Apple has just presented the iPhone 17 PROy, with him, we already have all the letters on the table in terms of high performance processors. The new iPhone sets the soc a19 pro, the Pixel 10 Pro has the G5 tensor and we already knew the Snapdragon 8 Elite of mobiles like the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra.
Those of the apple carry generations fighting to mark the rhythm in terms of power Thanks to some chips that have less nuclei than those of the competition, but great performance both in CPU and GPU. They are also usually sparse when talking about concrete specifications, such as the frequency of these nuclei, but this year they have been overcome.
They have given very few data from the A19 Pro and, nevertheless, They announce how big they are “The most powerful pro models ever created”. The funny thing is that this power of the iPhone 17 Pro can be more marked by the design of the mobile than only by the benefits of the processor itself. Because you don’t have to talk about how premium that is titanium and glass: you have to talk about aluminum.
And it makes all the meaning in addition to a great enemy: the covers.
THE DELIBLED MYSTERY OF THE A19 PRO
Apple is a company that takes great care of communication and does not say a word higher than another without having seriously meditated. Before seeing how they are talking about the power of the new iPhone, let’s see what they wanted to teach the processor.
To read something about A19 PRO, you have to go down to the middle of the terminal’s presentation page, where we can see that the soc “It offers the greatest power that an iPhone has had”. On the page characteristicsthey simply detail that it has six CPU nuclei (with two performance and four efficiency), six GPU cores with neuronal accelerators (this is the great novelty of this soc, by the way) and 16 nuclei in its ‘Neural Engine’.
Same CPU nuclei and same configuration as the A18 PRO (And that the A17 PRO) and same GPU nuclei, but now each of those nuclei with a support for the locations of the AI at the local level. We have not had the classic “yields x% more than the previous generation, something they detailed before.
The only percentage of yield we have had is that of sustained yield 40% better. And this is what must be explained because it is not so much thanks to the A19 Pro … as the design of the iPhone 17 Pro.
Steam chamber and aluminum body, performance keys
On its website, Apple mentions that “thermal design innovation makes the GPU and CPU achieve up to a 40 % more constant performance“, And all” thanks to their advanced cooling technology and the unibody structure of aluminum “, which has” allowed them to create the most powerful iPhone of all time. “
In the first seconds of the presentation of this model, we saw that Apple focused on showing the new chassis of the iPhone 17 Pro: A unibody body which implies that the sides, the interior and much of what we will have in sight and between hands it has been created from one piece, and not joining several to create the body.
It is something that Apple itself has already done in the past and that companies like Tesla, with her gigapressThey also use to build a chassis with the least possible number of pieces. But what attracts attention is the material: aluminum.
Apple has a couple of generations selling the idea that titanium and crystal of the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro It was the culmination of what we could understand as a mobile manufactured with premium materials and … do they return to aluminum after all these years? As paragraphs said: it is the decision that makes sense if they want solve a historical problem.
Aluminum is a material that is used, next to copper, when creating the dissipators that we have in consoles, computers and other devices that generate heat. He is a great driver, so the heat of his chips is easily transferred to aluminum and, from there, to the environment, helping to refrigerate the circuitry. Titanium and, above all, crystal … are not great heat drivers.
It depends on many factors such as alloy and thickness, but it is estimated that thermal conductivity, in watts per meter and Kelvin, of the three materials is as follows:
As I say, it is a measure that depends, but w/mk above or down, it is evident that aluminum is much better dissipating the heat than the other two materials. But if the iPhone 17 pro were only aluminum, it would be uncomfortable in the hand under heavy tasks (or recording video, that there is no need to render something with the iPhone so that TEMPERATE TEMPERATE). That’s where Apple’s other great rectification comes into play: a dissipation system at the height.
Last year We already saw that Apple incorporated a structure of graphite to drive the heat of the processor and distribute it better for the rear of the phone to prevent it from concentrating on a single point. It was something necessary, but we also commented that it might not be enough.
Thermal strangulation tests, as evidenced: When the iPhone is demanded, it is heated and the SOC, to protect itself, enters what we know as Throttling: its frequency – and performance – low to heat less. When the iPhone returns to normal temperature, the frequency of the processor increases automatically.
This generation, finally, have been given and accepted reality, incorporating a rumored steam camerawhich is one of the most advanced systems to dissipate heat. This mechanism It uses a metallic duct full of a low pressure fluid that, when changing state between liquid and vapor, transfers heat to reduce the device temperature.
That is why Apple, both in the presentation and on its website, provided that it mentioned the increase in iPhone 17 pro y has turned the iPhone’s own structure into a fundamental element to achieve a sustained power improvement.
In theory, by dissipating better, the iPhone will take longer to enter that range of thermal strangulation, allowing, for example, playing demanding titles to maximum performance for longer or recording in 4K without hot.
All this, obviously, is in theory and We will have to wait for the analysis of the iPhone 17 Pro to be able to verify it First hand, but although, on the one hand, it is disappointing not to see gross potential improvements in terms of A19 Pro performance (which we already say, we must wait to know the frequency details of the nuclei), I am glad that they have solved a problem that the last iPhone have had.
That’s why, Despite the step in terms of perceived quality of materials (That ‘pre -rig of designs thanks to glass and titanium), on paper is a great step forward for day -to -day use. Beyond that, although in CPU it seems that the A19 PRO will not mark a significant advance, in GPU it will improve gross performance compared to the previous generation.
Although, of course, the steam chamber will do its work, but I cannot think about how Apple is playing with the idea that aluminum will be the salvation of sustained performance when, in practice, Many will put an iPhone case that will cancel that thermal performance of the material itself.
In Xataka | One more year, we have new iPhone. And one more year, Apple is far in generative for mobiles
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