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Intel wireless chips turn up in iPhone 7

Finally, Chipworks notes that flash storage for the iPhone 7 is also being at least dual-sourced, with Hynix and Toshiba chips being found in its two teardown phones. On the cellular modem side, Chipworks found an Intel part that is likely the XMM7360, paired with two SMARTi 5 RF transceiver chips and a power management chip also from Intel. However they note that the iPhone model that the did the teardown with was the Model A1778 version, which basically points to the GSM model, so it is unclear if the CDMA version for Sprint and Verizon will yield a similar modem. No, Apple iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus don’t have Intel processors, rather the chipmaker is helping with the phone part of the device. Apple’s iPhone 7 does not bring any significant improvement in terms of design but it packs the best possible hardware specifications.

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And, as widely expected, some models of the new phone include modems from Intel. Intel’s technology is apparently only inside the first category of iPhone; a teardown of another iPhone by the fix company iFixit found Qualcomm modems. The report noted that “Orders from Apple represent the first major win for an Intel mobile chip program that had struggled for relevance and racked up operating losses”. We will decap it and shoot the die photo and update this blog as images become available. According to Techinsights, the RF transceivers are designed on TSMC’s 28nm process. It is also why Apple has yet to make the transition to Intel completely, although we guess keeping multiple suppliers so as not to be too dependent on one company is also pretty normal practice for a lot of businesses. Here we have the 338S00225, a new Apple/Dialog Semiconductor PMIC for the iPhone 7.

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Intel wireless chips turn up in iPhone 7