Apple A9 vs AMD A4-9120. Specifications, performance, tests

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

• CPU group
  Apple A9/A9X AMD A4-9000
• Family
  Apple A series AMD A
• Generation
  9 6
• Predecessor
  Apple A8 -
• Segment
  Mobile Mobile
• Successor
  Apple A10 Fusion -

Core counts, threads, cache and clock modes describe the CPU configuration. Performance depends on the workload and comparable measured results.

• A-Core
  2x Twister -
• Base Frequency
  1.85 GHz 2.2 GHz
• Core architecture
  normal normal
• CPU Cores
  2 2
• CPU Threads
  2 2
• Hyperthreading / SMT
  No No
• Overclocking
  No No
• Turbo Frequency (1 Core)
  No turbo 2.5 GHz
• Turbo Frequency (2 Cores)
  No turbo 2.2 GHz

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

• DirectX Version
  - 12
• Execution units
  6 2
• Generation
  6 7
• GPU Frequency
  650 MHz 660 MHz
• GPU name
  Apple A9 AMD Radeon R3 (Stoney Ridge)
• GPU Turbo
  No turbo No turbo
• Max. displays
  1 3
• Max. GPU Memory
  4 GB 2 GB
• Release date
  Q3/2015 Q2/2016
• Shader
  192 128
• Technology
  16 nm 28 nm

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

• AV1
  No No
• H.264 / AVC
  Decode Conflicting source values: Decode | Decode / Encode
• h265 / HEVC (8 bit)
  No Decode
• h265 / HEVC (10 bit)
  No Decode
• JPEG
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• VC-1
  Decode Decode
• VP8
  Decode Decode
• VP9
  No Decode

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by AMD A4-9120 and Apple A9. Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

• ECC
  No No
• Max. Memory
  2 GB 8 GB
• Memory channels
  1 1
• Memory type
  LPDDR4-3200 DDR4-2133
• PCIe lanes
  - 8
• PCIe version
  - 3.0

• AES-NI
  No Yes

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A9 and AMD A4-9120 Power specifications describe different manufacturer limits. TDP, base power and maximum turbo power are separate values; they do not establish measured system consumption.

• Maximum Operating Temperature
  - 90 °C
• TDP (PL1, legacy label)
  5 W 15 W
• TDP down
  - 10 W

Architecture, interfaces, additional instructions supported by Apple A9 and AMD A4-9120, virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Architecture
  A9 Stoney Ridge (Excavator)
• Instruction set (ISA)
  x86-64 (64 bit) x86-64 (64 bit)
• ISA extensions
  - SSE4a, SSE4.1, SSE4.2, AVX, FMA3, FMA4
• L2-Cache
  3 MB -
• L3-Cache
  4 MB 2 MB
• Release date
  Q3/2015 Q2/2017
• Socket
  - FP4
• Technology
  16 nm 28 nm
• Virtualization
  None AMD-V