Apple A15 Bionic vs Intel Core i9-12900K. Specifications, performance, tests

Background information about the processors being compared, series, generation and market segment.

• Segment
  Mobile Desktop / Server
• Family
  Apple A series Intel Core i9
• Generation
  15 12
• CPU group
  Apple A15 Intel Core i 12000
• Predecessor
  Apple A14 Bionic Intel Core i9-11900K
• Successor
  -- Intel Core i9-13900K

Basic parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base and turbo frequency, and cache size. These parameters indirectly tell about the speed of the processor, the higher they are the better.

• Frequency
  3.23 GHz 3.70 GHz
• CPU Cores
  6 16
• Turbo (1 Core)
  No turbo 5.30 GHz
• CPU Threads
  6 24
• Hyperthreading
  No Yes
• Overclocking
  No Yes
• Core architecture
  hybrid (big.LITTLE) hybrid (big.LITTLE)
• A core
  2x Avalanche 8x Golden Cove
• B core
  4x Blizzard 8x Gracemont

Internal Graphics does not affect the performance of the CPU, performs the work of the graphics card in its absence or on mobile devices.

• GPU name
  Apple A15 (5 GPU Cores) Intel Iris Xe Graphics 32 (Alder Lake S)
• GPU frequency
  1.80 GHz 0.40 GHz
• GPU (Turbo)
  3.20 GHz 1.45 GHz
• Execution units
  5 32
• Shader
  0 256
• Max. GPU Memory
  8 GB 16 GB
• Max. displays
  3 4
• Generation
  12 12
• DirectX Version
  12
• Technology
  5 nm 10 nm
• Release date
  Q3/2021 Q4/2021

Built-in codecs used to encode and decode content. Significantly speeds up the required operations.

• h265 / HEVC (8 bit)
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• h265 / HEVC (10 bit)
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• h264
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• VP9
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• VP8
  Decode / Encode Decode
• AV1
  Decode Decode
• AVC
  Decode Decode / Encode
• VC-1
  Decode Decode
• JPEG
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by Intel Core i9-12900K and Apple A15 Bionic. Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

• Memory type
  LPDDR4X-4266 DDR4-3200DDR5-4800
• Max. Memory
  8 GB 256 GB
• ECC
  No No
• Memory channels
  2 2
• PCIe version
  5.0
• PCIe lanes
  20

• AES-NI
  No Yes

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A15 Bionic and Intel Core i9-12900K to select a cooling system. Note, the TDP value refers to thermal watts, not electrical watts.

• TDP (PL1)
  8.5 W 125 W
• TDP (PL2)
  -- 228 W / 56 s
• Tjunction max.
  -- 100 °C

Architecture, interfaces, additional instructions supported by Apple A15 Bionic and Apple A15 Bionic, virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Instruction set (ISA)
  x86-64 (64 bit) x86-64 (64 bit)
• Virtualization
  None VT-x, VT-x EPT, VT-d
• ISA extensions
  SSE4.1, SSE4.2, AVX2, AVX2+
• L2-Cache
  4.00 MB 3.75 MB
• L3-Cache
  -- 30.00 MB
• Architecture
  A15 Alder Lake S
• Technology
  5 nm 10 nm
• Socket
  N/A LGA 1700
• Release date
  Q3/2021 Q4/2021
• Part Number
  -- BX8071512900K