Apple's A17 processor is expected to add ray tracing technology

According to Zhongshi News.com, the iPhone 14 series launched by Apple still uses the A15 application processor. Only the iPhone 14 Pro series is equipped with the A16 application processor. To solve the heat dissipation problem, the GPU core will add ray tracing technology.

Apple's new iPhones launched in the past few years will all use a new generation of application processors, but in 2022 only the iPhone 14 Pro series will be equipped with the new A16 processor. According to foreign media reports, the reason why the iPhone 14 series does not use the A16 processor may be that the original GPU of the Apple A16 processor made an upgrade error after adding ray tracing technology.

In addition, the industry pointed out that after the Apple A17 processor adopts TSMC's 3nm process, it is expected to successfully solve the power consumption and heat dissipation problems, and add ray tracing technology to the GPU core.

According to foreign media reports, the energy efficiency of Apple's A-series application processors has always been ahead of Android, but the performance of the A16 processor is not as good as expected, including the GPU core computing performance of Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 and MediaTek Dimensity 9200. And the leading advantage is obvious.

The A16 application processor is not as expected, and there may be personnel reasons. According to The Information, Apple's chip department has experienced a serious brain drain, and more and more chip engineers and executives such as designer Gerard Williams III have quit. Therefore, in terms of performance, the gap between Apple's A-series chips and Qualcomm's Snapdragon chips is getting smaller and smaller.