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So far, the A9 on the 6S is faster than the A8X per core. The only times the A8X wins is in multi-core benchmarks.
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I really don't know how people are so worried at the moment with processor horsepower of smartphones. I mean, there is not a single app that takes advantage of all A9X has to offer. As matter of fact, even A8X hasn't been fully used to its limit yet by app devs.
 
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In the end of things, it's ram that matters most with iOS, for the next few years the processors and graphics are fast enough. ..anything faster and you won't be able to tell the difference.....ipad pro 12.9 inch owners should rejoice with 4 GB of ram.
 
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With respect to all posters here. But the same was said for the A8X and it last 15 months before being blown away by the A9X.

There will ALWAYS be something better a year, or even 6 months from now. You sound like you want to hear that what you have now will be the best for years and years to come. It won't be, but is that really important?
 
I'm amazed every time Apple is able to double the performance of the previous chip. Double doesn't sound like much, but when you double every year, you're taking all the performance increases from ALL previous years and doing it in just one.
 
I don't think A10 will be as big as a leap as A9/X was as TSMC next die shrink will not be ready by this fall. Most of the previous AX releases have come with a die shrink.
 
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P.S.: don't pay too much attention to the comments that say it doesn't matter how much more powerful it will be. It does matter, in my opinion for two reasons: it's always incredible to see a smartphone SoC near or surpass the previous generation's tablet SoC, and it's even more incredible to see it near the power of desktop chips (slowly, but growing at a MUCH faster rate than Intel). It's not to far-fetched to think that a quad-core A-chip in a year or two could break the 10,000 GeekBench score.
Those aren't reasons, that is, unless you are mostly a benchmarker/specification enthusiast. Which is fine, hobbies are good. However, for those folks the problem with Apple products is that Apple controls both the hardware and software platform. Whereas a faster core processor on a more general platform (such as a PC with a diverse amount of add in cards) may actually equate to a 'better' user experience, Apple can interconnect hardware and software to achieve the desired user experience at the expense of unneeded CPU cycles or oversized memory. So next gen parts are fine for those that like to look at bar charts and say that theirs is longer, but it doesn't mean much to the target audience. For that audience, the only question should be "what am I doing _today_ and does my equipment fulfill those needs." And like many, my old iPads and NVIDIA hardware continue to work just fine for their intended purposes. When I have a need for more, I'll address it at that time. What's coming down the pike is interesting, but that's all it is.
 
Those aren't reasons, that is, unless you are mostly a benchmarker/specification enthusiast. Which is fine, hobbies are good. However, for those folks the problem with Apple products is that Apple controls both the hardware and software platform. Whereas a faster core processor on a more general platform (such as a PC with a diverse amount of add in cards) may actually equate to a 'better' user experience, Apple can interconnect hardware and software to achieve the desired user experience at the expense of unneeded CPU cycles or oversized memory. So next gen parts are fine for those that like to look at bar charts and say that theirs is longer, but it doesn't mean much to the target audience. For that audience, the only question should be "what am I doing _today_ and does my equipment fulfill those needs." And like many, my old iPads and NVIDIA hardware continue to work just fine for their intended purposes. When I have a need for more, I'll address it at that time. What's coming down the pike is interesting, but that's all it is.
Interestingly enough, I find general web browsing to be the most resource intensive task I do on the iPad and for that, JavaScript benchmarks appear to be quite relevant. Maybe I've just been spoiled by Core-based PCs with 16GB RAM and fast SSDs so internet connection speed is the primary bottleneck. Using the iPad (Air and older) for web browsing sometimes feels like I'm using an Atom-based PC with HDD. I really appreciate how Apple has been trying to close the gap with each new SoC. I've only played with the Pro 9.7 for a couple hours but I think the A9X is finally fast enough that the bottleneck is back to being internet speed.

Don't have the Air 2 (skipped that gen) so don't know how that compares.
 
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The current hardware on the current software is plenty satisfactory. My challenge will be in avoiding temptation to upgrade the os past iOS 10. And praying nothing requires a restore once iOS 12 comes out, because how could anyone expect ancient a9x hardware to handle the realtime path traced 3D UI? ;)
 
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