Apple's new A5X chip may be for iPad only, Analysts

Apple delivered a performance breakthrough Wednesday with its new A5X processor for the iPad, but it's possible that this chip won't make its way into the next iPhone, analysts said. The chips used in the first two iPads, the A4 and A5, both made their way into a new iPhone soon after. But the A5X, with its heavy focus on graphics, may not be ideal for smartphone use, and Apple may wait for a more power-efficient chip built with a new manufacturing process. The A5X has two CPU cores, just like the A5, and it was the superior graphics performance of the A5X that Apple played up at its launch event for the new iPad in San Francisco. The new chip has four graphics cores, which should boost multimedia performance and allow for smooth operation of the iPad's higher-resolution, 2048-by-1536-pixel display. Apple may have purpose-built the A5X specifically for the new iPad's improved screen, said Linley Gwennap, founder and principal analyst of The Linley Group, who emphasized he was still sorting through the information about the new chip Wednesday.