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Cortex-X3 (Makalu-ELP) µarch
General Info
Arch TypeCPU
DesignerARM Holdings
ManufacturerTSMC
Introduction2022
Process10 nm, 7 nm, 5 nm
Core Configs1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12
Pipeline
TypeSuperscalar, Pipelined
OoOEYes
SpeculativeYes
Reg RenamingYes
Stages320
Decode6-way
Instructions
ISAARMv9.0-A
ExtensionsFPU, NEON
Cache
L1I Cache64 KiB/core
4-way set associative
L1D Cache64 KiB/core
4-way set associative
L2 Cache1 MiB/core
8-way set associative
L3 Cache16 MiB/cluster
16-way set associative
Cores
Core NamesCortex-X3
Succession
Contemporary
Cortex-A715 (Makalu)

Cortex-X3 (Makalu-ELP) is the successor to the Cortex-X2 (Matterhorn-ELP), a performance-enhanced version of the
Cortex-A715 (Makalu), low-power high-performance ARM microarchitecture designed by Arm for the mobile market.

Cortex-X[edit]

ARMCortex
Year Cortex-X Core Cortex-A Core
2020 Cortex-X1 (Hera)
Cortex-X1C (Hera-C)
Cortex-A78 (Hercules)
Cortex-A78C (Hera Prime)
2021 Cortex-X2
(Matterhorn-ELP)
Cortex-A710 (Matterhorn)
Cortex-A510 (Klein)
2022 Cortex-X3 (Makalu-ELP) Cortex-A715 (Makalu)
2023 Cortex-X4 (Hunter-ELP) Cortex-A720 (Hunter)
Cortex-A520 (Hayes)
2024 Cortex-X5 (Chaberton-ELP)
Cortex-X925 (Blackhawk)
Cortex-A720AE (Hunter-AE)
Cortex-A725 (Chaberton)
2025 Cortex-X930 (Travis) Cortex-A730 (Gelas)
Cortex-A530 (Nevis)

Architecture[edit]

Key changes from Cortex-X2[edit]

The processor implements the following changes: [1]

  • Instruction set ARMv9.0-A
  • Decode width: 6 (increased from 5)
  • Rename / Dispatch width: 8
  • Up to 1 MiB of private L2 cache (increased from 1 MiB)
  • Micro-operation (MOP) cache: 1.5k entries (reduced from 3k)
  • Reorder buffer (ROB): 320 entries (increased from 288)
  • Execution ports: 15
  • Pipeline length: 9 (reduced from 10)

Performance claims:

  • 25% peak performance improvement over the Cortex-X2 in smartphones
(3.3GHz, 1MB L2, 8MB L3). [2]
  • 11% IPC uplift over the Cortex-X2, when based on the same process,
clock speed, and cache setup (also known as ISO-process).

Comparison[edit]

"Prime" core
Architecture Cortex-A78 Cortex-X1 Cortex-X2 Cortex-X3 Cortex-X4 Cortex-X925 Cortex-X930
Code name Hercules Hera Matterhorn-ELP Makalu-ELP Hunter-ELP Blackhawk Travis
ISA ARMv8.2-A ARMv9.0-A ARMv9.2-A
Peak clock speed ~3.0 GHz ~3.3 GHz ~3.4 GHz ~3.8 GHz ~4.2 GHz
Max in-flight 2x 160 2x 224 2x 288 2x 320 2x 384 2x 768
L0 (Mops entries) 1536 [3] 3072 1536 0
L1-I + L1-D 32+32 KiB 64+64 KiB 64+64 KiB 64+64 KiB
L2 128–512 KiB 0.25–1 MiB 0.5–2 MiB 2–3 MiB
L3 0–8 MiB [4] 0–16 MiB 0–32 MiB
Decode width 4 5 6 10 [5] 10
Dispatch 6/cycle 8/cycle 10/cycle

References[edit]

  1. Schor, David (2022-06-28). Arm Unveils Next-Gen Flagship Core: Cortex-X3.
  2. ARM unveils Cortex-X3 (+25% peak performance) and Cortex-A715 (+20% efficiency).
  3. Arm's New Cortex-A78 and Cortex-X1 Microarchitectures: An Efficiency and Performance Divergence.
  4. Schor, David (2020-05-26). Arm Cortex-X1: The First From The Cortex-X Custom Program.
  5. (2023-05-29) Arm Cortex-X4, A720, and A520: 2024 smartphone CPUs deep dive.
codenameCortex-X3 (Makalu-ELP) +
core count1 +, 2 +, 4 +, 6 +, 8 +, 10 + and 12 +
designerARM Holdings +
first launched2022 +
full page namearm holdings/microarchitectures/cortex-x3 +
instance ofmicroarchitecture +
instruction set architectureARMv9.0-A +
manufacturerTSMC +
microarchitecture typeCPU +
nameCortex-X3 (Makalu-ELP) +
pipeline stages320 +
process10 nm (0.01 μm, 1.0e-5 mm) +, 7 nm (0.007 μm, 7.0e-6 mm) + and 5 nm (0.005 μm, 5.0e-6 mm) +