Intro:
Intel is a renowned brand that produces processors on a large scale. The majority of the laptops and desktops mainly use Intel processors. AMD is a direct rival, but Intel has a significant market share, and the computing devices have been using Intel for a long time.
Intel has been designing processors from the Pentium series to the Core series. The Xeon is another category on Intel processors. The majority of the high-end gaming laptops use Intel processors, and the workstations also house Intel processors.
Intel increases speed and efficiency each year with the release of their new generation of processors. Some are overclockable, and some are not, nevertheless, Intel has been producing faster and efficient processors each year. Even Apple products such as the Mac books use Intel processors.
Apple also designs its processors, but only for its iPhones, iPods, and iPads. Apple is a leading manufacturer of Apple processors that rival against the top-notch Qualcomm processors in terms of speed and efficiency.
One of the reasons that Apple designs and uses its processors in iPhones is that Apple fine-tunes the iOS to efficiently utilize the resources of the iPhone, such as the processor. The processor and iOS synced with each other results in a more efficient and faster device.
Apple has made its mark in the smartphone domain by creating top-notch processors but is still to enter the laptop or desktop marketplace as the market is already well saturated. Intel is a big player, but AMD is slowly following up by releasing cheaper processors.
Today, we are going to compare two different processors from different brands. The first is i5 8250U from Intel, and the second is A12X from Apple. Let’s talk about each of them separately and then compare them head to head.
Apple A12X:
The full name for this processor is Apple A12X bionic, which is a 64-bit processor. Apple designs this system on chip. It was first used in the first generation of 11-inch iPad Pro, and the third generation of 12.9inch iPad Pro. Both of these iPads were launched on October 30, 2018, along with the processor A12X.
The A12X Bionic is significantly faster than its predecessor, the A10X. It is a variant of the A12 processor. This octa-core processor has 35% faster single-core performance, and 90% faster multi-core performance than its ancestor, the A10X. A12X has four energy-efficient cores called Tempest, and four high-performance cores called Vortex. The A12X has twice the graphics performance compared to A10X.
i5 8250U:
There are different variants of the 8th generation i5 processor, but we will be discussing the i5 8250U. This eighth-gen processor is from the Kaby Lake R family. It is a quad-core processor with eight threads. The i5 8250U is built on the 14nm process and has a base clock speed of 1.6 GHz. This processor can boost up to a clock speed of 3.4 GHz.
The i5 8250U has a TDP of 15 Watt. It is used in numerous different laptops of different companies. Some famous are HP, Dell, Asus, Lenovo, etc. It isn’t the fastest processor, but it is quite efficient. Let’s compare it with Apple’s A12X bionic and see the results.
i5 8250U vs. Apple A12X:
The i5 8250U processor was built to be used in laptops; on the other hand, the Apple A12X was designed to be used in tablets. They are both designed for different purposes.
The A12X is built on the 7nm FinFET process, while the i5 8250U is built on the 14nm+ process. The transistors in the 8250U are not known, but the A12X houses a whopping 10 billion transistors.
The i5 8250U is a quad-core processor with eight threads, while the A12X is an octa-core processor with eight threads. The base clock speed of the A12X is 1.6 GHz and can boost to a clock speed of 2.5 GHz. On the other hand, the Inteli5 8250U also has a base clock speed of 1.6 GHz and a turbo clock speed of 3.4 GHz.
Let’s talk about memory compatibility. The A12X has 8 MB of cache memory while the 8250U has 6 MB of cache memory. The maximum memory capacity for Intel i5 8250U is 32 GB, while the A12X can support a maximum of 6 GB. The A12X is compatible with LPDDR4X memory, and the 8250U is compatible with DDR4-2400 and LPDDR3-2133 memory.
Moving on to the graphics segment. The i5 8250U houses Intel UHD graphics 620 integrated GPU, with 24 execution units, 192 GPU shading units, and a GPU clock speed of 1,150MHz. The A12X houses the Apple A12X Bionic GPU, with 7 GPU execution units.
The A12X uses Big. Little technology, while the 8250U does not. The 8250U does not have integrated LTE, while the A12x does. Both of them have dynamic frequency scaling, NX BIT, AES, and support hardware-assisted virtualization.
The A12X has out-of-order execution and Trust Zone while the 8250U does not. The Intel i5 8250U has MMX, FMA3, F16C, and uses hyper-threading technology.
Both of these processors were tested on the Geekbench 4 application. The i5 8250U returned 13,834 scores on a multi-core test and 4,221 scores on the single-core test. The Apple A12X resulted in 17,696 scores on the multi-core test and 5,018 scores on the single-core test. This clearly shows that the A12X is a faster processor. The A12X is 19% faster in single-core performance and 28% faster in the multi-core performance.
Verdict:
The Apple A12X is the evident winner with a smaller semiconductor size, faster CPU speed, and more features than Intel i5 8250U.
