors manufactured on the 7-nm process technology from TSMC .

The Apple A12X processor was introduced on October 30, 2018 , along with the third-generation iPad Pro .

It contains 8 computing cores, of which 4 cores are productive and 4 are energy efficient. It uses 10 billion transistors ^[46] , manufactured on the 7nm process technology from TSMC.

• Atom ( Intel )
• Exynos (Samsung)
• NovaThor (ST-Ericsson)
• OMAP (Texas Instruments)
• Tegra (Nvidia)
• Snapdragon (Qualcomm)
• K3 (HiSilicon)

• Allwinner
• ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore
• PowerVR SGX GPU (used in iPhone 3GS and 3rd generation iPod touch )
• PWRficient , a processor developed by PA Semi , the company Apple acquired to develop its own ARM cores
• Rockchip