The A15 chip from Apple was found to be 62% faster than the competition as per an independent test that measured parameters like performance, efficiency, and graphics core improvements. This is a 12% gain over Apple’s own claim of the A15 being 50% faster.
The review, performed by AnandTech (via: MacRumors), revealed that while Apple’s larger cores are more power-hungry, they’re still a lot more energy-efficient. Energy efficiency was found to be improved by 17% on the peak performance states versus the A14.
AnandTech also noted that the system cache on the A15 has been boosted to 32MB, which is double when compared to the A14. This “dwarfs the competition” and is a “key factor in the power efficiency of the chip, being able to keep memory accesses on the same silicon rather than going out to slower, and more power inefficient DRAM,” the report said.
The L2 cache has gotten similar upgrades as well and now sports a memory of 12MB – a sizeable increase over last year’s 8MB. AnandTech has described this as “humungous” as its size is now the same as Apple’s M1 chips that are used in laptops. The 12MB figure also means that it’s twice as large as the L2 cache memory found on the Snapdragon 888.
These cache enhancements allow the A15 to squeeze out impressive gains from a performance core microarchitecture that isn’t all that different from last year’s A14. This is joined by an additional integer ALU and a faster memory subsystem in the efficiency cores that further add to the gains.
The GPU bundled with the A15 has also noted significant boosts in performance that are once again well above Apple’s claims. The only gripe about it is its bad thermal management that leads to throttling on at least the iPhone 13 Pro.
Despite this, the iPhone 13 models were still found to be “vastly faster and give out a better gaming experience than competitive phones.”
In conclusion, the substantial performance and efficiency improvements of the Apple A15 chip are the key to the vastly improved battery life seen on the iPhone 13 series.
RELATED:
- Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max becomes the display leader on DxOMark
- Over 200,000 Apple iPhone 12 series units sold during Flipkart Big Billion Day Sale in India
- Intel tries to poach Apple users in its latest marketing video
- Apple makes more money via gaming than Sony, Nintendo, Microsoft, Activision combined
