This year at Comoutex 2024 DescriptionDesign details of the new generation Core Ultra laptop processor codenamed "Lunar Lake"Later, Intel officially announced the specific performance details of this processor at the IFA 2024 pre-show event, and emphasized that all measurement data were obtained on actual commercially available models, rather than laboratory data or test platforms. It also emphasized that compared with competing processors, it can correspond to a more complete game and software application ecosystem, and can also support a more complete artificial intelligence application experience.
Intel emphasizes that "Lunar Lake" is designed for low power consumption and long battery life while still maintaining efficient operating characteristics. It also responds to various computing needs through high software compatibility. Especially in the current "AI PC" usage situation, it also touts its support for various computing precisions and artificial intelligence model operation modes, rather than just focusing on TOPS computing performance data, to ensure that users can obtain real-world performance.
What does the "V" in the first wave of "Lunar Lake" models stand for?
The first wave of "Lunar Lake" processors are actually named the Core Ultra 200V series. Intel explains that the "V" is mainly used to distinguish product models and can be applied to various adjectives, but at this stage it has no specific meaning, which means that "Lunar Lake" is currently positioned as a relatively unique processor product from Intel.
The "Lunar Lake" processor's main feature is its ability to achieve higher frames per second (FPS) at lower power consumption than competitors like Qualcomm and AMD. The P-Core performance cores offer improved computing performance, while the E-Core energy-saving cores offer increased performance while maintaining the same power consumption. This significantly boosts overall execution efficiency while significantly extending device battery life.
On the other hand, Intel also touted the "Lunar Lake" processor as capable of delivering higher-precision AI execution performance across its CPU, GPU, and NPU computing components. Furthermore, it is compatible with a wider range of AI computing models through its software ecosystem, thus emphasizing its ability to be more diverse in AI applications, unlike competitors that only emphasize AI computing performance under specific conditions.
Lunar Lake Hardware Review
In terms of overall design, "Lunar Lake" adopts Intel Foveros multi-chip packaging design, integrating two sets of LPDDR5X DRAM memory with the processor, providing a maximum capacity of 32GB. In addition, a 16GB capacity specification will be available. It also emphasizes that it reduces power loss by 40% and is as compact as 250mm.2The computing components are manufactured using TSMC's 3nm process (originally planned to be produced using Intel's 18A process), combined with the control components designed using a 6nm process. In addition, the substrate is also designed using Intel's process technology.
In addition, the connectivity part integrates Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4, and also corresponds to PCIe Gen 5. The laptop design also supports three sets of Thunderbolt 3 to meet different connection application requirements.
Architecturally, "Lunar Lake" adopts a 4-set P Core and 4-set E Core design. The P Core is replaced with the code-named "Lion Cove" design, which improves single-threaded computing performance. At the same time, it also increases the L2 cache memory that can be allocated to each core, and even adds an additional L0 cache memory design. Compared with the previous "Redwood Cove" design, it can increase the instructions per cycle (IPC) performance by 14% under the same power consumption, and the peak performance is increased to 50%.
The switch to the "Skymont" E Core design further improves computing performance with the same power consumption, and also increases L2 cache memory, thereby improving performance per watt by 20%-80%. In single-threaded operation, compared to the previous "Meteor Lake" design, it uses almost one-third of the power to achieve the same execution performance, and even improves average performance by 1.7 times, with peak performance exceeding 2 times. Multi-threaded operation can achieve an average performance increase of 2.9 times and peak performance exceeding 4 times.
Compared with the performance of P Core, the E Core design in "Lunar Lake" corresponds to single-thread performance, which is almost similar to the "Raptor Cove" P Core performance curve used in the 2022th generation desktop processor "Raptor Lake" launched in October 10, but the power consumption is almost only 13 times.
However, compared to previous processor designs, the more unique feature of Lunar Lake is the cancellation of Hyper-Threading. The reason is that the E Core's performance has been improved, but without affecting power consumption, there is obviously no need to use hyper-threading technology to allow the existing core number to correspond to more threaded tasks through similar overclocking methods as in the past.
However, Intel is apparently testing this adjustment with Lunar Lake, positioning it as equivalent to its previous ultra-low-power U-series processors to gauge market response when used in thin and light notebooks. The upcoming Arrow Lake processor, which will share a product codename with desktops, may still retain the hyper-threading design, but this remains uncertain.
Not only surpasses the previous generation of processors, but also comprehensively improves over competitors
Intel emphasizes that "Lunar Lake" has more than doubled the performance per watt compared to the previous generation, and reduced power loss by up to 2%.
Compared to Qualcomm's recently released Snapdragon X Elite processor, Intel's Core Ultra 7 268V processor, part of the "Lunar Lake" family, boasts a mere 10.7 hours of battery life for a three-on-three multi-party video conference using Microsoft Teams. However, it achieves up to 20.1 hours of battery life using the UL Procyon Office Productivity multitasking benchmark. Even with the same design and other parameters, it outlasts AMD's processors.
In terms of performance, in addition to improving execution performance with the same power consumption in the E Core energy-saving core, the P Core performance core further improves performance through multi-threaded scheduling, allowing the "Lunar Lake" 8-core configuration to better meet the battery life and performance improvement needs of thin and light laptops, thereby meeting more daily usage needs of users.
The newly launched Xe2 display architecture Arc GPU boasts real-time ray tracing support and a 31% improvement in GPU display performance over the previous generation. Test results for 45 games highlighted its complete compatibility, while competitor Qualcomm's processors only managed to successfully run 23 games. Lunar Lake even boasted better performance in 68% of the games tested. Furthermore, 16% of the games performed better than AMD processors. Intel also boasted that over 120 games supported its XeSS resolution enhancement technology, providing a better gaming experience.
On the other hand, Intel also stated that the newly launched "Lunar Lake" can significantly outperform competitors in multimedia audio and video and artificial intelligence applications, and even pointed out that competitors performed poorly in many test items or were unable to perform operations at all.
Promote the development of AI PC products, but emphasize that complex specifications will not be formulated
Compared to Microsoft's approach this year, which required a device-side computing performance of 40TOPS or higher to meet its "Copilot+ PC" design specifications, Intel emphasized its own specifications for "AI PCs," requiring only Core Ultra processors to be used. This means that whether using the previously released "Meteor Lake" or the recently announced "Lunar Lake" processor, Intel can consider it an "AI PC."
Intel emphasized that it will not use complex specifications to limit which application products can be considered "AI PCs." The reason is that these application products can all perform correspondingly with a certain level of computing power, and combined with cloud-based collaborative computing, they can promote a diverse artificial intelligence application experience. Therefore, Intel does not want to cause misunderstandings about its products.
At the same time, Intel also emphasized its continued collaboration with Microsoft to make the Windows operating system the optimal platform for "AI PCs." It also combined this with rich artificial intelligence models to establish a multimodal artificial intelligence application experience, allowing "AI PCs" to meet user needs with a new operational interaction model.
Related application products will be available for pre-order from now on and are expected to be launched after September 9th.
The first wave of "Lunar Lake" processors will be available in eight specifications: Core Ultra 9 288V, Core Ultra 7 268V, Core Ultra 7 266V, Core Ultra 7 258V, Core Ultra 5 238V, Core Ultra 5 236V, Core Ultra 5 228V, and Core Ultra 5 226V. The memory will be available in 8GB and 16GB specifications respectively. The basic operating power consumption is 32W, the lowest can reach 17W, and the maximum operating power consumption is 8W.
Intel plans to collaborate with over 20 major OEMs, including Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, MSI, Samsung, and LG, to launch over 80 different application products, which will be sold through over 30 retail channels worldwide.
