Purported iPhone 5 A6 Processor Leaks Along With September 12th Announcement

For all of the leaked parts we have seen up this point, what has been sorely absent has been the iPhone 5′s purported processor. Long debated, iPhone enthusiasts are eager to find out what direction Cupertino will go in for the iPhone 5 — the A5X, with its quad core GPU, or maybe the long-anticipated A6, which would be a true quad core CPU. Given that quad core is the new rave in Android smartphones this year, the assumption is that Apple will up the ante on their processor for an iPhone 5 that is bound to do a heck of a lot more than its predecessors.

But in spite of seeing iPhone 5 form factors, screens, and even motherboards, no glimpse of the processor chip — until now. Maybe.

What you’re looking at here is a very grainy shot of an A6 chip on what is said to be an iPhone 5 motherboard. According to Know Your Mobile:

A picture has leaked of what is alleged to be the iPhone 5’s new A6 processor chip. Previous reports suggested the handset would feature the existing A5X processor found in the iPhone 4S and iPad 3.

The leaked photo emerged on Twitter and although the picture is on the blurry side you can clearly see the ‘A6’ model number printed onto the hardware. That said, there’s still the possibility this is a well put together hoax.

Earlier rumours suggested that rather than upgrading to a quad core processor, the iPhone 5 would remain a dual core device. If the A6 is genuine it could fall into either camp.

So there you have it.

A blurry photo of an abstract motherboard with a black processor chip on it that could easily be doctored to say “A6″ is all we have to go by on this story, but I think that the possibility of an A6 chip is pretty plausible for the iPhone 5. The A5X, after, seems to be a processor that was custom-tailored for the iPad 3 and its retina display; the standard A5 simply wouldn’t have cut it. But with the A6, I think Apple will need it to be quad core in order to handle everything we’ve heard that it will have, namely, more Siri, a bigger/different display, 4G LTE, and maybe even NFC.

All of these features — some of them potentially culture-changing — are going to require a ton of processing power. Moreover, the quad-core GPU featured in the new iPad probably isn’t going to be necessary for the iPhone 5′s display. Thus, whether this photo is real or not, I’d be surprised if the iPhone 5 had anything less than a quad core A6.

 
By Michael Nace
 

Source : iphone5newsblog[dot]com