Apple A5 vs Apple A6X. Specifications, performance, tests

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

• Family
  Apple A series Apple A series
• CPU group
  Apple A5/A5X Apple A6/A6X
• Segment
  Mobile Mobile
• Generation
  5 6
• Predecessor
  -- Apple A5X
• Successor
  Apple A6 Apple A8X

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.

• CPU Cores / Threads
  2 / 2 2 / 2
• Core architecture
  normal normal
• A-Core
  2x Cortex-A9 2x Swift
• Frequency
  1.00 GHz 1.40 GHz
• Turbo (1 Core)
  No turbo No turbo
• Turbo (2 Cores)
  No turbo No turbo
• Hyperthreading
  No No
• Overclocking
  No No

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
  PowerVR SGX543MP2 (2 Cores) PowerVR SGX554MP4 (4 Cores)
• GPU frequency
  0.20 GHz 0.30 GHz
• GPU (Turbo)
  No turbo No turbo
• Execution units
  4 16
• Shader
  32 128
• Max. displays
  1 1
• Direct X
  10 10
• Technology
  32 nm 32 nm
• Release date
  Q1/2012 Q3/2012

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

• h265 / HEVC (8 bit)
  No No
• h265 / HEVC (10 bit)
  No No
• h264
  No No
• VP8
  No No
• VP9
  No No
• AV1
  No No
• AVC
  No No
• VC-1
  No No
• JPEG
  No No

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by Apple A6X and Apple A5. Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

• Memory type
  LPDDR2-800 LPDDR2-1066
• Max. Memory
  1 GB 1 GB
• Memory channels
  2 4
• ECC
  No No
• AES-NI
  No No

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A5 and Apple A6X to select a cooling system. Note, the TDP value refers to thermal watts, not electrical watts.

Architecture, interfaces, additional instructions supported by Apple A5 and Apple A5, virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Instruction set (ISA)
  ARMv7-A32 (32 bit) ARMv7-A32 (32 bit)
• L2-Cache
  1.00 MB 1.00 MB
• Architecture
  A5 A6
• Technology
  32 nm 32 nm
• Virtualization
  None None
• Socket
  N/A N/A
• Release date
  Q1/2011 Q3/2012
• Part Number
  APL 0498 APL 0598