Apple A5 Dual-Cores Clocked Lower Than A4 in Early Benchmarks

Early benchmark tests of Apple’s new dual-core A5 chip featured in the iPad 2 have revealed that each processing core is actually clocked at a slower speed than the previous A4 chip, which features in the original iPad, iPhone 4, and the latest iPod touch.

Tests performed by iOSnoops show that overall, each of the A5’s cores runs at least 10% slower than the single core featured in Apple’s A4 chip, running at around 890 MHz in comparison to the 1 GHz A4. The speed of the A5 fluctuates depending on the applications it’s running however, with its lowest speed clocked at 861 MHz and its highest at 894 MHz.

Of course, the iPad 2 is still significantly faster than its predecessor thanks to its dual-cores, which together deliver a speed improvement of 65%, according to the iOSnoops tests. It’s thought that the A5’s cores are clocked a little lower in an effort to keep power consumption to a minimum.

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