Benchmark

Galaxy Note 7 vs. iPhone 6s real-life speed test proves specs aren’t everything

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 23, 2016

In spite of running Qualcomm’s latest 64-bit Snapdragon 820 processor with four CPU cores, Adreno 530 graphics and 4GB of RAM, Samsung's latest Galaxy Note 7 phablet delivers embarrassing real-world performance when pitted against almost-a-year-older iPhone 6s and its in-house designed A9 chip with two CPU cores and just 2GB of RAM.

As seen in this side-by-side video comparison from YouTuber PhoneBuff, the iPhone 6s easily beats the latest Note when it comes to loading apps and games, thanks to the combination of efficient iOS software and Apple's custom-designed hardware.

Early CPU scores suggest modest gains for iPhone 7’s A10 chip vs. iPad Pro’s A9X

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 14, 2016

Early Geekbench 3 benchmark of the Apple-designed A10 system-on-a-chip—which will be the next iPhone and iPad's engine—was posted Thursday by Dutch blog TechTastic.nl. Purported scores suggest the device may not be much speedier than the iPhone 6s and iPad Pro. The upcoming chip scored a tad more than last year’s A9 powering the iPhone 6s series and a little bit faster than the A9X in the iPad Pro.

On the other hand, the benchmarked A10 is almost certainly a prototype unit so final scores should be higher than is currently the case.

New MacBooks offer 90 percent faster SSD write speeds, Skylake CPU up to 20 percent faster

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 6, 2016

Apple today announced a second-generation twelve-inch MacBook which brings speed increases across the board thanks to the use of Intel's latest Skylake chip platform, PCIe-based flash storage and a speedier 1,866MHz RAM.

The Verge took the new machines briefly for a spin. Having put the new MacBook through its paces in Primate Labs' $0.99 Geekbench 3 benchmarking app to measure the performance of the new Intel CPU and using the free Blackmagic Disk Speed Test app for benchmarking disk I/O operations, the publication was able to determine just how performant the updated flash storage and Intel's new Skylake CPU are.

iPhone 6s customer receives her device early, benchmarks show a marked increase in power

Jeff Benjamin ∙ September 21, 2015

The iPhone 6s doesn't officially go on sale for another 3 and a half days, but one fortunate customer from San Diego was able to snag hers, even before review embargoes are lifted.

Adrienne Levin, a UX and visual designer living on the west coast, unexpectedly received her Rose Gold iPhone 6s in the mail today. Being the savvy techie that she is, she immediately took to posting 4K videos, pictures of her adorable dog, and, most importantly, Geekbench 3 benchmarks.

The result of said benchmarks? Let's just say you should expect a significant increase in power over the iPhone 6.

iPad mini 4 performance: faster than last year’s model but slower than the iPad Air 2

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

I think we all pretty much expected the iPad mini 4 to be a little slower than Apple's still top of the line iPad Air 2, and some new benchmarks from Ars Technica back up that expectation. The iPad mini 4, which received little fanfare during last Wednesday's iPhone 6s event, ships with a new A8 processor and 2GB of RAM.

With its new specs in tow, the iPad mini 4 can benefit from one of the major changes in tomorrow's iOS 9 release—side-by-side multitasking. True, the iPad mini 4 may still come in second place when compared to its larger sibling, but this refresh is a marked improvement over its predecessors.

New purported details about next iPhone and iPad’s ‘A9’ chip emerge

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 2, 2018

Interesting tidbits regarding Apple-designed 'A9’ chip said to power the upcoming 'iPhone 6s' and 'iPhone 6s Plus' handsets surfaced Monday, offering some previously unknown details regarding its performance and design.

It appears that the next iPhone and iPad's processor could employ so-called system-in-package (SiP) design which squeezes some additional components into a tiny chip, including the baseband modem and the power management circuitry.

Moreover, a leaked benchmark purports to compare single and multi-thread performance of several unreleased mobile processors, such as NVIDIA's Denver 2, Samsung's Exynos M1, Huawei’s Kirin 950, LG's NUCLUN 2 and Apple's A9 and A9X.

Here are some interesting tidbits about Apple’s ‘best iPod touch yet’

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 26, 2016

Apple yesterday refreshed its aging lineup of iPod-branded music players. By and large, the iPod touch has received its most substantial upgrade yet as Apple really went all out with upgrades on the hardware front.

Not only does the new iPod touch run the latest Apple-designed “A8” processor as the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, but includes the M8 motion coprocessor, a much-improved eight-megapixel camera on the back, three times faster Wi-Fi and the latest in Bluetooth networking.

Here are some interesting tidbits related to the iPod touch's hardware surprises.

iOS 9’s Low Power mode throttles down CPU performance to preserve iPhone’s battery life

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 9, 2018

With iOS 9, Apple has brought out a brand new Low Power mode which kicks in when you're nearly out of juice. It was designed to help extend your iPhone's battery life, providing up to three hours of additional time before charging.

After using Geekbench's iPhone application to measure an iPhone 6's processor performance in Low Power, MacRumors was able to determine that this mode reduces processor performance by about forty percent. As a result, an iPhone 6 in Low Power mode would be roughly on par with an iPhone 5s or iPhone 5 in terms of sheer CPU performance.

The iPad Air 2 is much faster than the iPhone 6 and the original iPad Air

Jeff Benjamin ∙ October 21, 2014

No big shocker at first glance. Of course the iPad Air 2, a device that's just now landing into the hands of rabid fans, is faster than the year-old device that it's intended to replace. Yes, the iPad Air 2 is faster, but it's the way that it's faster that is truly noteworthy.

The A8X processor that's nestled deep within the confines of the iPad Air 2's new slim and trim body is, for the first time in the history of iOS devices, a 1.5Ghz triple-core processor. The iPad Air 2 also features a healthy 2GB of RAM. Coincidentally, the 2GB of RAM is also a first for any iOS device.

Needless to say, the iPad Air 2 is a beast on paper, but it's no mere paper tiger. This thing screams, and the first benchmarks posted on MacRumors comparing it to previous iOS devices are proving that point.

iPhone 6 and 6 Plus beat all smartphones in reputable camera benchmark

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 27, 2016

The improved rear camera on both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus has scored Apple a major victory over its biggest rivals in exhaustive smartphone camera benchmarks published Wednesday by the reputable camera and lens experts at DxOMark.

Achieving an impressive rating of 82 out of 100, both new iPhones have managed to beat Apple's chief competitors in the smartphone space.

Not only does this include the usual suspects like Samsung's flagship Galaxy S5 smartphone, which scored 79 out of 100, and the previous Galaxy S4 (75/100), but also other quality devices such as Sony's Xperia Z1 (76/100), Z2 (29/100) and Z3 (79/100) and yes — even the 41-megapixel sensor featured on the Nokia 808 PureView (77/100).

iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus smoke competition in benchmarks

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 22, 2014

The new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus powered by the Apple-designed A8 processor leave the vast majority of Android competition in the dust in terms of CPU performance and battery life, according to a series of performance benchmarks conducted by the reputable hardware review website AnandTech.

The website's founder Anand Lal Shimpi recently joined Apple for an undisclosed role.

Speaking of the handsets' graphics performance, the site has found the iPhone 6 Plus performing a hair slower versus the iPhone 5s due to the increased screen resolution. It's also approximately fifteen percent slower in GPU performance than the Nvidia Shield-based tablets. Despite this minor setback, performance gains across the board translate into “a pretty solid lead over the competition for the iPhone 6/A8,” wrote the site.

According to Apple, the A8 processor has two billion transistors, twice as much as the previous A7 chip. The piece of silicon incorporates twenty percent faster CPU and a cool fifty percent faster graphics while enabling up to 50 percent more energy efficiency than its A7 counterpart, as per Apple's official numbers.

Alleged iPhone 6 Geekbench suggests same 1GB of RAM, slightly higher 1.4GHz CPU frequency

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated September 26, 2016

Conveniently timed just ahead of Apple's big reveal at 10a. PT / 1pm ET, an alleged Geekbench benchmark of Apple's unreleased iPhone 6 smartphone surfaced online Tuesday morning. The scores suggest that the Apple-designed A8 chip powering the forthcoming handset still has the same 1GB of RAM as prior iPhones.

However, Apple seems to have increased the A8's clock frequency marginally, going from the 1.3GHz inside the iPhone 5s slightly up to 1.4GHz on the iPhone 6.

Geekbench scores come via the same Weibo user “zzray” who made a video of a nearly-assembled iPhone 6 booting to iOS 8 and running smoothly in spite of its bigger screen with more pixels.