If the Mac chip had twice the performance cores than the iPad Pro then I think you would see more than 50 percent CPU increase. Probably more like 75%. Also I wouldn’t expect such a massive GPU on an entry level Mac SoC. Maybe a 14 inch MacBook Pro but not a 12 inch MacBook or 13 inch MacBook Air. Although if they do use the a14x for a MacBook/Air then they can start the Mac specific SoCs with much bigger GPUs.Here is my unscientific speculation based on the presentation of A14:
A12 6.9 billion transistors, 6 CPU cores, 4 GPU cores, Geekbench 5 single core 1112, multi-core 2866, Metal 4641
A12X 10 billion transistors, 8 CPU cores, 7 GPU cores
A12Z 10 billion transistors, 8 CPU cores, 8 GPU cores, Geekbench 5 single core 1118, multi-core 4631, Metal 10337
A13 8.5 billion transistors, 6 CPU cores, 4 GPU cores
A14 11.8 billion transistors, 6 CPU cores, 4 GPU cores, 40% faster CPU than A12, 30% faster GPU than A12, Geekbench 5 single core 1557, multi-core 4012, Metal 6033
A14Z 17.1 billion transistors, 8 CPU cores, 8 GPU cores, 40% faster CPU than A12Z, 30% faster GPU than A12Z, Geekbench 5 single core 1565, multi-core 6483, Metal 13438
A14Z Mac SoC 25.8 billion transistors, 12 CPU cores, 32 GPU cores, 50% faster multi-core than A14Z, 300% faster GPU than A14Z, Geekbench 5 single core 1565, multi-core 9725, Metal 53752
That would put A14Z Mac on par with 10-core i9 in iMac 2020 and the GPU between RX 580 and RX Vega 56.
I could see them doing a 12 core / 24-32 core for MacBook Pro 14 and 24 inch iMac and 16 core / 40-48 core for MacBook Pro 16 and 27-32 inch iMac. The iMacs would get the less efficient binned chips and would clock higher and the laptops would get the cream of the crop efficient chips and clock lower.
They could then throw either or both of those in the Mac Mini and then make a mega 400-600mm2 monstrosity for the Mac Pro and iMac Pro.
Anyways, I’m just speculating...
Apple wildly under quoted the GPU performance gains for the a12 -> a13. The number they specified at the keynote was 20%, but in reality for compute is was closer to 40% and in games and gaming benchmarks it was way more than 20% (varies from 20%-60%)
It is definite that they are underquoting the a12->a14 performance gains as well.
I wonder why they do this? Maybe they normalize for power and don’t consider gains to be gains if it comes at the expense of higher power usage. Unlike Nvidia who just flat out lies and say their new GPU is 1.9x more efficient when it reality they just massively increased the power.
We do know that the a13 in the iPhone 11 used more energy than the a12 in the XR and XS and I speculate that the a14 will use less energy than the A13 due to 5G and slightly smaller batteries. The a13 was offset with a bigger battery.
Last edited:
