The race to create the most compelling AI PC processors continues with the introduction of the Intel Core Ultra 200V. At Computex in Junewe learned that these “Lunar Lake” laptop chips will have a powerful 48 TOPS (tera operations per second) neural processing unit to handle artificial intelligence, and surprisingly, they will have up to 32 GB of internal memory for faster performance. and lower power consumption. Today at the IFA trade show in Germany, Intel gave us a closer look at the next generation of AI PC hardware.
According to Intel, the Core Ultra 200V will be the “most efficient x86 processor ever” with up to 50 percent lower power consumption in a package. In addition to bringing memory directly to the chip, Intel doubled the cache and core count (to 4MB and 4 cores) for the “Low Power Island” that handles less demanding tasks. Thanks to the new Xe2 embedded GPU, performance per watt has more than doubled in overall performance and gaming. (One example: Intel claims the Core Ultra 200V uses 35 percent less power than the previous generation, while delivering 32 percent faster performance.)
Obviously, Intel is working directly for Qualcomm, whose Arm-based Snapdragon chips are traditionally more energy efficient than x86 processors. Intel even claims to be the leader in battery life. In a test on the same laptop model, the Core Ultra 7 268V lasted 20.1 hours on the UL Procyon Office Productivity benchmark, compared to 18.4 hours with the Qualcomm X Elite chip. The Snapdragon system still held its lead in the Microsoft Teams 3×3 test, lasting 12.7 hours compared to the Intel 268V’s 10.7 hours.
In virtually every way, the Core Ultra 200V is a reimagining of Intel’s traditional x86 processor design. For example, the company abandoned Hyperthreading technology, which allows a single CPU core to support multiple threads. Instead, Intel is optimizing the new chips for single-threaded performance. The company claims that the Core Ultra 200V’s P-cores (performance) are 14 percent faster than the last generation, and its E-cores (efficiency) are 68 percent faster.
Unlike Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chips, Intel’s Core Ultra 200V processors can run legacy x86 software without any problems. There’s no emulation slowdown or arm mismatch to worry about. While the Snapdragon X Elite chips impressed me Surface Pro and XPS 13 Copilot+ systemsWindows on Arm performance issues remain, such as the inability to play games with strong anti-cheat protection Fortnite. If you’re worried about running older software or games, it makes sense to use an x86 chip for the next few years.
While the Core Ultra 200V series features 8-core 8-thread processors, Intel says it’s up to three times faster than its previous chips in terms of performance per thread. If that’s not enough bragging, Intel claims the new Xe2 GPU is 32 percent faster than its predecessor, 68 percent faster than Qualcomm’s 12-core X Elite chip, and 16 percent faster than AMD’s HX 370. Xe2 also adds an additional 67 TOPS. In addition to NPU’s 48 TOPS, AI computing performance.
As for AI, the Intel Core Ultra 9 288V NPU claims 79 percent faster denoising in Adobe Lightroom compared to its previous chip. And the Snapdragon X Elite 78-100 was 66 percent slower than Intel’s latest chip. As always, we’ll have to do our own testing to confirm the company’s numbers, but it’s clear that it’s not shy about its potential performance numbers.
The Intel Core Ultra 200V family is topped by the Ultra 9 288V with eight cores (4P + 4E) with a Max Turbo speed of up to 5.1 GHz on P cores. This model is also packed with the most powerful 8-core Xe2 Arc 140V GPU and 32GB of RAM. While the 200V chips all have 8 cores, their respective GPU, NPU, and RAM are all reduced down the line. The lower-end Core Ultra 226V, for example, has a 7-core Arc GPU, 40 TOPS NPU, and 16GB of RAM.
Like Apple’s M-series chips, the Core Ultra 200V’s internal memory means you won’t be able to upgrade your memory sequentially. Ultimately, this is a particular shame easily upgradeable LPCAMM2 memory makes his way to the notebooks. At least Intel isn’t forcing anyone to live permanently with 8GB of RAM.
Intel Core Ultra 200V systems will be available on September 24 from major manufacturers such as Dell, ASUS and Acer.
