Hey guys it’s Greg with Apple Explained and today I want to talk about Apple’s secret
weapon.
Something the company has invested heavily in over the last decade, and something that
will keep Apple’s products ahead of their competition for many years to come.
But what is this weapon exactly?
Well, it’s custom silicon.
Which are Apple-designed chipsets that the company makes exclusively for their own products.
And in this video we’re going to explore how this has been such a big advantage for
Apple and where it could lead them in the future.
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Now I want to start off the video by explaining what it means for a company like Apple to
make their own custom chipsets.
Because at first glance it may not seem like much of an accomplishment.
I mean, Apple already makes the software and hardware for their products, how hard can
it be to make a little chip?
Well, it turns out chip-making is extremely expensive and requires high scalability to
achieve a profitable return on investment.
That’s why there are entire companies like Qualcomm dedicated to designing chips for
various devices.
And then tech companies buy chipsets from Qualcomm for use in their smartphones.
For example, Google buys the Qualcomm Snapdragon processor for their Pixel phone.
And that’s actually what Apple did for most of their early iPhones, except their CPUs
happened to be purchased from Samsung.
And those risks are why so few tech companies design their own custom silicon.
In fact, companies like HP, Motorola, and IBM have all had chipset divisions at some
point, but they eventually failed due to the expense.
So when Jobs decided Apple needed to design their own chips, he made sure the company
was in the right place before making the leap.
iPhone sales needed to be high enough to justify the cost, and Apple needed semiconductor manufacturers
to actually assemble the chips.
So once Apple broke a million sales of the iPhone in its first year, they knew they had
no problems with scalability.
And they avoided any costs associated with manufacturing since they delegate that responsibility
to Samsung.
So Apple went ahead and acquired a chipset design company called P.A.
Semi in 2008.
Who was known for their high performing, high efficiency chips.
And this turned out to be one of the most important decisions the company would ever
made.
As Apple would soon begin reaping the tremendous benefits of an in-house silicon design team.
Now Apple debuted their first custom chipset on the original iPad in 2010, which featured
the A4 system-on-a-chip.
And just weeks after the iPads introduction, Apple bought another chip company called Intrinsity.
Who were known for making chipsets for mobile devices.
So with their chipset team in full force, Apple began making unbelievable strides in
performance with each new generation.
In fact, Apple was the first company to put a 64-bit chip on a smartphone, which shocked
the entire tech industry.
It happened back in 2013 with the introduction of the iPhone 5s, and here’s what a Qualcomm
employee had to say about it, “The 64-bit Apple chip hit us in the gut.
Not just us, but everyone, really.
We were slack-jawed, and stunned, and unprepared.”
And this is exactly how Apple went from not being involved in the silicon industry at
all, to becoming it’s main driving force in less than three years.
And these huge strides Apple has made with their custom chipset year after year has left
their competition in the dust.
Struggling to keep up with the level of performance and efficiency Apple continues to deliver.
In fact, competitors like the Galaxy S8 had to include chipsets with 4 high performance
cores and 4 high efficiency cores in order to match the speed of the 2-core A10 Fusion
chip on the iPhone 7.
Which just goes to show how much more optimization you get from custom silicon designed specifically
for the device it powers.
But that was just the beginning for Apple.
Because just eight years after the company debuted their first custom silicon, Apple
has managed to make a mobile device chipset for the iPad Pro that’s faster than 92%
of notebooks on the market.
And this begs the question, why doesn’t Apple include custom silicon on their Mac
computers?
And the answer is, they actually do.
But not in the way you might think.
The iMac, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, and Mac Mini all features Apple’s T2 coprocessor
which controls the MacBook Pro’s Touch Bar and handles power management and computer
security.
So Apple has already began to include their own processors in their Macs, and it’s only
a matter of time before they include an entire custom made CPU, and that’s something they
might be working on right now.
But I also want to mention the emphasis Apple put on single core performance with their
chipsets.
Because if you don’t understand how processors work, then you might only be concerned with
how many cores it has and how much power all of those cores can deliver.
But it’s important to remember that the single core performance of a device is essentially
what’s powering its user interface responses and interactions.
So that’s part of the reason why Apple devices are known for their buttery-smooth animations,
while other smartphones and tablets experience hiccups or lagging.
But there is a downside to such powerful single core operation, and that is the strain it
puts on the battery.
Which is why Apple had to throttle the processor when a device’s battery dropped below a
certain percentage of deterioration.
Because if not, the device would shut down unexpectedly and leave a lot of users frustrated.
But today Apple is being much more transparent about this throttling and actually giving
users the option to disable it.
Now you’re probably wondering how on earth Apple is able to introduced these advanced
chipsets year after year without any real competition.
And it has to do with the fact that Apple doesn’t sell their chipsets to any other
company.
They just make custom silicon for their own devices and that’s it.
So they’re operating on their own time, not according to industry standards.
They don’t have to worry about the shelf life of each generation, they don’t have
to worry about satisfying vendors, they don’t have to worry about paying markups to a chipset
company, and they don’t have to worry about their chips running well on a variety of devices
with a variety of operating systems.
All Apple has to do is run their own iOS and apps as fast as they possibly can.
And if you’re a silicon engineer, you’d be able to do your best work at Apple since
they aren’t bogged down by the constraints of traditional chipset companies.
And this isn’t even considering how much easier it is to design silicon when you have
direct access to the hardware and software engineers, and industrial design team who’re
all working together to help build the best device possible.
Something that’s challenging to achieve when making chipsets at a completely different
company from the one making the actual devices.
But there’s another advantage of Apple having their own in-house silicon team.
They can actually create chipsets with the technology necessary to support upcoming features
that haven’t even been announced yet.
That’s why Apple’s portrait mode worked in live view from the start, while Google’s
smartphones didn’t until three generations later.
Also, this proves Apple didn’t start designing their own custom silicon as a publicity stunt
or sales gimmick.
They did it in order to fulfill their belief in what a great device should do.
It should seamlessly integrate the hardware and software in order to deliver a magical
experience for the user.
An experience where the technology behind the screen doesn’t interfere with what’s
happening on the screen.
And that’s exactly what Apple has achieved with every device running their custom silicon
today.
Because they’ve actually made several different chips for different purposes.
The A-Series powers the iPhones and iPads, the S-series powers the Apple Watch and combines
virtually all the device’s electronic components into one package.
There’s the W-series which is used in the AirPods and Apple Watch and allows for a fast
and reliable connection to bluetooth and wifi.
And the T-series which serves as a secure enclave and enables features like “Hey Siri”
on the Mac.
Now when you look back at just how much progress Apple’s made with their custom chipsets,
it’s hard to imagine that they’ve only been at it for eight years, considering they’re
dominating the entire industry.
I mean just look at this comparison of multi-core score between the iPhone XS and some of its
biggest competitors.
Notice that iPhone X from over a year ago is still significantly more powerful than
any other smartphone today.
So you can only imagine where Apple will be five or ten years from now.
And that’s why custom silicon is Apple’s secret weapon.
It’s what’s keeping their software responsive and running silky-smooth, and it’s also
adding years of longevity to hardware that used to become obsolete every couple years.
So what’s in store for the future of Apple’s chipsets?
Well, Apple has been poaching modem engineers from QUALCOMM which suggests they likely have
plans to create their own modem’s, and that could mean a stronger, more reliable connection
to your network.
There’s also the very strong possibility that Apple creates a custom CPU for their
Mac computers, switching from their current Intel-based processors.
And rumors suggest Apple has been working on this for years and that the transition
could happen as soon as 2020.
But that would require a complete rebuild of the Mac operating system, which could takes
years to complete.
But the benefits of the new architecture would be huge for users and developers alike.
So that is Apple’s secret weapon, and if you want to vote for the next video topic,
don’t forget to subscribe.
Thanks for watching and I’ll see you next time.