Today, sales of laptops based on the new energy-efficient Intel Core Ultra 200V (Lunar Lake) processors began. Most reviewers (and there are not many of them yet) got their hands on the Asus Zenbook S14 OLED laptop based on the Core Ultra 7 258V. In this article, we have collected the most interesting data from reviews of this laptop from the Tom’s Hardware and PCWorld portals.
Image credit: Mark Hachman/IDG
The Asus Zenbook S14 OLED uses an eight-core Core Ultra 7 258V processor with four productive Lion Cove P-cores with a frequency range from 2.2 to 4.8 GHz and four energy-efficient Skymont E-cores operating at frequencies from 2.2 to 3.7 GHz. Lunar Lake chips do not support Hyper-Threading technology, so they work only with eight computing threads. The Core Ultra 7 258V also includes an AI accelerator (NPU) with a performance of 47 TOPS (trillion operations per second) and new integrated Arc 140V graphics. Another important feature of Lunar Lake processors is the integrated LPDDR5X-8355 RAM, of which the Core Ultra 7 258V has 32 GB. In other words, it is not possible to increase the amount of available RAM in laptops based on the Core Ultra 200V.
The new Asus Zenbook S14 OLED features a 14-inch display with a resolution of 2880 × 1800 pixels and a refresh rate of 120 Hz. The laptop has a 1 TB PCIe 4.0 SSD and an Intel BE201 adapter with Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4. In standalone mode, the device runs on a 73 Wh battery.
For comparison with the Asus Zenbook S14 OLED, PCWorld chose the following laptops:
Asus Zenbook S16 based on 12-core and 24-thread Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 with integrated Radeon 890M graphics and 50 TOPS NPU, equipped with a screen with a resolution of 2880 × 1800 pixels; Microsoft Surface Laptop based on 12-core Snapdragon X Elite (X1E-80-100) with a frequency of up to 4.0 GHz, 45 TOPS NPU and integrated Qualcomm Adreno X1 graphics, as well as a screen with a resolution of 2304 × 1536 pixels; MSI Prestige 16 AI EVO based on 16-core and 22-thread Intel Core 7 Ultra 155H with a frequency of up to 4.8 GHz, integrated Arc graphics of the previous generation, equipped with a screen with a resolution of 2560 × 1600 pixels.
Tom’s Hardware, in turn, in addition to solutions based on AMD Ryzen and Snapdragon X Elite, also added for comparison a 15-inch MacBook Air based on an eight-core Apple M3 processor.
It should be added that PCWorld conducted its tests of the Asus Zenbook S14 OLED in two power consumption modes. In the first case, the Windows “Balanced” power scheme was used for all Intel and AMD-based laptops. And for the Snapdragon X Elite laptop, the lowest settings were used. The Asus Zenbook S14 OLED was also tested with the “Maximum Power Consumption” power scheme. In the test graphs, it is marked with the “MAX” prefix. Tom’s Hardware does not specify at what power consumption settings the tests were conducted.
According to Tom’s Hardware, the Core Ultra 7 258V in the Asus Zenbook S14 OLED was almost on par with its competitors in terms of single-threaded performance. In the single-core Geekbench 6 test, the new Asus product scored 2,751 points. In the multi-core test, the result was 11,157 points. In terms of single-core performance, the new Intel chip was close to the Dell XPS 13 and Asus Zenbook S16 laptops based on Snapdragon X Elite and Ryzen AI, respectively. However, the Core Ultra 7 258V fell slightly behind the Apple M3 processor (3,093 points). Multi-threaded performance in this benchmark was lower than that of its competitors. The Apple M3 was second from the bottom. This is understandable, since other chips have more computing cores.
In the data transfer test, the new Zenbook with the Core Ultra 7 258V copied 25GB files at 1,007.29 MB/s. That’s better than the Zenbook S16 (908.45 MB/s), but the Snapdragon-powered XPS, MacBook Air, and last year’s Zenbook S14 OLED were all better at 1,342.05 MB/s and 1,167.29 MB/s.
The Core Ultra 7 258V performed poorly in the Handbrake test for transcoding video from 4K to 1080p. According to Tom’s Hardware, the chip completed the task in 8 minutes and 28 seconds, which is worse than the results of the other laptops presented in the comparison. The same Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite in the Dell XPS 13 (9345) completed the same task in 4:47 (the fastest result). PCWorld also compared the efficiency of laptops in Handbrake 1.8 for transcoding video, but with a different file, which took the Core Ultra 7 258V an hour to process, almost twice as long as the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370. The situation was slightly improved by choosing the “Maximum Performance” power scheme in Windows, which allowed the Core Ultra 7 258V to outperform the Snapdragon X Elite in this task.
The PCWorld portal compared the performance of the integrated graphics of the Core Ultra 7 258V with competitors’ solutions. For this, the 3DMark test was used, as well as the games Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Cyberpunk 2077.
With the recommended power management settings, the Arc 140V graphics in the Core Ultra 7 258V outperformed its competitors. Switching to the “Maximum Performance” power management scheme increased this gap.
In Shadow of the Tomb Raider, the Arc 140V graphics were faster (55 fps) compared to the Snapdragon X Elite’s integrated graphics, which averaged only 30 fps. Switching to the Maximum Performance power plan in Windows allowed the Arc 140V to outperform the Radeon 890M graphics in the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and the Arc graphics in its predecessor, the Intel Core 7 Ultra 155H.
The picture remained the same in Cyberpunk 2077. In the balanced power consumption mode, the new Arc 140V graphics showed 47 frames per second, overtaking the integrated Snapdragon X Elite and Core Ultra 7 155H chips. In the maximum performance mode, it was the fastest, showing 65 frames per second. The same Radeon 890M showed only 58 frames per second.
The Core Ultra 7 258V’s AI performance in the Procyon Vision test was slightly better than the Snapdragon X Elite and significantly better than the Core 7 Ultra 155H. The newcomer also significantly outperformed its predecessor in the Procyon image generation test.
According to PCWorld, the Intel Lunar Lake-based notebook lasted an average of 17 hours and 7 minutes. The maximum runtime was 21 hours (conditions not specified). The Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite-based notebook lasted 16 hours and 20 minutes, the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370-based system lasted 10 hours and 42 minutes, and the Intel Meteor Lake-based notebook lasted 10 hours and 35 minutes. Tom’s Hardware reports that its new Zenbook S14 OLED lasted an average of 14 hours and 7 minutes. The Dell XPS 13 (9345) based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite (X1E-80-100) lasted 19 hours and 31 minutes. However, the laptop is equipped with a less capacious 55 Wh battery. At the same time, the Dell XPS 13 received a display with support for a Full HD resolution, which definitely also affected its battery life results. According to Tom’s Hardware, the 15-inch MacBook Air based on the M3 worked for 15 hours and 3 minutes. It is not equipped with an OLED screen, but its display supports a higher resolution of 2880 × 1864 pixels.
Drawing conclusions about the entire Core Ultra 200V platform based on a review of one laptop with one processor would be wrong. Tom’s Hardware agrees. The portal notes the high single-core performance of the Core Ultra 7 258V, which should be enough for most everyday tasks, but at the same time, in resource-intensive tasks, the multi-core performance of the new energy-efficient Intel processor may not be enough.
PCWorld, in turn, says that the energy efficiency of the laptop based on the specified Intel processor is quite competitive with systems based on Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite. In many resource-intensive tasks, the AMD Ryzen processor copes better, but it provides lower autonomy. The portal adds that in tasks that require CPU performance, the Lunar Lake chip shows average results. At the same time, journalists were pleasantly surprised by the performance of the integrated graphics of the new processor and NPU.
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Source: 3dnews.ru
