Apple has made use of numerous unique processors, predominantly ARM-based, in their products.
Apple silicon is a brand name for Apple's in-house ARM-based system-on-a-chip (SoC) designs. A typical SoC in an Apple product will include general-purpose application processors, including the CPU and GPU, unified random access memory shared between the two, and various purpose-specific coprocessors, such as the Secure Enclave Processor. The SoC bears a unique identifier, named the Exclusive Chip ID (ECID), and a "burned", read-only bootrom, the first code executed when the device turns on.
History
Apple's use of ARM technology begins shortly after the inception of ARM itself, when Acorn Computers, Apple, and VLSI Technology formed the ARM Ltd. joint venture on 27 November 1990 . Apple's motive to invest in ARM was to enable them to develop a processor that could power the Newton, Apple's first low-power portable device. Apple cancelled the Newton project after Steve Jobs's 1997 return to the company. ARM Ltd. continued operations, and Apple investigated other use cases for ARM-based product designs. This led to the inception of the iPad as a successor to Newton, the iPhone as a spin-off of the iPad concept, and the iPod, which Apple recognised as simpler than either concept to bring to market.
On 23 October 2001iPod, a portable music player device making use of PortalPlayer ARM SoCs. The iPod is credited as being a key part of Apple's return to profitability, selling 100 million units in six years.
, Apple announced theOn 12 September 2006iPod nano (2nd generation), their first device to make use of the Samsung Electronics S5L87xx series of ARM processors.
, Apple announced theOn 9 January 2007iPhone, making use of the closely-related Samsung S5L90xx series ARM processors.
, Apple announced theOn 23 April 2008P.A. Semi for $278 million.[1] P.A. Semi already had history working with the ARM platform, having developed the early DEC StrongARM processor used by the Newton MessagePad 2000 series, among other RISC designs.
, recognising the demand for the first iPhone to do more than any SoC on the market was capable of, Apple acquired Santa Clara-based semiconductor design companyOn 27 April 2010Intrinsity for an estimated $121 million.[2] Intrinsity created products to simplify semiconductor logic design, particularly in ARM core designs, reducing transistor count and power consumption.
, Apple confirmed the acquisition of Austin-based semiconductor design companyOn 10 September 2012iPhone 5. While still manufactured by Samsung, the CPU core is the first to be designed by Apple's in-house team.
, Apple announced theOn 9 September 2014iPhone 6. Its A8 SoC was the first to be manufactured by TSMC.
, Apple announced theOn 12 September 2017iPhone X and iPhone 8. Its A11 Bionic SoC was the first to use an in-house designed GPU, rather than a licensed Imagination Technologies PowerVR design. The A11 series additionally introduced the Apple Neural Engine, an AI accelerator coprocessor.
, Apple announced theOn 22 June 2020Intel processors to its in-house designed Apple M-series processors.
, Apple announced plans to transition its Mac product line fromList of ARM SoCs
Newton
The Newton project saw Apple's earliest use of ARM processors. These are just the processor alone, not a system-on-a-chip.
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ARM610 | ARM710A | StrongARM SA-110 | |
Architecture | ARMv3 | ARMv4 | |
Clock speed | 20 MHz | 25 MHz | 162 MHz |
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Early iPod
PortalPlayer SoCs were used in early iPods. This list additionally includes the SigmaTel STMP 3550, an unrelated SoC used in the same timeframe for the first-generation iPod shuffle.
PP5002 | PP5020 | PP5021C | PP5022 | STMP 3550 | |
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Architecture | ARMv4T | DSP56000 | |||
Clock speed | 90 MHz | 80 MHz | 90 MHz | 80 MHz | 75 MHz |
Core design | ARM7TDMI × 2 | DSP56004-based | |||
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Samsung
Samsung S5L87xx
In 2007, Apple switched the iPod product line from the PortalPlayer PP50xx series to S5L87xx SoCs, designed in cooperation with Samsung. The iPod touch (2nd generation) also makes use of the S5L8720 SoC.
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S5L8701 | S5L8702 | S5L8720 | S5L8730 | S5L8723 | S5L8740 | S5L8747 | |
Architecture | ARMv4T | ARMv6 | ARMv7 | ||||
Process | ? | ? | 65 nm | ? | ? | ? | ? |
Clock speed | ? | ? | 533 MHz | ? | ? | ? | ? |
Core design | ARM940T | ARM926EJ-S | ARM1176JZF-S | Cortex-A5 | |||
Used in |
Samsung S5L84xx
Along with the switch to Samsung SoCs in full-display iPods, the iPod shuffle line switched to a lower-end line of Samsung SoCs. The line is optimized for the limitations of the iPod shuffle, using a package-on-package (PoP) configuration with DRAM and NAND flash stacked on top of the CPU core. Not much is known about the specifications of these processors.
S5L8441 | S5L8442 | S5L8443 | |
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Architecture | ? | ? | ARMv7 |
Process | ? | ? | ? |
Clock speed | ? | ? | ? |
Core design | ? | ? | Cortex-A5 |
Used in |
Samsung S5L89xx
The Samsung S5L89xx series was designed and manufactured by Samsung for use by Apple. While Apple began branding the chips as "A"-series starting with A4, they continued to use generic ARM cores until A6, when the Apple-designed Swift ARMv7 core was used.
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S5L8900 | S5L8920 | S5L8922 | S5L8930 (A4) | S5L8940 (A5) | S5L8942 (A5) | S5L8947 (A5) | S5L8945 (A5X) | S5L8950 (A6) | S5L8955 (A6X) | S5L8960 (A7) | S5L8965 (A7) | |
Architecture | ARMv6 | ARMv7-A | ARMv7-A "Swift" | ARMv8.0-A | ||||||||
Process | 90 nm | 65 nm | 45 nm | 32 nm | 45 nm | 32 nm | 28 nm | |||||
Core design | ARM1176JZF-S | Cortex-A8 | Cortex-A9 | Cortex-A9 × 2 | Cortex-A9 | Cortex-A9 × 2 | Swift × 2 | Cyclone × 2 | ||||
Clock speed | 412 MHz[note 1] | 600 MHz[note 2] | 1.0 GHz[note 3] | 1.0 GHz | 1.3 GHz | 1.4 GHz | 1.3 GHz | 1.4 GHz | ||||
GPU design | PowerVR MBX Lite | PowerVR SGX535 | PowerVR SGX543 | PowerVR SGX543 × 2 | PowerVR SGX554 × 4 | PowerVR SGX543 × 3 | PowerVR SGX543 × 4 | PowerVR G6430 × 4 | ||||
GPU clock speed | 103 MHz | 200 MHz | 250 MHz | 200 MHz | 266 MHz | 300 MHz | 450 MHz | |||||
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A-Series Chips
Starting with A8, Apple began switching from Samsung to TSMC as their chip fabrication partner. A9 was dual-sourced from both Samsung and TSMC. Apple has continued to work closely with TSMC to take advantage of their latest process node improvements.
Starting with A10 Fusion, Apple introduced the big.LITTLE architecture, referring to the big cores as "Performance" (P) and little cores as "Efficiency" (E). Performance cores provide the maximum processing power of the device, while efficiency cores optimise for lower power operation. The operating system dynamically manages scheduling tasks on either kind of core as it sees fit to complete an operation, balancing performance against battery life. Enabling "Low Power Mode" on the device disables work from being scheduled on performance cores. Notably, A10 Fusion has a limitation that only the performance or efficiency cores can be active at a time - not both. This was resolved in A11 Bionic, which can activate both kinds of cores simultaneously. A10 Fusion additionally can only execute 32-bit code on performance cores, while A11 Bionic lacks support for executing 32-bit code, as this compatibility was removed in iOS 11.
Starting with A11 Bionic, Apple introduced the Apple Neural Engine, a set of coprocessor cores that optimise the machine learning tasks increasingly being taken advantage of by operating system features. Apple additionally introduced their own GPU core designs for the first time, replacing the PowerVR designs used to this point.
A8 - A11
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T7000 (A8) | T7001 (A8X) | S8000 (A9 Samsung) | S8003 (A9 TSMC) | S8001 (A9X) | T8010 (A10 Fusion) | T8011 (A10X Fusion) | T8015 (A11 Bionic) | |
Architecture | ARMv8.0-A | ARMv8.1-A | ARMv8.2-A | |||||
Process | 20 nm | 14 nm | 16 nm | 10 nm | ||||
Big core design | Typhoon × 2 | Typhoon × 3 | Twister × 2 | Hurricane × 2 | Hurricane × 3 | Monsoon × 2 | ||
Big core speed | 1.5 GHz | 1.85 GHz | 2.26 GHz | 2.34 GHz | 2.38 GHz | 2.39 GHz | ||
Little core design | — | Zephyr × 2 | Zephyr × 3 | Mistral × 4 | ||||
Little core speed | — | 1.09 GHz | 1.30 GHz | 1.19 GHz | ||||
GPU design | PowerVR GX6450 × 4 | PowerVR GX6850 × 8 | PowerVR GT7600 × 6 | PowerVR GT7850 × 12 | PowerVR GT7600 Plus × 6 | PowerVR GT7600 Plus × 12 | Apple G10P × 3 | |
GPU clock speed | 533 MHz | 450 MHz | 650 MHz | 900 MHz | 1.00 GHz | 1.06 GHz | ||
Neural Engine cores | — | 2 | ||||||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR3-1600 | LPDDR4-3200 | LPDDR4X-4266 | |||||
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A12 - A18 Pro
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File:Apple A18.jpg | File:Apple A18 Pro.jpg | |
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T8020 (A12 Bionic) | T8027 (A12X Bionic) | T8027 (A12Z Bionic) | T8030 (A13 Bionic) | T8101 (A14 Bionic) | T8110 (A15 Bionic) | T8120 (A16 Bionic) | T8130 (A17 Pro) | T8140a (A18) | T8140 (A18 Pro) | |
Architecture | ARMv8.3-A | ARMv8.4-A | ARMv8.5-A | ARMv8.6-A | ARMv8.7-A | |||||
Process | 7 nm (TSMC N7) | 7 nm (TSMC N7P) | 5 nm (TSMC N5) | 5 nm (TSMC N5P) | 5 nm (TSMC N4P) | 3 nm (TSMC N3B) | 3 nm (TSMC N3E) | |||
Big core design | Vortex × 2 | Vortex × 4 | Lightning × 2 | Firestorm × 2 | Avalanche × 2 | Everest × 2 | ||||
Big core speed | 2.49 GHz | 2.65 GHz | 3.00 GHz | 3.24 GHz | 3.46 GHz | 3.78 GHz | 4.044 GHz | |||
Little core design | Tempest × 4 | Thunder × 4 | Icestorm × 4 | Blizzard × 4 | Sawtooth × 4 | |||||
Little core speed | 1.59 GHz | 1.72 GHz | 1.82 GHz | 2.02 GHz | 2.11 GHz | 2.424 GHz | ||||
GPU design | Apple G11P × 4 | Apple G11G × 7 | Apple G11G × 8 | Apple G12P? × 4 | Apple G13P? × 4 | Apple G14P? × 5 | Apple G14? × 5 | Apple G15P? × 6 | Apple G16P? × 5 | Apple G16P? × 6 |
GPU clock speed | 1.12 GHz | 1.23 GHz | 1.27 GHz | 1.33 GHz | 1.39 GHz | 1.47 GHz | ||||
Neural Engine cores | 8 | 16 | ||||||||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR4X-4266 | LPDDR5-6400 | LPDDR5X-8533 | |||||||
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M-Series Chips
Macs and iPad Pros with Apple silicon use a chip from the M-series. Major chip designs (which tend to receive a marketing name) are made available in various configurations, which are listed together below. These configurations are presumably the result of binning chips based on the yield of working cores.
M1 Series
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T8103 (M1) | T6000 (M1 Pro) | T6001 (M1 Max) | T6002 (M1 Ultra) | |
Architecture | ARMv8.5-A | |||
Process | TSMC N5 | |||
Big core design | Firestorm × 4 | Firestorm × 6 or 8 | Firestorm × 16 | |
Big core speed | 3.204 GHz | 2.228 GHz | ||
Little core design | Icestorm × 4 | Icestorm × 2 | Icestorm × 4 | |
Little core speed | 2.064 GHz | |||
GPU design | Apple G13G × 7 or 8 | Apple G13X × 14 or 16 | Apple G13X × 24 or 32 | Apple G13X × 48 or 64 |
GPU clock speed | 1.27 GHz | 1.29 GHz | ||
Neural Engine cores | 16 | 32 | ||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR4X-4266 (2133 MHz) | LPDDR4X-6400 (3200 MHz) | ||
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M2 Series
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T8112 (M2) | T6020 (M2 Pro) | T6021 (M2 Max) | T6022 (M2 Ultra) | |
Architecture | ARMv8.5-A | |||
Process | TSMC N5P | |||
Big core design | Avalanche × 4 | Avalanche × 6 or 8 | Avalanche × 8 | Avalanche × 16 |
Big core speed | 3.504 GHz | 3.667 GHz | ||
Little core design | Blizzard × 4 | Blizzard × 8 | ||
Little core speed | 2.424 GHz | |||
GPU design | Apple G14G × 8 or 10 | Apple G14X × 16 or 19 | Apple G14X × 30 or 38 | Apple G14X × 60 or 76 |
GPU clock speed | 1.39 GHz | |||
Neural Engine cores | 16 | 32 | ||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR5-6400 | |||
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M3 Series
T8122 (M3) | T6030 (M3 Pro) | T6031 (M3 Max (16-core CPU)) | T6034 (M3 Max (14-core CPU)) | |
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Architecture | ARMv8.5-A | |||
Process | TSMC N3 | |||
Big core design | ? × 4 | ? × 5 or 6 | ? × 12 | ? × 10 |
Big core speed | 3.23 GHz | |||
Little core design | ? × 4 | ? × 6 | ? × 4 | |
Little core speed | 2.064 GHz | |||
GPU design | Apple G15G × 8 or 10 | Apple G15X × 14 or 18 | Apple G15X × 40 | Apple G15X × 30 |
GPU clock speed | ? GHz | |||
Neural Engine cores | 16 | |||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR5-6400 | |||
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M4 Series
T8132 (M4) | T6040 (M4 Pro) | T6041 (M4 Max) | ||
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Architecture | ARMv8.5-A | |||
Process | TSMC N3 | |||
Big core design | ? × 4, 5 or 6 | ? × 8 or 10 | ? × 10 or 12 | |
Big core speed | ? GHz | |||
Little core design | ? × 4 | |||
Little core speed | ? GHz | |||
GPU design | Apple G15G × 8 or 10 | Apple G15G × 16 or 20 | Apple G15G × 32 or 40 | |
GPU clock speed | ? GHz | |||
Neural Engine cores | 16 | |||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR5-6400 | |||
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S and T-Series Chips
Apple introduced the S series to provide an highly integrated, low-power system-in-a-package (SiP) for the Apple Watch. These chips have also found use in the iBridge (Mac coprocessor) and HomePod series. The T-series was merged to become integrated in the M-series SoCs.
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S7002 (S1) | T8002 (S1P, S2, T1) | T8004 (S3) | T8012 (T2) | T8006 (S4, S5) | T8301 (S6, S7, S8) | T8310 (S9, S10) | |||||||
Architecture | ARMv7k | ARMv8-A (arm64_32) | |||||||||||
Process | 28 nm | ? | 16 nm | 7 nm (TSMC N7) | 7 nm (TSMC N7P) | 5 nm? (TSMC N5P)? | |||||||
Core design | Cortex-A7 | Cortex-A7 × 2 | Hurricane × 2 Zephyr × 2 Cortex-A7 |
Tempest × 2 | Thunder × 2 | Blizzard? × 2 | |||||||
Clock speed | 520 MHz | ? | ? | ? | 1.59 GHz | 1.8 GHz | ? | ||||||
GPU design | PowerVR Series5 | PowerVR Series6 | ? | ? × 3 | Apple G11M | Apple G12M? | Apple G15M | ||||||
Memory[note 4] | LPDDR3 | LPDDR4 | LPDDR4X? | ||||||||||
Baseband | — | Qualcomm Snapdragon X7 LTE (MDM9635M) | — | Intel PMB9955 | |||||||||
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W and H-Series
The W-series, later renamed to H-series, features in Apple's wireless headphone products. W-series chips following the W1 are integrated as part of the S-series SiPs.
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W1 | W2 | W3 | H1 | H2 | ||
Bluetooth | 4.2 | 5.0, later 5.3 | 5.0 | 5.3 | ||
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Assorted coprocessors
From time to time, purpose-built embedded silicon has been produced for Apple.
Motion coprocessors in the M-series were briefly part of this family. With the A9, the coprocessor became integrated in the main system-on-a-chip.
The U-series coprocessors provide ultra-wideband functionality.
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LPC18A1 (M7) | LPC18B1 (M8) | U1 | U2 | |
Purpose | Motion coprocessor | Ultra-wideband controller | ||
Architecture | ARMv7-M | ARMv7E-M | ? | |
Process | ? | 16 nm | ? | |
Core design | Cortex-M3 | Cortex-M4 | ? | |
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Other
List of PowerPC CPUs
PowerPC 600 Series
PowerPC G3 (PowerPC 750 Series)
PowerPC G4 (PowerPC 7400 Series)
PowerPC G5 (PowerPC 970 Series)
List of Intel Processors
Intel Macs frequently were available with several Intel processor configurations. Where a Mac has multiple processor options, they are listed together. The processors are listed from the one(s) included in base configurations, to the highest "build-to-order" configuration. Not all processor specifications completely match those listed on their Intel ARK page, as manufacturers are able to make minor tweaks to the configuration of a CPU. In some cases, Intel produced custom processor models for Apple's exclusive use. Where possible, the table below links such CPUs to CPU-World, a crowdsourced database of processor specifications.[4]
Series | Microarchitecture | Codename | Device | CPU Models | |
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Pentium 4 | NetBurst | Prescott |
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Pentium M | P6[note 5] | Dothan |
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Core | P6 Enhanced[note 5] | Yonah |
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Core 2 | Core | Merom |
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Xeon | Woodcrest |
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Clovertown |
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Core 2 | Wolfdale |
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Penryn |
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Core 2 Xeon | Harpertown |
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Core i | Nehalem | Lynnfield |
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Westmere | Clarkdale |
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Arrandale |
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Xeon | Bloomfield |
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Westmere EP |
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Core i | Sandy Bridge |
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Ivy Bridge | Ivy Bridge |
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Xeon | Ivy Bridge-EP |
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Core i and M | Haswell | Haswell |
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Haswell |
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Skylake | Skylake |
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Xeon | Skylake W |
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Core i | Skylake |
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Core i | Kaby Lake |
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Core i | Amber Lake |
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Xeon | Cascade Lake |
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Core i | Sunny Cove | Ice Lake Y |
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Skylake | Comet Lake |
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See Also
References
- ^ https://www.forbes.com/2008/04/23/apple-buys-pasemi-tech-ebiz-cz_eb_0422apple.html
- ^ https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/28/technology/28apple.html
- ^ pexpert/pexpert/arm64/board_config.h in xnu-7195.141.2 at line 164
- ^ https://github.com/acidanthera/OpenCorePkg/tree/2f14b6d30e47cf4b79ee3bf9cf4bb9c6130a8eb6/AppleModels/DataBase
Notes
- ^ Underclocked from 666.6 MHz.
- ^ Underclocked from 833 MHz.
- ^ Underclocked to 800 MHz in iPhone 4 and iPod touch (4th generation). Runs at full clock speed otherwise.
- ^ a b c d e f g Double data rate (DDR) memory speeds are measured in megatransfers per second (MT/s). To determine the clock speed in MHz, halve the number indicated. For instance, LPDDR4X-4266 is 2133 MHz.
- ^ a b P6-based processors do not support Intel 64. As such, they can only run 32-bit macOS and apps.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m This processor is a custom model designed by Intel for Apple. The linked Intel ARK entry (if any) is for the processor it is based on.
The Apple Wiki would like to thank Henriok, who produced the majority of Apple and Motorola/Freescale SoC renders used in this article, releasing them into the public domain.