5 ms·

> They also have a CPU that is as powerful as anything you get in Desktop PCs. Is this actually true?

dmcy22 9y ago
Yes it is, at least when using Geekbench as a measure. The A11 beats some of the Intel processors in the 2017 MacBook Pro models. https://www.macrumors.com/2017/09/13/a11-bionic-chip-geekbench-scores/ https://www.macrumors.com/2017/09/13/a11-bionic-chip-geekben...
- ulber 9y ago
  Well, that makes the CPU as powerful as some processors in mobility focused laptops, not as powerful as "anything you get in desktop PCs".
  - InTheArena 9y ago
    I'm writing this from my linux desktop. It has 11k/3.8k for the geekbench numbers. This is pretty much there.
valarauca1 9y ago
No. Geekbenchmark is a bad test. It does a series of short burst tests spaced out over time. These avoid harsh thermal throttling on mobile devices, yet on larger desktops they don't register as a heavy workload so the maximum clock doesn't come into play. Bigger chips will stay down clocked. Effectively what Geekbenchmark's result ends benchmarking sleep state transition speed. Desktop/Laptops don't spin up/down as fast as cellphones so this heavily favors them. Just doing a continuous long test would heavily favor desktops/laptops as they have better designed heatsinks. --- iPhones do have great processors, just fair mobile/desktop test are very hard. They are different chips, that require different power, change clock states in different ways, and have different thermal constraints. The core workloads in most scenarios are very different, so fair for one isn't fair for another.
- SirHound 9y ago
  I might be talking from ignorance here, but if you put the iPhone chips in a different environment that included the same active cooling that desktop CPUs enjoy, would this still be true?
  - imtringued 9y ago
    Most arm servers perform incredibly poorly per core and are significantly less power efficient.
  - valarauca1 9y ago
    Unlikely. Modern X64 cores are super smart. Not just on _easy_ things, like predicting branches, and how data flows though instructions. But with caching, memory access, inter-core communication, cache snooping, and cache synchronization/invalidation. The real issue for modern system is RAM access. Everything you CPU does between hitting RAM may as well be instant how expensive a RAM hit is. X64 has a large cache hierarchy to make this rarer. A11/A10X/A10 less so.
Cieplak 9y ago
Transistor count is a limited metric. That said, the A11 supposedly has 4.3 billion transistors, which is more than IBM's 12-core POWER8 chip's count. Apples to oranges, since the A11 has far more application-specific circuitry and much lower power consumption & clock speed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count Ps: should be noted that the embedded GPU in the A11 contributes many transistors.

Yes it is, at least when using Geekbench as a measure. The A11 beats some of the Intel processors in the 2017 MacBook Pro models. https://www.macrumors.com/2017/09/13/a11-bionic-chip-geekbench-scores/ https://www.macrumors.com/2017/09/13/a11-bionic-chip-geekben...

ulber 9y ago
Well, that makes the CPU as powerful as some processors in mobility focused laptops, not as powerful as "anything you get in desktop PCs".
- InTheArena 9y ago
  I'm writing this from my linux desktop. It has 11k/3.8k for the geekbench numbers. This is pretty much there.

valarauca1 9y ago

No. Geekbenchmark is a bad test. It does a series of short burst tests spaced out over time. These avoid harsh thermal throttling on mobile devices, yet on larger desktops they don't register as a heavy workload so the maximum clock doesn't come into play. Bigger chips will stay down clocked. Effectively what Geekbenchmark's result ends benchmarking sleep state transition speed. Desktop/Laptops don't spin up/down as fast as cellphones so this heavily favors them. Just doing a continuous long test would heavily favor desktops/laptops as they have better designed heatsinks. --- iPhones do have great processors, just fair mobile/desktop test are very hard. They are different chips, that require different power, change clock states in different ways, and have different thermal constraints. The core workloads in most scenarios are very different, so fair for one isn't fair for another.

SirHound 9y ago
I might be talking from ignorance here, but if you put the iPhone chips in a different environment that included the same active cooling that desktop CPUs enjoy, would this still be true?
- imtringued 9y ago
  Most arm servers perform incredibly poorly per core and are significantly less power efficient.
- valarauca1 9y ago
  Unlikely. Modern X64 cores are super smart. Not just on _easy_ things, like predicting branches, and how data flows though instructions. But with caching, memory access, inter-core communication, cache snooping, and cache synchronization/invalidation. The real issue for modern system is RAM access. Everything you CPU does between hitting RAM may as well be instant how expensive a RAM hit is. X64 has a large cache hierarchy to make this rarer. A11/A10X/A10 less so.

Cieplak 9y ago

Transistor count is a limited metric. That said, the A11 supposedly has 4.3 billion transistors, which is more than IBM's 12-core POWER8 chip's count. Apples to oranges, since the A11 has far more application-specific circuitry and much lower power consumption & clock speed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count Ps: should be noted that the embedded GPU in the A11 contributes many transistors.