The iPhone 5 has over twice the overall processing performance of any previous iOS device, including the third generation iPad, according to Geekbench results revealed by Primate Labs Sunday. The results, if authentic, show that the iPhone 5 is powered by a dual-core ARMv7 processor with 1 GB of RAM.
Despite the iPhone 5’s relatively low memory bandwidth when compared to the third generation iPad, the latest iPhone’s processor overall scored more than twice as high as the iPad on Geekbench tests, 1601 to 790, and two and a half times higher than the iPhone 4S, 1601 to 632. Geekbench is a multi-platform scalable benchmark that tests only processing and memory performance. It does not evaluate graphics performance, something that distinguishes the iPad and iPhone 5 from each other and their predecessors.
The iPhone 5 also fared well against its primary Android competitor, the Samsung Galaxy S3, which scored 1628 on the Geekbench test. The roughly 1.5 percent advantage for the Galaxy S3 is notably small, considering that the Android phone has a quad core processor compared to the iPhone’s custom-designed dual-core chip.
Also revealed by the Geekbench data is the clock of the iPhone 5’s A6 processor, which is 1 GHz. The A5 found in the iPhone 4S was clocked at 800 MHz. The 1 GB of RAM reported by the results also matches earlier reports based upon part numbers and is an increase from the 512 MB of RAM found in the iPhone 4S.
Of note, the iPhone 5’s 1601 Geekbench score is higher than a June 2004 Power Mac (with a score of 1580), early 2006 Mac Mini (1398), iMac G5 (1179) and many other Macs that were considered computational powerhouses just a few years ago.
The iPhone 5 will launch this Friday, September 21, at 8:00 a.m. local time. Press releases from Apple and its carrier partners indicate that the iPhone 5 will shatter sales records set by the launch of the iPhone 4S last October.