Apple A9X 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
  9 8
• CPU group
  Apple A9/A9X Apple A8/A8X
• Predecessor
  Apple A8X Apple A7
• Successor
  Apple A10X Fusion 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
  2.16 GHz 1.10 GHz
• CPU Cores
  2 2
• Turbo (1 Core)
  2.26 GHz 1.50 GHz
• CPU Threads
  2 2
• Turbo (2 Cores)
  2.26 GHz 1.50 GHz
• Hyperthreading
  No No
• Overclocking
  No No
• Core architecture
  normal normal
• A core
  2x Twister 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
  Apple A9X Apple A8
• GPU frequency
  0.65 GHz 0.53 GHz
• GPU (Turbo)
  No turbo No turbo
• Execution units
  12 4
• Shader
  384 128
• Max. GPU Memory
  4 GB 4 GB
• Max. displays
  1 1
• Generation
  6 5
• Technology
  16 nm 20 nm
• Release date
  Q3/2015 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
  Decode / Encode Decode
• VP9
  No No
• VP8
  Decode No
• AV1
  No No
• AVC
  Decode Decode
• VC-1
  Decode Decode
• JPEG
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by Apple A8 and Apple A9X. Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

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

• AES-NI
  No No

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A9X and Apple A8 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 A9X and Apple A9X, virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Instruction set (ISA)
  x86-64 (64 bit) x86-64 (64 bit)
• Virtualization
  None None
• L2-Cache
  3.00 MB 1.00 MB
• L3-Cache
  -- 4.00 MB
• Architecture
  A9 A8
• Technology
  16 nm 20 nm
• Socket
  N/A N/A
• Release date
  Q3/2015 Q3/2014