3C@1.5GHz sounds about right for that 40% claim.
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Using the 64-bit instruction set isn't always a win as far as performance goes due to increased branch prediction pressure (due to removal of conditional code execution) and data cache thrashing (due to 64-bit pointers). The latter can be somewhat mitigated by using ILP32, but I don't think Apple supports that.
It remains to be seen if the area gained by not supporting 32-bit code could compensate that loss...
Denver is pretty good performer if you take in account transistor budget. Competition Is a major force drive innovation.
More than anything those memory scores are outstanding. Seems the CPU has full access to the 128bit interface.
Edit: Also notice the L2 cache is being reported as 2MB instead of 1MB on the A8 http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench3/compare/1061936?baseline=1061742
With Cyclone and enhanced Cyclone CPU, the Geekbench 3 dual-core score appears to be ~ 1.777x higher than the single-core score. In other words, for every doubling of cores, the Geekbench 3 multi-core score should increase by ~ 1.777x. Since there are three cores in iPad Air 2, the multi-core score is ~ 2.47x higher than the single-core score ( 2.47 = 1.777*(1+1.777)*0.5 ).
Compared to the iPhone 6/Plus's scores, the iPad Air 2 does 20-25% better in 3DMark IS Unlimited. That scaling is much worse than the other benchmarks and is bizarrely anemic for a chip that physically has 50% more of everything along with slightly higher clocks.
Honestly I myself mostly look at Gfxbench results but even there for more than one test I'm not completely sure what exactly the application is doing.I wish that Futuremark would make post somewhere stating "this is what we do, how we do it, and we are 100% right". Right now, though, I'm quite willing to assume that 3DMark's code has a bottleneck that doesn't apply to any other game/benchmark.
What I can estimate right now from the very limited data provided is that the onscreen Manhattan score needs work; we had seen some weird early behaviour on GK20A in that regard also but it was quickly rectified. With the bandwidth the A8X has, the onscreen score sounds weird.
What numbers were you looking for instead? Comparing to the Shield Tablet and taking its resolution (1920x1200) into account, the Air 2's onscreen results look normal to slightly above expectations.