Intel’s 1st Gen Core Ultra processors, codenamed Meteor Lake, are less impressive than we thought, or so the rumors go. Laptop makers are allegedly upset over the dismal generational gains from the 4nm-class modular CPUs. According to Moore’s Law is Dead, Meteor Lake offers “no appreciable” performance uplift over Raptor Lake, forcing OEMs to lean into AI, graphics, and efficiency for better marketing.
The NPU (Neural Processing Unit) and its AI-related benefits were originally supposed to be one of the bonus selling points of Meteor Lake. Only recently, Intel shifted the focus to AI to hide the minimal performance gains offered by the 1st Gen Core Ultra processors.
Many OEMs plan to try their luck with AMD’s Zen 5 processors, the most notable examples being Strix and Hawk Point. You can expect more notebooks leveraging the Ryzen 8000 (or 9000) processors in 2024 and beyond.
The conclusion here is that the 1st Gen Core Ultra “Meteor Lake” processors are barely faster than existing Raptor Lake offerings. They may be more power-efficient, with an advanced NPU and a tiled iGPU, but as far as raw performance is concerned, look elsewhere. You may find the following reads interesting:
- Intel: 14th Gen Meteor Lake CPU Cores Almost Identical to 13th Gen, It’s a Tic!
