Apple A8X vs Apple A9. 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
  8 9
• CPU group
  Apple A8/A8X Apple A9/A9X
• Predecessor
  -- Apple A8
• Successor
  Apple A9X Apple A10 Fusion

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
  1.50 GHz 1.85 GHz
• CPU Cores
  3 2
• Turbo (1 Core)
  No turbo No turbo
• CPU Threads
  3 2
• Hyperthreading
  No No
• Overclocking
  No No
• Core architecture
  normal normal
• A core
  3x Typhoon 2x Twister

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 A8X Apple A9
• GPU frequency
  0.45 GHz 0.65 GHz
• GPU (Turbo)
  No turbo No turbo
• Execution units
  8 6
• Shader
  256 192
• Max. GPU Memory
  4 GB 4 GB
• Max. displays
  1 1
• Generation
  5 6
• Technology
  20 nm 16 nm
• Release date
  Q3/2014 Q3/2015

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

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by Apple A9 and Apple A8X. Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

• Memory type
  LPDDR3-1600 LPDDR4-3200
• Max. Memory
  4 GB 2 GB
• ECC
  No No
• Memory channels
  2 1

• AES-NI
  No No

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A8X and Apple A9 to select a cooling system. Note, the TDP value refers to thermal watts, not electrical watts.

• TDP (PL1)
  8 W 5 W

Architecture, interfaces, additional instructions supported by Apple A8X and Apple A8X, virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Instruction set (ISA)
  x86-64 (64 bit) x86-64 (64 bit)
• Virtualization
  None None
• L2-Cache
  2.00 MB 3.00 MB
• L3-Cache
  4.00 MB 4.00 MB
• Architecture
  A8 A9
• Technology
  20 nm 16 nm
• Socket
  N/A N/A
• Release date
  Q3/2014 Q3/2015