Talk:Apple motion coprocessors

Can we get some sources in here. This article currently has a grand total of zero sources and makes some pretty grand claims. We also need a serious re-write for readability purposes. There are currently extensive grammatical and spelling errors littered throughout the article. 216.249.49.31 (talk) 19:41, 11 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Move to A7 article?

Doesn't this information belong in the Apple A7 article? The M7 is just a part of the A7 SoC. Unless they start putting it in other chips, I don't see the point in having a separate article. --Imroy (talk) 07:14, 12 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

M7 is a new processor -- a separate chip, not part of the A7 chip. Though should possibly be merged as a section of the 5s page, until other devices use it. --cambookpro (talk) 18:32, 12 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I had assumed it was integrated. The description makes it sound very simple and the name is reminiscent of the ARM Cortex-M family of uC's. So I had assumed it was included in the A7 SoC, in much the same way the OMAP 4470 has two Cortex-M3's as "coprocessors" and all of the OMAP 5's have two Cortex-M4's. But none of the articles I've been able to find says one way or the other. We'll find out when someone does a teardown of the iPhone 5S. --Imroy (talk) 23:42, 12 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think Apple brands their processors based on ARM's Cortex-A and Cortex-M cores. The "A" probably stands for "Application" in both cases, or "Apple" in Apple's case. But the "M" probably differs. "Microcontroller" in ARM's case, and "Motion" in Apple's. But you could very well be completely right! The M7 might very well include a Cortex-M processor. That wouldn't be surprising at all. -- Henriok (talk) 16:52, 20 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ifixit have now done this teardown: http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iPhone+5s+Teardown/17383/2 & Apple M7 doesn't exist as a seperate IC - see their witty comment under Step 15. Promoting the M7 as a seperate chip was just Apple marketing so this page should be deleted/incorporated within A7 page.

Maybe the "M" stands for "magical," the M7 is invisible, and Apple does use pixie dust to hold the device together. Or perhaps the "M" stands for "marketing"… Toffee374 (talk) 12:01, 20 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Apple says that it's a separate chip on their iPhone 5S spec page. Even if Ifixit didn't find the M7 processor, it might still be there and it is still a separate IC that could be a part of the A7 package. We'll have to see when Chipworks get their hands on this where it's really located. -- Henriok (talk) 16:52, 20 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Its been found, and it is TINY compared to the A7. Time to resize and change the color of the image. :) Flightsoffancy (talk) 02:04, 21 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm on it! -- Henriok (talk) 10:39, 21 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It has been added to the intro of the article that "Chipworks found that the M7 most likely is a NXP LPC18A1 microcontroller, based on an ARM Cortex-M3 core.[1]"

But it is incorrect to say that the M7 is nothing more than a 3rd party general-purpose microcontroller because it was non-functional without a custom made software, that is developed by Apple here. So, I've added to the paragraph this text: "Although, a general-purpose microcontroller is non-functional without a custom made software - that Apple has developed here to control the sensor IC's, collect and pre-process their measurement data, etc. (It's comparable to the practice of OEM's to use 3rd party general purpose microcontrollers with custom made software to supervise PC motherboard, under their own brandnames.)" (It's a general practice, really.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.48.121.99 (talk) 13:41, 21 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Apps

I was just wondering if we were allowed to mention apps that use the M7 in here. I think it's interesting how developers are starting to come up with ideas of how to use the M7 and I wondered if some example apps would be appropriate or not on Wikipedia.