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A Closer Look at Apple's A7 Chip from the iPhone 5s
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Agreed. SRAM is most likely used for things like processing camera images, analyzing fingerprint data, and/or other high performance chores.
Almost all high tech science throughout the 20th century on it's day would seem like science fiction if you went back 30 years prior to that day.
Dont forget ARM
ARM Holdings (a British company) actually owns the basic design for the chip and licenses it to Apple which customizes and refines the design.
ARM Holdings (a British company) actually owns the basic design for the chip and licenses it to Apple which customizes and refines the design.
apple and a few other companies have special ARM licenses where they can develop their own chip architecture that works with the ARM instruction set. samsung and others license the CPU design, tweak it a little and sell it
No. Samsung simply threw all their suppliers' ideas together and churn it out quickly. Wireless charging that doesn't quite work, waterproofing that is not entirely watertight, Android OS that is patched with Samsung's incremental enhancements, latest color(s) and material from what's hot out there, etc.
They are resourceful, rich, clever and dedicated. But they are definitely a follower. Not at the same level as Apple or even Google.
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Samsung designed the 32-bit, octa-core processor that they themselves don't want to use on some of their flagship phones. Their CEO said they will go 64-bit eventually, not in the shortest possible time. My guess is they will try to buy someone else's CPU.
... for manufacturing A7, yes. They will want Apple's contracts for A8 and beyond too. For now, their own in-house designed CPU is kinda stuck in 32-bit land until further work.
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It'd be even more amazing if they had not, after spending $278 million to buy an ARM design company, and hiring away Samsung's top and very experienced ARM designer.
It is amazing that they can assimilate a group of talents and make them innovate together. In fact, they absorb experts beyond the teams highlighted above.
Samsung's very experienced ARM designer may not be able to come up with A7 today had he stayed in Samsung.
Why do you say that? Failed acquisitions are far more common in business than ones that work. Just ask Microsoft, which spent $500 million on the folks who made the Sidekick phones, and quickly drove that venture straight into the ground.
An early escapee was no less than Andy Rubin, who went on to found Android, later purchased by Google.
THAT is how bad acquisitions can get, and typically do. Apple's stunning success with its PA Semi acquisition is truly uncommon.
I think there is designed, and then their is DESIGNED.
And, as far as I know, no one here knows, they just spout either pro or anti Apple talk.
I an unsure if Apple REALLY deep deep down design the real guts of the chip
Say I want to build a car.
I could spec some nice wheels from USA Wheels inc, perhaps asking for them to cut a fancy shape in the alloy
Buy and Engine in, with my own gearing choices and CC
Spec the leather grade, the instruments from the instument makers
etc etc etc....
and totally legit I could sell it as my own custom, own designed car.
but really it's not MY own fabrication of car. I am reliant on others tech that build the guts on the dashboard instruments, the skills of the wheel makers who know how wheels need to be make, the engine makers who know how to make the engine based upon my customisation requests.
I do wonder if this is more what Apple do with their chip
Do they really have the people and the time to honestly design the chip from the ground up totally from nothing, from scratch, how it all works, the CPU and GPU cores, the memory, everythings from zero ground up.
Or are they more tweeking, speccing and requesting customisations from those who are doing it from ground up,
I think many here think they do it from nothing, but I am guessing this is not in reality the case
Why are you comparing Apple to Microsoft?
I expect Apple to make good use of the talent they acquire.
Although I'm still waiting for LiquidMetal to show up
Apple truly is a remarkable company, I have a lot of respect for what they are able to pull off. I hope they continue to innovate and press forward.
Maybe, maybe not. Most of the smartphone industry thinks this A7 is just marketing fluff and not really useful at all. Even after seeing the benchmarks. It's probably simple for the Android manufacturers to up the clock speed on their processors in order to beat the iPhone 5s benchmarks. Neither the tech pundits or Wall Street things this A7 is anything special. In fact, they think it's a big yawn. All the things that Apple is doing now is generally laughed aside. Apple has lost all credibility after getting butt-hurt by Samsung in smartphone sales.
A major advantage of SRAM is that it is faster than DRAM and it also doesn't require refreshing, which consumes power. Most internal memories of SoCs are SRAM, despite taking up more space.
We have had articles and reports that explained the development process of the A6 and the A7 team. We do know it's Apple's own custom design and the "real guts" of the chip is designed by Apple.
Precisely. Once upon a time it was a popular sport to remind everyone that Foxconn makes the iPhone when nobody paid any attention to the fact some of other very popular products made by Foxconn.
Now that fad has passed, it's on odd obsession for some when it comes to Apple and Samsung where the manufacturer of components MUST get the credit for making them and even for the success of the final product. I don't recall seeing TSMC getting credits for the success of phone makers after making the most essential parts for countless companies. But when it's Samsung making Apple's chips, there always is someone who wants to jump in and emphasize Samsung's involvement.
Maybe, maybe not. Most of the smartphone industry thinks this A7 is just marketing fluff and not really useful at all. Even after seeing the benchmarks. It's probably simple for the Android manufacturers to up the clock speed on their processors in order to beat the iPhone 5s benchmarks. Neither the tech pundits or Wall Street things this A7 is anything special. In fact, they think it's a big yawn. All the things that Apple is doing now is generally laughed aside. Apple has lost all credibility after getting butt-hurt by Samsung in smartphone sales.
It's not a high school popularity contest. Apple don't need to behave like attention whores, trying to please every crowd and clowns.
It's hardcore design work. The competition didn't expect it, didn't talk about it (like Gold Samsung phones during the leaks) which means they didn't even imagine it's possible in this timeframe. They could only try to downplay it.
64-bit also allows Apple to unify their internal MacOSX and iOS development better. So it's strategic even if the folks out there try to pretend the advantage is not there.
The way Apple treats Samsung they're lucky to even get good chips like this.
Proving once again that Apple needs Samsung in ways they are afraid to admit. It would be refreshing if Apple would act in a dignified manor.
Ok, as I say I am not aware.
I thought it was an ARM based chip. I did not realise Apple by themselves started with a blank sheet of paper and designed this chip from the ground up starting from nothing, for this phone.
ARM-based doesn't mean Apple just tweaked it. It's Apple's own implementation of the ARM instruction set, and the cores are designed by Apple's team and nothing like the car analogy you've used earlier. It's much like what Qualcomm did with Scorpion and Krait. To give you a slightly different comparison, while Intel uses AMD's x86-64 instruction set, that doesn't mean the Intel chips are not Intel's own design.
It's business.
Without Apple, Samsung won't even come this far. At the moment, their own CPU design has lost to other ARM competition. Contracts from Apple is money. Lot's of money is good for Samsung.
The problem is Samsung grew greedy and want to own the entire chain themselves. They thought they have "learned" everything from Apple. It's a rather typical backstabbing gangster story in Asian movies.
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