Teardown Puts A7 CPU Under the Microscope

[Maura]

Chipworks and iFixit have posted the results of their teardown of the iPhone 5s’s new A7 CPU, reports AppleInsider. In order to be able to see exactly what is going on under the hood, so to speak, Chipworks blasted the layers off the semiconductors with an Ion Beam Etcher, and then looked at them under a transmission electron microscope.

One fact revealed by this close examination was that the Samsung-made chip uses that company’s 28-nanometer Hi K metal gate process, which is the same as that used by the eight-core Samsung Exynos 5410, found in Samsung’s newest Galaxy range.

Chipworks also found that the “gate pitch” or distance between the transistors, in the A7 is 114 nanometers, compared to the A6 chip’s 123s nanometers. AppleInsider says that this gives the A7 as much power as the A6, but over a smaller area.

The A7 also uses more total space that the A6, thanks to the 28-nanometer process, enabling Apple to greatly improve on processor performance.

Source: Apple's new A7 CPU dissected to reveal 28nm manufacturing process