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iPad Mini 4 Uses Speed-Bumped 1.5 GHz A8 Chip With 2 GB of RAM

Tuesday September 15, 2015 9:33 am PDT by Eric Slivka
Apple last week introduced the iPad mini 4, advertising the device as essentially a scaled down version of the iPad Air 2, although the device uses a A8 chip rather than the A8X found in the iPad Air 2. Ars Technica has now taken an early look at the iPad mini 4, finding that the A8 runs at 1.5 GHz, slightly faster than the 1.4 GHz A8 used in the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Like the iPad Air 2, the iPad mini 4 also carries 2 GB of RAM.

ipad_mini_4_geekbench
Having a whole extra CPU core makes the 1.5GHz A8X in the iPad Air 2 about 50% faster than the Mini 4, but we're still looking at a 20-or-so percent improvement over the old Mini 2 and Mini 3. That extra RAM will be good for more than just Split View multitasking, too—2GB iDevices need to eject things from memory less often, cutting down on the amount of tab reloading that Safari does and generally reducing wait times when switching between different tabs and apps.
With the iPad mini 4 using a slower chip than the iPad Air 2 while still driving the same display resolution and similar other internals, performance won't be quite as good on the smaller tablet, as the smaller body likely has some heat-related impacts that drove Apple to include the less-powerful chip. Still, users should see substantial performance upgrades over earlier iPad mini models, as well as support for all of the latest iOS 9 features like Split View multitasking.

Related Roundup: iPad mini 5
Buyer's Guide: iPad Mini (Don't Buy)
[ 174 comments ]


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borntrouble
45 months ago
I was very upset when Apple left out important information on the iphone 6s concerning battery life, weight etc. at the official keynote last week. But regarding the iPad mini 4, this was basically nothing more than a dirty little lie.

Phil Schiller: "So whats the iPad mini 4? Well simply, we've taken the power and performance of iPad Air 2, and built it into an even smaller and mini enclosure"
Rating: 19 Votes
Avatar
Glassed Silver
45 months ago
So they basically lied during the keynote.
Interesting.

[MEDIA=youtube]0qwALOOvUik[/MEDIA]
@50:58min ('https://youtu.be/0qwALOOvUik?t=50m58s')

Glassed Silver:mac
Rating: 14 Votes
Avatar
Menel
45 months ago

So they basically lied during the keynote.
Interesting.

Glassed Silver:mac

Blatantly lied.
False advertising? maybe.
Rating: 11 Votes
Avatar
JonneyGee
45 months ago

No one can complain about this! But some probably will...

I disagree. Seeing the new iPad Mini come in slower than last year's iPad Air is disappointing.
Rating: 9 Votes
Avatar
Rogifan
45 months ago
Has anyone confirmed that the A8 in the iPad mini is slow and makes the user experience poor? I can't say I've ever thought my iPhone 6 was slow. Yes I wish it had more RAM but I've never thought the phone felt slow. I don't care about specs, I care about user experience.
Rating: 8 Votes
Avatar
7thson
45 months ago
No one can complain about this! But some probably will...
Rating: 7 Votes
Avatar
Mackinjosh
45 months ago

No one can complain about this! But some probably will...

And fanboys like you will blindly defend the decision to not include a chip that works in smaller devices like the upcoming iPhones. But yeahhhhhh everyone else that hates these cheap moves by Apple are just "complainers".
Rating: 7 Votes
Avatar
EldonChew
45 months ago

So they basically lied during the keynote.
Interesting.

[MEDIA=youtube]0qwALOOvUik[/MEDIA]
@50:58min ('https://youtu.be/0qwALOOvUik?t=50m58s')

Glassed Silver:mac


Trimmed it out ;)

[MEDIA=youtube]lNTODMaIOHM[/MEDIA]
Rating: 6 Votes
Avatar
caligurl
45 months ago
i'm still angry they lied during the keynote.
Rating: 5 Votes
Avatar
MrGimper
45 months ago
Shame it comes up short compared to the Air 2 :(
Rating: 4 Votes

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