Another Year, Another iPhone Scandal

"Chipgate 2015"

Various "gates" have unleased the wrath of Apple device owners unto their beloved company. However, some recent reports are trying to overrule previous findings and tests that launched the latest Apple scandal, "chipgate."

First, there is last year's "bendgate" scandal with the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, which is something that caused controversies, but nothing that a careful handling of the devices couldn't address. Simply, when pressure was applied (anything around and above 30lbs of pressure) to the device, it would bend noticeably. The fulcrum of the bend was near the volume buttons, which was a weak point of the iPhone 6 chassis.

One that could be brewing the biggest storm the company has faced is "chipgate," which points to the discrepancy between the A9 SoCs for the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus that Apple outsourced from TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) and Samsung. Note that Apple only designs the chips and has no foundries to manufacture them with and thus, 13 million A9 chips that Cupertino needed were outsourced to both.

Determine the Manufacturer: TSMC or Samsung

An easy way to determine which manufacturer made the chip running on a particular Apple device is through the free iOS app called Lirum Device Info Lite. For the iPhone 6s, if Lirium identifies the chip as N71mAP, then it was made by TSMC and if it displays N71AP, then it is from Samsung. The same is true for the iPhone 6s Plus. TSMC's chips will have N766mAP and Samsung's will be displayed as N66AP.

So why does it matter if they came from different manufacturers?

One of the first ones to tell highlight the different chips running on Apple's latest iPhone models is Chipworks, which reported that TSMC's A9 chip is bigger than that of Samsung's by about 8.5 mm2. This is courtesy of TSMC using a 16nm FinFET process while Samsung used its 14nm LPE FinFET technology.

Basically the TSMC chip is slightly bigger than the chip from Samsung. This should make little difference, but that didn't stop consumer's from launching investigations and making assumptions on their own.

In truth, the chips do differ slightly in performance and battery life. Even Apple made a comment on the matter to dissuade public opinion that the Samsung chip was far inferior to the TSMC chip. According to Apple, the performance gap between the two chips is only about 2-3%.

If you are a average user, this should not concern you. The difference will be negligible. However, if you want to find out exactly which chip your new iPhone 6s or 6s Plus has, download the app above and find out for sure!

Check out this video for a more in depth discussion of the differing chips: