Apple A11 is 6 core (2+4)

[greatnoob]

I have high hopes that iOS 12 will make use of the 8+ and X's screaming performance with some sort of multitasking feature found in iPads.

Also hope that the A9's performance doesn't magically start degrading on iOS 11 and newer because I can't see any new features or APIs/libraries that would be more demanding of the A9 than it would of the A10.

 

[Eug]

I have high hopes that iOS 12 will make use of the 8+ and X's screaming performance with some sort of multitasking feature found in iPads.

Also hope that the A9's performance doesn't magically start degrading on iOS 11 and newer because I can't see any new features or APIs/libraries that would be more demanding of the A9 than it would of the A10.

iOS 11 seems fine to me on A9 iPhone 6s but a few people are reporting small lags here and there. Much worse on A8 iPhone 6 Plus according to reports, but much of that probably relates it its 1 GB RAM.

 

[ksec]

iOS 11 seems fine to me on A9 iPhone 6s but a few people are reporting small lags here and there. Much worse on A8 iPhone 6 Plus according to reports, but much of that probably relates it its 1 GB RAM.

As always with new iOS release, they are only optimized for the latest iPhone. Subsequent release ( iOS 11.1 ) will improve performance across all iPhone.

 

[Eug]

EETimes: TSMC Updates its Silicon Menu: First 7-nm chips, EUV migration described

TSMC reported progress in 7 nm and extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography and bolstered a planar process that competes with fully depleted silicon-on-insulator at an annual event here. It also gave updates on its work in packaging and platforms for key market segments.

The foundry, celebrating its 30th anniversary, expects to tape out more than 10 7-nm chips this year and start volume production with the process next year. The chips include a quad ARM A72 core processor running at up to 4 GHz — possibly Huawei’s Kiron mobile processor — a CCIX development platform, and an unnamed ARM server processor.

TSMC sketched out what it called a relatively simple process of porting design rules and IP to an N7+ process using EUV that it could put into production in 2019. The process can deliver 20% greater density, 8–10% higher speeds, or 15–20% less power than its current N7 node. Compared to its 16FFC process, N7+ can enable 30% higher speed or 50% less power on an ARM A72 core, said Cliff Hou, vice president of R&D for design technology at TSMC.

As always with new iOS release, they are only optimized for the latest iPhone. Subsequent release ( iOS 11.1 ) will improve performance across all iPhone.

I feel no slowdowns at all on my iPhone 7 Plus. I did in the betas. They were noticeably slower, but the GM of iOS 11 feels just as fast to me as 10.3 for day-to-day usage. I have noticed occasional bugs though, but mostly in third party apps.

As for the 6s and A9, I'd be OK using that as a daily driver too actually.

BTW, A11 Bionic scores about 45% higher in Geekbench multi-core than my brand new 2017 MacBook Core m3. The Core m3-7Y32 barely breaks 7000. However, given that it has 16 GB RAM and PCIe SSD with speeds over 1 GB/s, it still feels decently zippy.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Where did you get this number? Last time I check Apple is close ( in unit ), but hasn't overtaken Intel (yet)*. The last 12 months it is likely Apple has shipped more transistor on CPU then Intel did.

Given how Intel is late with 10nm, PC market is shrinking, DC Market growth is slowing, AMD is gaining some market share, along with an Apple super upgrade, it is highly likely Apple will past Intel in both transistor and CPU unit volume.

And Apple's own GPU's will overtake AMD and Nvidia in unit sales.

Quite Astonishing.

*Apple's Number Excluding Intel Mac and Intel's Numbers include HPC and Data center, Tablet, etc

Smartphone volumes are just nuts. Apple alone sells some 500K iPhones per day on a slow quarter.

 

[ksec]

Smartphone volumes are just nuts. Apple alone sells some 500K iPhones per day on a slow quarter.

Yes, I knew the numbers are huge. We are well past the Wintel PC era in terms of volume. By 2016 numbers Apple shipped just shy of 300M of their Apple CPU, excluding Intel, everything from Apple Watch, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV etc.

However Intel still has 300M+ x86 unit sold by any estimate and analyst.

Like i said It will likely happen in the next 12 months.

 

[Eug]

Yes, I knew the numbers are huge. We are well past the Wintel PC era in terms of volume. By 2016 numbers Apple shipped just shy of 300M of their Apple CPU, excluding Intel, everything from Apple Watch, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV etc.

However Intel still has 300M+ x86 unit sold by any estimate and analyst.

Like i said It will likely happen in the next 12 months.

How many does Qualcomm ship?

This world of technology moves so quickly. Just 15 years ago, it seemed absurd that Apple would even enter the CPU design and manufacturing world again.

I wish I didn't sell my AAPL stock, when it was still well below $100.

 

[Eug]

Except most software Mac people use doesn't run on iOS and ARM. From office to Photoshop. And these software actually uses floating point performance in which AXX is just way behind.

Umm.. I don't think you know what you are talking about.

I have a 2017 iPad Pro running the a10x chip and a 2015 13" MacBook Pro (Broadwell)

No - there is no full photoshop on iOS but there is full Affinity photo and almost feature complete Adobe Lightroom.

The iPad Pro is much faster running Lightroom than the MacBook Pro. The difference was very noticeable. I was very surprised at the large performance difference.

Same for Affinity photo (although the difference isn't as big). The iPad Pro is noticeably faster.

I have Office on my iPad (ARM of course). I don’t like using it but the speed is totally fine. Speed of Office on iOS is not the limiting factor. The problem with Office on iOS is the interface. Without a mouse and pointer, Excel can be a total pain in the ass, even if you have a keyboard. And I have a keyboard for it, a full sized foldable one at that.

Up until recently, I was using Office 2011 on an 8 year old laptop. Excel and Word are OK. PowerPoint is somewhat slow with multiple large images but it is more than usable, and this laptop was my primary laptop until spring 2017. Note that the laptop benches at 1/4 of the speed of the latest iPhone. Even if there are things that are significantly faster on x86, brute force CPU speed can compensate on ARM now if you’re just talking about stuff like Office for mainstream business users. No, I’m not a corporate accountant with ginormous Excel spreadsheets, but then again most people aren’t.

For mainstream non-specialized usage ARM is usually more than capable to power laptops IMO. The bigger problem is software compatibility/availability, and the user interface.

 

[ksec]

How many does Qualcomm ship?

This world of technology moves so quickly. Just 15 years ago, it seemed absurd that Apple would even enter the CPU design and manufacturing world again.

I wish I didn't sell my AAPL stock, when it was still well below $100.

I dont follow Qualcomm so i dont know the answer. There are roughly 1.4B Smartphone shipped in 2016, if you exclude Apple that is roughly 1.15B, Split up between Qualcomm, Mediatek, Huawei, Samsung, Xiaomi.

My guess is Qualcomm is 500M+. Samsung, Huawei and Xiaomi are relatively smaller than Mediatek in terms of shipment.

Note: Remember Qualcomm used to ship 200M+ Baseband Modem to Apple as well.

 

[Eug]

Interesting. The A10X which is supposedly 10 nm like A11, has a huge fan in the 4K Apple TV.

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Apple+TV+4K+Teardown/97511

I was expecting this thing to be fanless, esp. given how thick it is.

 

[tamz_msc]

A11 is ~90 mm^2.

 

[PricklyPete]

As always with new iOS release, they are only optimized for the latest iPhone. Subsequent release ( iOS 11.1 ) will improve performance across all iPhone.

I’ve been on 11 for a day now on my 6s and it actually seems to be performing better than hay iOS10 (at least from a perception point of view). Of course one day is not enough, but I am more than happy with this upgrade.

 

[thunng8]

I’ve been on 11 for a day now on my 6s and it actually seems to be performing better than hay iOS10 (at least from a perception point of view). Of course one day is not enough, but I am more than happy with this upgrade.

No issues will th 6s plus here. In everyday tasks it seems a bit faster than ios10

 

[PeterScott]

I have Office on my iPad (ARM of course). I don’t like using it but the speed is totally fine. Speed of Office on iOS is not the limiting factor. The problem with Office on iOS is the interface. Without a mouse and pointer, Excel can be a total pain in the ass, even if you have a keyboard. And I have a keyboard for it, a full sized foldable one at that.

I totally agree. Spreadsheets are a pain without proper pointer controls off screen.

iOS has been evolving a very nice pace and the one missing critical feature, is a Trackpad/Mouse pointer control.

I really do think Apple must realize the ergonomic deficit this creates and it will be added in iOS 12, or 13.

When it is added, I will start considering an iPad pro, without it, I won't, because to be more than a consumption device, you want to do input off the screen for productivity.

 

[StrangerGuy]

A11 is ~90 mm^2.

Even if one considers TSMC 10nm which is AFAIK intrinsically very slightly denser than Intel's 14nm, Apple having 4.3 billion transistors in 90mm^2 versus Skylake 4C at what I guesstimate to be 2 billion tops at 122mm^2 is beating up Intel silly in implementation density.

 

[Eug]

DigiTimes: Apple-TSMC partnership started from home dinner hosted by Morris Chang, says Jeff Williams

Under the first deal, Apple contracted TSMC to fabricate all the application processor chips for its iPhone 4 devices in 2010, and the latter invested USS$9 billion and funneled a workforce of 6,000 people into the production of mobile chips at its base in the Southern Taiwan Science Park, successfully starting volume production of "almost perfect" chips within 11 months, according to Williams.