Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
1–10 of 40 posts
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#2Why people are excited about Intel barely matching already outdated CPUs of the competition?
Shouldn't we be concerned that the company instead of aiming for the leap is producing legacy hardware destined for landfill?
Wake me up when Intel produces something groundbreaking.
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#3Why people are excited about Intel barely matching already outdated CPUs of the competition? Shouldn't we be concerned that the company instead of aiming for the leap is producing legacy hardware destined for landfill? Wake me up when Intel produces something groundbreaking.
Comments like this one remind me of all the people saying "China can't invent things, they can only copy the US" 20 years ago.
Like, we're comparing a new Dell to a Mac released only 4 months ago. How did you feel about the Mac Neo then, and now? Is it also legacy hardware destined for the landfill?
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#4The improved efficiency is great!
The Apple Neo was still 2x faster for graphics and around 1.4x faster for single core cpu. And remember the Apple Neo is running an iPhone CPU that is much slower than the M series.
It is strange that this chip is so crazy efficient though. I would love to know the details of exactly why it is? It seems like some new tech or process?
I do want 1.5x battery life for free out of my next laptop. Who wouldn’t?
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#5Why people are excited about Intel barely matching already outdated CPUs of the competition? Shouldn't we be concerned that the company instead of aiming for the leap is producing legacy hardware destined for landfill? Wake me up when Intel produces something groundbreaking.
Comments like this one remind me of all the people saying "China can't invent things, they can only copy the US" 20 years ago. Like, we're comparing a new Dell to a Mac released only 4 months ago. How did you feel about the Mac Neo then, and now? Is it also legacy hardware destined for the landfill?
Not only that, the efficiency (FP64, HPL) is also beating all the M4/M3/M2/M1 systems I've tested besides the M4 Mac mini: https://github.com/geerlingguy/top500-benchmark#results
I think the bigger news is Intel's made a chip that isn't just pushing clocks to hit some performance number, they've actually tuned clocks for efficiency... which also leads to much better battery life.
And the fan on the system in the original article[1] also allows the Intel system to run substantially faster for longer tasks (where the Neo thermally saturates and has to stay throttled).
(The iGPU is another matter... sadly still a bit lacking.)
I'm hoping Intel makes a follow-up to the N100-series chips with just four of their newer low power E-cores.
[1] https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2026/excited-for-intel-eff...
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#6Rather than the Hackaday article, which doesn't add anything to the original, here's Jeff's actual video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2B7oI0FYqo
and post:
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2026/excited-for-intel-eff...
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#7Why people are excited about Intel barely matching already outdated CPUs of the competition? Shouldn't we be concerned that the company instead of aiming for the leap is producing legacy hardware destined for landfill? Wake me up when Intel produces something groundbreaking.
Comments like this one remind me of all the people saying "China can't invent things, they can only copy the US" 20 years ago. Like, we're comparing a new Dell to a Mac released only 4 months ago. How did you feel about the Mac Neo then, and now? Is it also legacy hardware destined for the landfill?
I don’t think it’s completely unfair to say that the Neo is based on a chip that was first announced in Sep 2024 while the Intel chip is from Apr 2026.
Also, I think the battery life most people are practically interested in is more like running (close to) idle and less like the number of Watts spent when running maxed out, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Arm chips still win on that metric…
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#8The improved efficiency is great! The Apple Neo was still 2x faster for graphics and around 1.4x faster for single core cpu. And remember the Apple Neo is running an iPhone CPU that is much slower than the M series. It is strange that this chip is so crazy efficient though. I would love to know the details of exactly why it is? It seems like some new tech or process? I do want 1.5x battery life for free out of my nex…
Apple has been working ruthlessly on battery efficiency for a long time because of the phones and their tendency to minimize battery sizes on Macs for thinness.
The exact design of the cores, how they’re scheduled, the way background stuff is handled on MacOS. All of it. The chips are made on a fantastic process too, but that alone isn’t it. For example they’ve been putting the ability to drop refresh rate really low when nothing changes to more and more of their machines.
It could be that the Intel chip is close, IDK.
But add in other motherboard components, the screen, the OS, the software and system libraries, all are optimized together to hit those numbers. And any of those alone or in combination could be part of the differences.
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
Comments like this one remind me of all the people saying "China can't invent things, they can only copy the US" 20 years ago. Like, we're comparing a new Dell to a Mac released only 4 months ago. How did you feel about the Mac Neo then, and now? Is it also legacy hardware destined for the landfill?
I don’t think it’s completely unfair to say that the Neo is based on a chip that was first announced in Sep 2024 while the Intel chip is from Apr 2026. Also, I think the battery life most people are practically interested in is more like running (close to) idle and less like the number of Watts spent when running maxed out, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Arm chips still win on that metric…
Plus it’s a phone chip. Yeah it’s used in the Neo but it’s no M5.
It’s good Intel got to this point, but you can’t declare them tied with Apple. They qualified for the real race, which us great, but they're not going to win with that chip.
Re: Can Intel finally beat ARM on performance per Watt?
#10The improved efficiency is great! The Apple Neo was still 2x faster for graphics and around 1.4x faster for single core cpu. And remember the Apple Neo is running an iPhone CPU that is much slower than the M series. It is strange that this chip is so crazy efficient though. I would love to know the details of exactly why it is? It seems like some new tech or process? I do want 1.5x battery life for free out of my nex…
> And remember the Apple Neo is running an iPhone CPU that is much slower than the M series.
We really need to get over generalization like "phone CPU". Times have changed. Phone or not really isn't the focus.
Per core the A series (cough phone) isn't that much slower than equivalent M series. It's literally the same family just with some extra features, more power, etc.