Apple A7 vs Apple A8. Specifications, performance, tests

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

• Segment
  Mobile Mobile
• Family
  Apple A series Apple A series
• Generation
  7 8
• CPU group
  Apple A7 Apple A8/A8X
• Predecessor
  -- Apple A7
• Successor
  Apple A8 Apple A9

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
  1.30 GHz 1.10 GHz
• CPU Cores
  2 2
• Turbo (1 Core)
  1.40 GHz 1.50 GHz
• CPU Threads
  2 2
• Turbo (2 Cores)
  1.40 GHz 1.50 GHz
• Hyperthreading
  No No
• Overclocking
  No No
• Core architecture
  normal normal
• A core
  2x Cyclone 2x Typhoon

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 G6430 Apple A8
• GPU frequency
  0.45 GHz 0.53 GHz
• GPU (Turbo)
  0.45 GHz No turbo
• Execution units
  4 4
• Shader
  64 128
• Max. GPU Memory
  -- 4 GB
• Max. displays
  1 1
• Generation
  5
• DirectX Version
  10
• Technology
  28 nm 20 nm
• Release date
  Q3/2013 Q3/2014

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 Decode
• VP9
  No No
• VP8
  No No
• AV1
  No No
• AVC
  No Decode
• VC-1
  No Decode
• JPEG
  No Decode / Encode

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by Apple A8 and Apple A7. Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

• Memory type
  LPDDR3-1333 LPDDR3-1600
• Max. Memory
  1 GB 2 GB
• ECC
  No No
• Memory channels
  1 1

• AES-NI
  No No

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A7 and Apple A8 to select a cooling system. Note, the TDP value refers to thermal watts, not electrical watts.

• TDP (PL1)
  5 W

Architecture, interfaces, additional instructions supported by Apple A7 and Apple A7, virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Instruction set (ISA)
  x86-64 (64 bit) x86-64 (64 bit)
• Virtualization
  None None
• L2-Cache
  1.00 MB 1.00 MB
• L3-Cache
  4.00 MB 4.00 MB
• Architecture
  A7 A8
• Technology
  28 nm 20 nm
• Socket
  N/A N/A
• Release date
  Q3/2013 Q3/2014
• Part Number
  S5L8960X --