iPad A11, A13 and A16 Bionic

[Homme]

But primarily the A11 more than the other two for one primarily reason, lack of iPad Support but those 3 chips which seperate from the other A series chips since A5, the lack of an X chip for the A11 and A13 ( and an M variant for the A16).

I always found it fascinating that the 3 SoC’s never had a supercharged variant and Apple was smart not to put one in all 3 of them ( the other A series chips there had always been a good reason)

A11 because of a few reasons the gap between A10X and A12X iPads release dates ( not to mention the redesign) and A10X being delayed initially by a few months closer to the launch of A11 iPhones but unfortunately A11 is the most neglected A series chip being on 3 devices (iPhones)

A13 although it is more products than A11 and A16 (so far though ) was released between the A12 and WWDC 2020 when Apple announced the transition to Apple silicon. I see why there was no A13X ( when we all thought 4th gen iPad was going to get it when it was revealed instead of A12Z) but Apple silicon in the Mac from the M1 is the primarily reason alongside A13 being a slightly enhanced version of A12 ( I know there was a A12Z version of the Mac mini to transition to Apple silicion for developers but yeah)

A16s case for not getting a variant primarily is the obvious one in the room being that it was not only another 5nm ( redesigned 4nm) but also we had the A14 and A15X lines ( M1 and M2) being on 5nm was another case. A16 is just an enhanced A15 with not only a GPU similar to A15 but compared to A17/M3 the GPU was redesigned for A16 but it was bad enough for ray tracing because of 5nm that they had to go back to using a modified version of A15’s GPU for A16 so I’m happy Apple skipped an M variant of A16 for an M version of A17 because M1 and M2 is used in plenty of devices

Add that the A16 only going to 3 iDevices so far ( including the iPad 11th generation if the rumors are true) it can end up being another A11 Bionic ( not being neglected in a way like it but Apple is pushing out A18 when there is a non A17 pro)

I was really bored making this so feel free to say your opinion

 

[Slartibart]

I was really bored making this so feel free to say your opinion

IMHO you should make it clearer what the exact subject or theme is, you want people to comment on. 🤓

 

[Populus]

The reason is, from my point of view, mainly because the following (or previous) SoC were a big jump in performance/efficiency, and the aforementioned chips are just refinements?

Although the A11 would be an exception. It’s in-between two very different architectures, the necessary chip design to transition from a more traditional chip (A9, A10 Fusion) to one with a big projection into Machine Learning (A12 Bionic). It was the first chip with a Neural Engine, needed for the first FaceID on the iPhone X, but with only two cores it was really limited. The big oomph for ML came with the A12 and it’s 8-core Neural Engine.

So, yeah, all of them are either transitional chips or refinements, such as the A13 (a refinement over the A12, both built at 7nm), or the A16 (an emergence iteration of the A15, because the 3nm process was delayed).

The chips used… oh wait. You already did the analysis I was doing. I guess my work here is done, but I’m not deleting the message because I spent 12 minutes typing it.

 

[Homme]

Reviving this thread but it’s a good thing that the 11th gen iPad got the A16. That SoC although it is used on 3 devices like the A11 Bionic will be supported for longer because the A16 was released on September 2022/23 for the 14 Pro/15 and 2025 for this iPad.

If this iPad didn’t get the A16 then it would have been neglected like the A11 series but I can see Apple putting this on the next generation studio display to replace the A13😁

Speaking of which it’s good that Apple is selling 1 product with the A13 and 2 with A16.

The A16 is like the A11 when it comes to hardware flaws. Probably more for A16 because it was supposed to be 3nm, have hardware ray tracing, possibly have 8GB of RAM, a redesigned GPU but because of its dual 5nm/4nm ( TSMC delayed 3nm back then due to difficulty) it was a failure in the experimenting room forcing Apple to recode everything particularly the GPU since its GPU is similar to the A15’s. Thank goodness M3 is based on A17’s Microarchitecture not A16,

A16 is the new cheap SoC,

 

[Populus]

Reviving this thread but it’s a good thing that the 11th gen iPad got the A16. That SoC although it is used on 3 devices like the A11 Bionic will be supported for longer because the A16 was released on September 2022/23 for the 14 Pro/15 and 2025 for this iPad.

If this iPad didn’t get the A16 then it would have been neglected like the A11 series but I can see Apple putting this on the next generation studio display to replace the A13😁

Speaking of which it’s good that Apple is selling 1 product with the A13 and 2 with A16.

The A16 is like the A11 when it comes to hardware flaws. Probably more for A16 because it was supposed to be 3nm, have hardware ray tracing, possibly have 8GB of RAM, a redesigned GPU but because of its dual 5nm/4nm ( TSMC delayed 3nm back then due to difficulty) it was a failure in the experimenting room forcing Apple to recode everything particularly the GPU since its GPU is similar to the A15’s. Thank goodness M3 is based on A17’s Microarchitecture not A16,

A16 is the new cheap SoC,

And, also, they are manufacturing it on their Arizona plant.

Honestly I’d have liked the A18 to be the new base across many products (including the iPad mini and, why not? The base iPad) like it was the marvellous A15 back then. But I guess the A16 is plenty for the iPad 11.

 

[Homme]

And, also, they are manufacturing it on their Arizona plant.

Honestly I’d have liked the A18 to be the new base across many products (including the iPad mini and, why not? The base iPad) like it was the marvellous A15 back then. But I guess the A16 is plenty for the iPad 11.

But with the Mini 7 the fact that it gets a SoC With a Pro Chip is actually better than a non pro chip so the Mini Lineup will hopefully in the future Get Pro Branding A series Chips because its design looks far more closer to an iPad Pro than the Air/Base iPad because of one unique thing… the camera flash at the back of that iPad ( which reminds me of the 2018 Pros design). The good thing is Mini 7 getting A17 Pro gave it a 10gb USB C port but then A17 Pro and A18 are almost identical

A15 is a fine class Chip indeed. It’s good that the Mini 6 was the first iDevice to have gotten it before the iPhone 13 lineup and with the A15X Variants

A16 is definitely plenty of power and longevity for it. I mean 7th Gen iPad with A10 is still supported ( until September) and 8th Gen iPad will be the last supported iPhone/iPad that has 32GB of storage for iPadOS 19 compared to 128GB for the A16 iPad.