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  • royalcrown - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    It doesn't have to be as hard as you think, for instance use Samsung A9s in the Iphones where there is more of a space constraint; use the TSMC A9s in the new Ipad Pro. That also has the advantage of making sure each device has the same Idle and leakage characteristics.
  • JoeMonco - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Except the iPad Pro uses the A9X not the A9 as used in the 6s models. So your explanation makes no actual sense.
  • Ancillas - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Who pissed in your Cheerios today? Here, let me help you out.

    "The iPad Pro uses the A9X, not the A9 as used in the 6s models."

    You could even go on to politely explain the other reasons why their comment isn't accurate.

    "Chipworks actually found two versions of the A9 in two otherwise identical iPhone 6s phones. Apparently you could get either when you purchase."
  • ToastyFlake - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Calm down now Ancillas, JoeMonco ain't hurtin' nobody.
  • WinterCharm - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Except there is an iPhone 6s and a 6s Plus which BOTH use the A9, and are two different sized phones.
  • JoeMonco - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    But as pointed out in the article this was about two of the same model phone. So, no, that is not an explanation.
  • Colin1497 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Not only that, but the if you didn't put them in the same package they wouldn't be interchangeable in production and you'd give up a lot of the inherent advantage of being dual source.
  • royalcrown - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    I really didn't say what they put in, I haven't been following the hardware. Just said how they could solve the problems Ryan listed, so it's still a valid solution even if apple hasn't done that.
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  • ddarko - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Except that's not how it's being done being done by Apple. Chipworks found the two versions of the A9 during its teardown of the iPhone 6s, to quote their announcement of their findings, "in two otherwise identical phones."
  • BillyONeal - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    This very tiny difference in die size is completely hidden by packaging.
  • FunBunny2 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Alas, this should have been the first comment.
  • astroboy888 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    I think Anadtech missed an important point from Chipworks article. (chip works also made a wrong assumption in their statement) The article says A9 (APL0898) is from Samsung, A9X (APL1022) is from TSMC. The die sizes are not comparable because A9 is a dual core and A9X is a tri or quad version of the A9* with more GPU processing cores. A9X will have much higher performance than A9. We have heard rumors that TSMC has 100% of the orders of the A9X. So this has been confirmed.

    We have also heard a rumor that TSMC is also producing some large percentages of A9s. TSMC A9 dies sizes are actually smaller and have lower power than that of Samsung's A9 due to inherent process inefficiencies. I am hoping Chipwork would eventually get a iPhone with TSMC A9 and does a decap analysis.
  • astroboy888 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Aww nevermind, I read incorrectly. Ignore my previous comment. They found two versions of the processors in identical phones.
  • Link - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    According to iFixit, it seems Apple used APL1022 (TSMC) on 6s Plus and APL0898 (Samsung) on 6s. Also APL1022 is not A9X.
  • psychobriggsy - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    "TSMC A9 dies sizes are actually smaller and have lower power than that of Samsung's A9 due to inherent process inefficiencies."

    I think this goes to show how internet rumours really should be taken with a grain of salt, as we can clearly see that TSMC's A9s are 10% larger than Samsung's A9s.

    The thing to take from this is that Samsung advertising their process as 14nm is accurate compared to TSMC advertising theirs at 16nm (I'm not commenting on Intel here). Previously it was 'common knowledge' (i.e., rumour still) that they were pretty much equivalent in terms of density.
  • ImSpartacus - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Is it impossible that a larger die perform similarly to a smaller one?

    I mean, I would assume that there are complexities that make it a nontrivial question, but I'm speculating.
  • Morawka - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    astro wtf are you talkin about.. chipworks clearly states the samsung a9 is 10% smaller than the TSMC model. And it's 10% more power efficient. Performance will have to be tested but your comments saying TSMC's are better is complete bull crap.
  • astroboy888 - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link

    Either of the TSMC or Samsung die are in exactly the same chip package and are pin compatible. So you can't really tell the difference from the outside. The iPhone6s/plus assembly workers just randomly picks the chips up and plug it into the system board.
  • shadowii - Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - link

    Thanks, armchair CEO!
  • MonkeyPaw - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Now what I would love to see is if there are tangible performance differences between the 2. Does one run hotter? Does one offer better battery life? It could make for a good investigative report, Anandtech. ;)
  • Margalus - Thursday, October 1, 2015 - link

    except they don't know which they have until they have disassembled the package, which is then too late...
  • SunnyNW - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Apple could have used one for 6s phones and the other for the 6s+ but according to chipworks this is not the case, and I wonder why...
  • solipsism - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    They chips are are equivalent components. Sure, there will be some heat and power efficiency differences (and even cost differences), but the reasons for this likely fall to "not putting all your eggs in one basket" to one supplier simply not being able to make enough chips for Apple's needs. My guess leans toward the latter. The only constant is that there is a "least common denominator" variable that makes the logic board for all the iPhones needing to support the larger of the two chips, but the additional footprint size isn't so large that it would make any real difference in the overall design of the device.

    The rumour is TSMC will be the sole provider next year with their 16nm process for the A10. I guess we'll see in a year. Additionally, maybe we'll find TSMC (or Samsung) as the being the sole provider of the 6S Plus or iPad Pro.
  • Link - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    TSMC is trying to go 10nm for A10.
  • Death666Angel - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Sure, and I am trying to shit gold bricks.
  • Peichen - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Did you eat gold for dinner?
  • name99 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    You really should be careful about comments like that.
    Since Apple got into the CPU business with the A6, I've seen an endless stream of comments about various things that are, supposedly "unpossible". It was impossible for Apple to design their own core, then to design a 64-bit core, then to design a core that's competitive with Intel.
    Likewise, to hear the Internet say it, TSMC (and Samsung, though they get less abuse) are supposedly doomed by some law of nature to always be lagging behind Intel.

    TSMC has publicly announced that they will start risk production on 10nm this year, which suggests volume next year (presumably for Apple). I remember just a few months ago people scoffing at the idea of TSMC having a 16nm FF node in volume this year...

    And you all have to get past this idea that Intel nodes are the measure of all things. Yes, there are some metrics by which Intel nodes are superior. And some (eg design flexibility) by which they are inferior. At the end of the day, the process is a tool, not an end in itself, and it's pretty clear from the A9 that both Samsung and TSMC's process, when coupled to a good design, can deliver results comparable to anything Intel can deliver.
  • name99 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Oops, forgot the link:
    http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1327725
  • solipsism - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Adding to that… Even outside of their A-series chips, for years we've read about Apple's unique position of extremely high unit sales for a given product paired with their efficient, lateral adoption of technologies across multiple product categories, and vast financial resources to invest heavily in other companies to produce components that were seemingly not possible at a reasonable consumer price point and/or at high volume. Their high-PPI IPS displays comes to mind.

    To name a few:
    » http://www.macrumors.com/2010/12/13/toshiba-and-ap... [13-DEC-2010]
    »http://www.theverge.com/2015/3/6/8161677/apple-new... [06-MAR-2015]
    » http://www.businessfinancenews.com/23530-apple-inc... [17-AUG-2015]
  • mortimerr - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Thanks for the post.

    Everyone was talking about how the sky was falling because Intel delayed a Tick, when I guess it seems like their clock, so to speak, is just a little behind everyone else's.

    Maybe, possibly...hopefully, now that Intel isn't at the top of the pack anymore will cause them to improve?
  • Morawka - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    TSMC will never be that fast. Their shrinks always take 2 years or more. TSMC doesnt have very smart engineers imo, all they can do is make small chips.. when they try and make anything over 110mm the yields get destroyed. Samsung is the future fab imo
  • astroboy888 - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link

    You must be confusing TSMC with someone else or just have no idea of the semiconductor industry. TSMC holds over 70% of the world market share on contracted semiconductors. For example, the inventor of the "FinFet" or 3D gate worked for TSMC and they were the pioneers of that technology.

    Break open every electronic device that you have ever owned in your life time, you will find that at least 70% of the chips are made by TSMC. (Even your Samsung phone!!!) TSMC products are all around you, you were born with it you grew up with you, but you just have no idea!
  • name99 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Exactly. This is no conceptually different from Apple using RAM from both Hynix and Micron, or using flash from both Samsung and Toshiba. Of course the product is question is bespoke --- designed by Apple and manufactured to their specs, not for sale on the open market. But once you get past that detail, everything else is the same.

    I think this shows the power of trying to do one thing well, rather than a dozen things sorta well.
    Yes Apple had to design two mask sets and run through two sets of physical optimization for this. But Intel creates god knows how many mask sets to handle every damn version of Broadwell or Skylake, from crappy Pentium and Celeron versions to the K versions. Sure, some of that is handled by just fusing off features, but at least some of it seems to really require masks that are putting fewer CPU and/or GPU cores and/or L3 SRAM on the die.

    At the end of the day, Apple's ability to have every engineer in the team optimizing ONE design (and TWO implementations) rather than splitting them across a dozen different designs seems to be paying off as much as the same philosophy when applied at the product level. Two designs here only seems like a lot of work when you ignore how much more (probably pointless) work Intel and QC and so on engage in.
  • Link - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    It seems Apple used Samsung on 6s and TSMC on 6s+ according iFixit.
    6s+
    https://d3nevzfk7ii3be.cloudfront.net/igi/kFywxSJ4...
    6s
    https://d3nevzfk7ii3be.cloudfront.net/igi/Yfme6TtQ...
  • Wolfpup - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    As per this article, that 's incorrect. That's just luck of the draw. You can get either in either. It doesn't matter.
  • tipoo - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Chipworks found two different chips in two of the same 6S model
  • ingwe - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Well I didn't expect that. Very interesting...
  • baconforall - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    For such an important product for Apple, yeah it does indeed make a lot of sense to tape out from two foundries even with the added cost of doing so -- especially for risk mitigration because of the sales volume of iPhones. Any delay or yield issue with only one fab isn't be such a deal breaker anymore. Just look at AMD and GloFlo...

    Also, with other fabless companies scrambling to utilize these lower nodes now that they are finally yielding a bit more, maybe they are somewhat forced to spread the love out.

    But sorry to the guys taping out the same thing twice on different processes. I can't even imagine the design rule checks at 14nm...
  • SunnyNW - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    I believe I remember reading on Anandtech, either in the 7420 deep-dive or galaxy s6 review, that Samsung binned their 7420 socs based on power characteristics with a rating system and a consumer device would be guaranteed to only ship with an soc below a certain number(or above cant remember). Therefore certain 7420 socs had lower power consumption on the power curve and I believe according to that article that this information could be obtained through the software...So...I was just wondering does Apple do this, is there a way to get this info from iphones? I apologize if I'm worng here.....
  • close - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Samsung sells the Exynos to other phone manufacturers, like Meizu. So there's a market for the lower binned parts. The Apple chips are Apple exclusive and I don't see them selling A9 chips to any other manufacturer.
  • GodHatesFAQs - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Apple could use the lower binned parts for future iPod Touches, Apple TVs, etc. The new iPod Touch and Apple TV use the A8. It's not hard to imagine these are the lower binned chips made during the last year for iPhones.
  • Wolfpup - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    I don't think they're any different though, and Apple goes YEARS between releases on those products, for whatever reason.
  • SunnyNW - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Also a question to someone more knowledgeable on the subject of die sizes and wafers. Is the die size difference big enough to produce more dies per wafer with the Samsung version than the TSMC version?
    I do understand yields play a roll in this but considering everything else being equal, not sure if the wafer costs are even equivalent or in the same ballpark but considering they were would the samsung Soc then be cheaper marginally for Apple, that is if the small size difference even would produce a good enough more chips per wafer...
  • Kristian Vättö - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    The gross number of die (i.e. not taking partial dies on the edges and die spacings into account) is 736 for Samsung 14nm and 676 for TSMC 16nm.

    Samsung isn't necessarily cheaper, though, because it depends on Apple's contract with them. My guess is that the pricing is very close given that TSMC is competing against Samsung with their 16nm node, so despite it being slightly less cost efficient in terms of die size they must be competitive in price or otherwise everyone would go with Samsung/GF.
  • SunnyNW - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Thank You for the reply, that was very informative.
  • psychobriggsy - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Work it out yourself: http://www.silicon-edge.co.uk/j/index.php/resource...

    You'll want 300mm wafers.

    I get something like 620 dies for Samsung, and 510 for TSMC (although I estimated the height and width a bit as I only had the area to work from).

    I don't know what the wafer processing cost is for FinFet on both nodes, but it is is $8K, then it costs $13 to make a die at Samsung, and $16 to make a die at TSMC. Of course, this is before yield takes effect, and yields could be widely different at each fab. Assuming 70% yield (it's a small die) at both for fairness, the cost goes to about $18 and $22 respectively. That's before you factor in packaging costs and R&D costs (but Apple sells so many chips that R&D per chip isn't actually major - a few dollars). The total cost of an A9, with 2GB LPDDR4 integrated in the final package, is probably under $40 each.

    And you can adjust the maths if it turns out that wafer costs are higher/lower than my $8K estimate, or if we get more accurate yield numbers.
  • astroboy888 - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link

    It is the other way around. Apple orders number of wafers processed per month and don't order on per die basis. For example, Apple may buy 20,000 wafers each month from both TSMC and Samsung. The effective unit cost per die strictly depends on yield.

    Just because TSMC's die is slightly larger, it doesn't mean it is more expensive. If TSMC yield is higher, then cost per die would e lower than that of Samsung. In fact, I suspect TSMC yield was probably significantly better than Samsung during their trial run back in April. It could be the reason why we are seeing more TSMC dies in iPhones 6s/6s+ today.
  • cfenton - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    How come Apple doesn't set up their own fabrication plant? Isn't that kind of vertical integration almost always beneficial in the long run? I understand that setting up a plant is extremely expensive, and that keeps smaller companies like AMD and Nvidia out, but surely Apple could afford it. Is it just cheaper for them to use their massive ordering power to get good deals from the existing fabs?
  • Penti - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Why use their cash for this? Who would use a Apple fab except Apple? They are not really a semiconductor company just because they design their own SoC. How would they beat both TSMC and GloFo/Samsung? Who would they collaborate with on process? They have also decided to pay out some of their profits to the shareholders. Manufacturing takes investments and risk, now players in Taiwan and other parts of the world takes that risk and has big bank loans for the investment needed in order to fulfill their supply contracts with Apple.

    Most of Apples staff is in retail. In that sense they are unlike any other tech company.
  • KoolAidMan1 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Fabrication plants would only reduce their profit margins. Better for Apple just to tape out their own designs and have someone fabricate chips instead of doing it themselves.

    Apple actually used to do everything themselves, construction and assembly included. They shuttered the last of their Northern California factories in 2004 and moved everything over to China. Its only recently that they started to do some production in the US, and that's still outsourced.
  • astroboy888 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Fabs is bad business. Financially it looks bad on the books. It is better to let specialists with scale do it.
  • name99 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    For the same reason they contract manufacturing to Foxconn and use Imagination GPUs.

    In both cases they are a large enough customer that they can basically compel the other company to do what they want (so they get the benefit of control) BUT they can also reduce costs by having the infrastructure costs paid off in sales to other parties. For Foxconn they can ensure that milling machines stay Apple exclusive for a few years; for Imagination they are the only customer for the high-end GPUs, but the low-end ones get sold to a few Chinese companies and help reduce overall costs.

    With CPUs there presumably wasn't a good partner they could work with. ARM, QC, nV all have their own agendas, and don't want to just be Apple's contract CPU designer...
  • lilmoe - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Unless Apple has tweaked one or the other to perform (and consume power) identically, it would be very interesting if someone can get their hands on one and do some extensive testing to see which one is better than the other.
  • lilmoe - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Dear Anandtech, we really need an edit button, you can add a timer for edits if you're worried about integrity...
  • V900 - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Both TSMCs and Samsungs newest processes use an older/bigger back end of line interconnects, and can't be compared to Intel's 14 nm process.

    Since they both use older interconnects with FINFETs slapped on top, they should be very close to each other in performance and power usage.
  • astroboy888 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Intel generation 1 and generation 2 both use 22nm metal. It is bigger than both TSMC and Samsung's 20nm back plane. Intel might migrated to pitch match 14nm in generation 3 or 4 of the process, but we've not seen them announce it yet.
  • lilmoe - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Who said anything about Intel? I want to see a comparison between Samsung and TSMS silicon.
  • astroboy888 - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link

    Generally when we compare semiconductor process technology per generation, we compare the 3 major "schools" of process technologies: Intel, TSMC, and IBM. Both Samsung/Globalfoundaries derived their technology from the IBM "school".
  • lilmoe - Sunday, October 4, 2015 - link

    "Both Samsung/Globalfoundaries derived their technology from the IBM "school""

    Sure, everyone knows that. I still want to see a comparison though. @V900 thinks that Samsung and TSMC have similar performance, and while both use a similar approach, history tends to disagree.
  • Soulkeeper - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    This is good for competition.
    Rather than rewarding the fastest/first 100% they are spreading the money to keep them both fighting and prices down :) I can't wait to see these process techs hit x86, ddr4, gpu's, etc.
  • kwrzesien - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    This is bad for GPU's, who would usually get the first crack at TSMC's newest process. Now we get stuck on 28nm forever. Apple is sucking up all the best capacity at TWO fabs now, not to mention a good bit at Intel too!
  • astroboy888 - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link

    Don't worry about Nvidia and AMD GPUs, TSMC has plenty of capacity for their 16FF+ line. Counting all of the Apple A9s won't exceed 2% of TSMC's total capacity.

    The Pascal/Fiji GPUs will be delivered on time and the gamer's will rejoice.
  • Just42 - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Its not all of that hard to dual source as long as you keep the analog delta to a minimum. The tools do a lot of work once you get the timing files from the vendors and your internal tools group and follow good layout rules . Plus the cost of the mask set (4-7million or so) is what ,maybe 2 minutes of sales for Apple. This is nothing compared to if one of these vendors have an excursion.

    Someone, please put a decent graphing power meter on VccMain and run the benchmarks and see what the delta is.
  • Vishalaestro - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Why can't Apple USE Intel for surfing the chips ,they have a far better chips compared to Samsung or tsmc.
  • Vishalaestro - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Edit:Intel,as far as I know has the world best process node so u still dont find a reason why Apple is not using Intel fab
  • WorldWithoutMadness - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Every stumbled upon the term 'money'?
  • astroboy888 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    The reasons are too long to get into. It has a lot to do with legacy. Every fabless semiconductor company uses TSMC's design rules over 30 years. In a way, the entire chip design industry standardized on TSMC's rules, spice models, tool sets, and reference flows.

    Many reason why transitioning to Intel is difficult. 1) software retooling takes about 2-3 years. you have to stay in bed with Intel for 2 years even to get your first product out. Do you trust them? 2. Intel being a secretive and paranoid companies often don't want to share what they consider as proprietary secrets. This makes specialized design tweaking very difficult. Apple does a lot of this to push the process to the limit. 3. Intel potentially become a "frienemie" - both a supplier and competitor. Question is when Intel is short of manufacturing capacity for their CPU, do they focus on their own production first or honor their contract to Apple? For these reasons, Apple prefers to work with the likes of TSMC - "pure-play" foundry. This way there is no conflict of interest.
  • Michael Bay - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    >guarding trade secrets
    >secretive and paranoid
  • baconforall - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link

    Something to note here is that tsmc is using their old back end of line metallization from their 20soc process. This is the limiting factor for the chip size. The reported transistor gate length of 16 or 14 nm makes no difference.
  • astroboy888 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    So is Samsung 14nm, using 20nm metal. Intel 14nm which is using 22nm metal.
  • tipoo - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    No, Intel uses 14nm for both FEOL and BEOL, unlike others.
  • dontlistentome - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Everyone is missing the most interesting thing here.

    This die is ~100mm2 on the same size process as intel uses for Broadwell. The Broadwell Core M is ~82mm2 - ie, the iphone CPU is 25% larger than that in the Macbook.

    Given the benchmarks are getting uncomfortably close for Intel, expect future Intel cpus to start fattening up with bigger cores and (finally) decent jumps in IPC. About time too - their cores have been shrinking in physical size at the same time as they've been upping the prices...
  • Qwertilot - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Probably all sorts of stuff in the A9 that isn't in the CoreM mind :)
  • tipoo - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    It's not on the same sized process, despite the advertising.

    http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014...
  • name99 - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    The CPU is comparable to Broadwell Core-M.
    The GPU is already twice Broadwell Core-M performance.

    And of course there's a bunch of stuff on die, from h.265 encoders/decoders, TrustZone support, secure storage, and ISP, that all aren't present on Intel.
  • lilmoe - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    The sad story here is that even with their well known shortcomings, they have absolutely no incentive to improve other than pushing their "newer" silicon. IE: the biggest competitor for Intel is Intel. Why? x86. If you want to build an x86 device, your ONLY competitive options are either CoreM or Atom.

    Zen is the only thing that might change that either by being better, or by forcing Intel to change their ways. If Zen's a flop, forget ARM-like progress in the x86 market.

    Either way, Intel has an obligation to be more dedicated in offering better value for their users (and OEMs). They need to scrap Airmont (and its successors) altogether and stick with an improved Core M series of chips with both dual and quad core models. One that is competitive in price with tablet ARM processors. Their GPU performance on Core M is nothing short of embarrassing. It needs to be twice the performance at least. I'd prefer if it was closer to Tegra X1 in performance.

    The Atom brand is already a turn-off for consumers and reviewers (whether being rightfully so or not). They should start fresh with the Core M branding. If they're insisting on using Atom, throw that to their smartphone segment.
  • iwod - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    I dont have actual numbers to back me up, so rough estimate or educated guess.

    Intel currently ships about 300M CPU per year. That includes everything from Desktop, Mobile, and Server. And I would guess majority, or Half of those are Haswell / 22nm.
    So on a rough estimate we are talking about 150M 14nm CPU from Intel. Apple is on its way to sell roughly ~200M iPhone this year, if we account for iPad Pro A9X, we are talking about Apple shipping more CPU on the most advanced node then Intel!

    I am not quite sure has there been anything like this in history, shipping massive amount of SoC on the most advance node to 200 millions of customer in a year!

    And remember Intel has never even rolled out a leading node chips which this amount of quantity!. Apple sold 13M of those in 3 days, and history tell us Apple will sell most 2Q within its product launch. It is no wonder why Apple hedge its bet with dual source Fab.
  • StrangerGuy - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    There isn't a shadow of doubt that the A9 will outship the entire Intel chip volume this holiday quarter. PC sales are falling and 14nm yields are bad as seen by the poor supply of 6700K.

    And it's kinda crazy to think about it: The world's largest semicon company outshipped in volume by a consumer electronics firm producing their own phones with their in-house designed high performance SoC and SSD solution.
  • Wolfpup - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    PC sales aren't falling. Where did you get that idea?
  • StrangerGuy - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/07/09/pc-sales-continue-to-fall/

    "Jul 9, 2015 - Worldwide PC sales saw their sharpest decline in nearly two years in the second quarter of 2015"

    "Shipments fell 9.5 percent, year on year, to 68.4 million units, according to the research firm Gartner. Rival researcher IDC, which doesn’t include tablets in its tally, tracked an 11.8 percent drop, year on year, to 66.1 million shipments during the quarter"

    Yup, totally not falling.
  • dontlistentome - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    I'm sure there is, but still - i'd love to see a size comparison of a Broadwell CPU core vs Apple A9 without all the SoC stuff ...
  • Dmcq - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Well you can see the size of the 2-core CPU in the Samsung version of the A9 at

    http://www.chipworks.com/about-chipworks/overview/...
  • zdma - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Even the exact same chip in different phones will differ in performance.
  • zodiacfml - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Interesting..yet not surprising. It is the combination of many factors for Apple to consider dual sourcing a very high end SoC where some of the reasons are already mentioned by the writer. It might also be possible that Apple has some new but niche devices which will use the SoC.

    I expect performance to be very similar as I'm sure Apple worked much to ensure variation is as small as possible. They have chosen a frequency and voltage where the difference would only mean to a website such as Anandtech.
  • Midwayman - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    This is frustrating. Chip lotteries suck. While performance shouldn't be too hard to match up, the power consumption won't. A few mV can make a difference in battery life.
  • Oxford Guy - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Maybe the NSA will have a slightly more aggressive monitoring suite to compensate? That would please Apple.
  • blackcrayon - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    That would only matter if Apple advertised a certain power consumption, and then either one of their A9s didn't meet it.
  • BillBear - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Intel really has to be kicking themselves in the butt here over their diminishing leadership position in silicon fabbing. It's an exceptionally capital intensive business, and only getting more expensive as time goes on.

    When they refused Apple's business for the original iPhone CPU, Intel funneled a hell of a lot of money into the coffers of the contract fabs, and those competitors are using their profits from that increased volume to get closer and closer.

    With TSMC beginning to ramp up a process node that is supposedly roughly equivalent to Intel's current node, things are looking much more interesting than they have ever looked before.

    http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1327725
  • Michael Bay - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Except it`s not equivalent, and when it finally becomes so, Intel will roll out 10 nm or whatever is next.
    Literally been here, done that.
  • StrangerGuy - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    Because Intel's process advantage is the end-all solution for a declining market with people keeping their perfectly fine 5+ year old PCs while the rest of the industry has bypassed them completely.

    Their tunnel vision to reign as the king of x86 has led them to be vertically integrated in the worst possible manner.
  • mortimerr - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    So if Apple is already bring the 14nm FinFET process to consumers how far behind is Qualcomm and Intel? The 820 I believe is, but that isn't out until Q1 2016 right?
  • Morawka - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link

    i'm glad apple did this dual source thing. It lets us know that samsung has the best 14/16nm process. TSMC can't argue theirs is the same :P.. we now know samsung is 10% more advanced.. Wish nvidia would use samsung instead of TSMC
  • theonetruestripes - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link

    We know the resulting die size is smaller, but that doesn't say which has better power consumption, yields, or performance (and each could have a different answer! Er, well, only two real answers are available, so um, well a mix at any rate...likely not a tie though).
  • TechJunkie4Life - Thursday, October 1, 2015 - link

    Found better information here.. http://www2.techinsights.com/l/8892/2015-09-28/zxx...
    They seem to be ahead of the competition again
  • saayeee - Friday, October 2, 2015 - link

    I guess one easy way to identify which process is better is to see which process was used to make the A9X. Given the lower volumes for the iPad Pro compared to the 6s phones it doesn't make sense to dual source the A9X and Apple would have stuck to the one with better performance.
  • theonetruestripes - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link

    Not really, the A9 being the first duel sourced CPU, and ~2 year design cycles will only show who Apple thought would be the "best" quite some time ago, before they actually started getting chips back! Plus "best" might not be best power consumption or performance, it might be lowest cost or most likely to not miss a deadline.

    In another year or two we might get better results from this sort of question...but the answers would still be distorted by Apple making business choices based on business needs.
  • KDaniu - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link

    The review could be better with more details ... e.g. power consumption under same load? Thermal under heavy load?
  • Sp4rrowhawk - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link

    Looks like there might be a big difference in battery life (~20%?) https://www.reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/3nn00t/li...

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