Core Ultra 200V: Intel's Lunar Lake CPU for slim AI notebooks

Contents

"The most efficient x86 processor ever" – Intel uses this strong statement to promote its Core Ultra 200V mobile processor. However, the statement also illustrates how much pressure the previous top dog in the notebook market is under: Qualcomm has entered the stage since the middle of the year and, with the help of Microsoft, has stomped the AI notebook category out of the ground –, including the new marketing label Copilot+.

The noticeably biggest improvement that Snapdragon notebooks bring with them should also be possible with Core Ultra 200V, namely significantly longer battery life. Intel's newcomer should also be at the forefront in terms of computing power: Benchmark results published by Intel – independent tests have not yet been possible – sometimes show one platform and sometimes the other slightly ahead in terms of CPU performance. It should be noted that Core Ultra 200V only has eight cores (four performance and four efficiency cores) without Hyper-Threading. Intel revealed technical details about this a few months ago.

In the wild, you are likely to encounter an even greater variance and range of performance and runtime differences than those shown by Intel, because the framework conditions are rarely 1:1 comparable in these considerations: It always depends on how a notebook manufacturer designs its cooling system and which other components are in the system. The screen in particular is a critical component when it comes to battery life.

Salty fingers

However, Intel is also rubbing salt in the wounds of the competition. In gaming benchmarks, Intel not only emphasized the higher graphics performance itself, but also that Snapdragon laptops can only run far fewer games. And even with conventional apps, there are many examples of applications for which an x86 CPU is still absolutely necessary.

What Intel is not mentioning: New types of AI functions that Microsoft is planning for the integrated AI units (Neural Processing Units, NPUs) and integrating into Windows 11 24H2 currently only run on Snapdragon chips. This means that the traditional x86 world (in addition to the Core Ultra 200V, AMD's Ryzen AI 300 is also affected) will have to wait until software support catches up. Microsoft has not yet given a specific date for when this will happen; according to Intel, the necessary update will come in November. Either way, we are talking about Microsoft, Intel's most important software partner to date. For years, the hybrid term Wintel stood for an unshakeable cooperation that is now showing clear cracks.

Price issue

Another catch: While Core Ultra 200V undoubtedly offers full x86 compatibility and a copilot-capable NPU and Intel's performance promises are certainly not completely out of thin air, this collection of desirable features is expensive.

This is not because Intel has gilded the combo, but rather because the Core Ultra 200V is technically a special case. It has an independent design, including integrated RAM. Interested buyers are indirectly affected by this: Notebook manufacturers have to design dedicated motherboards, which is expensive, and the development costs are, of course, passed on to customers.

Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, LG, MSI and Samsung, among others, are launching notebooks with Core Ultra 200V on the market. At the time of going to press, we were far from having all the prices, models and equipment variants available, but among the known information there was no device that undercut the starting price of Qualcomm-equipped notebooks (RRP 1200 euros, available from a good 1000 euros) – and it only stops above 3000 euros.

Variants

At the launch of the Core Ultra 200V family, Intel is selling nine processor models, which differ in minor details such as clock frequencies. They are all eight-core processors. In addition, the field is practically doubled because models with 16 and 32 GB of integrated RAM have their own model numbers.

Apart from lower clock rates, Intel is cutting back on the GPU in Ultra 5 models (7 instead of 8 cores), but also on the NPU: it now only consists of 5 instead of 6 blocks, which is exactly sufficient for the copilot requirement of 40 TOPS. Higher processor models deliver 47 or 48 TOPS – the difference indicates slightly different clock rates.

Except for the Core Ultra 9 288V, which is supposed to run at a nominal 30 watts, all newcomers are specified at 17 watts. Even if they can swallow up to 37 watts in boost, this is a noticeably lower heat dissipation than the Core Ultra 100 (Meteor Lake) and before. Apart from the Core 9 model, Intel's newcomers can also be operated with just 8 watts, which would allow passively cooled (and therefore completely silent) notebooks.

It is not yet clear whether such notebooks will actually come. However, Intel has announced that notebooks with Core Ultra 200V, which carry the company's own marketing label Evo, should work particularly quietly. The presence of a fan does not mean that it will be really loud; instead, the OEM is required to optimize the cooling system for a low noise level.

According to Intel, notebooks with Core Ultra 200V can be pre-ordered now. Delivery is scheduled for September 24th. (mue)