Why I won't buy an Intel Lunar Lake-powered laptop

[sjkpublic]

I agree with the author. IMHO just another nail in the Intel coffin. The company keeps on making one bad mistake after another.

 

[sjkpublic]

New mobile chipsets are 96GB memory. Intel is only doing 64GB? Huh? NUC's are based on mobile chipsets. It looks like Intel has KILLED its NUC market.

 

[enewmen]

It seems memory requirements have been stagnant for the past 15 years. I should expect mainstream applications to require 64 GB by now. 64 bits is a lot of address space; let's use it.

 

[USAFRet]

Silly person. It may meet the needs of thousands today. Next year they my find out it doesnt meet there needs AND THEY CANNOT UPGRADE. Fixed memory is great for Intel. Because a year or 2 from now when a person realizes they need more memory they have to go out and buy a brand new machine.

Not everything is upgradeable.

Especially laptops, of any kind. Sold in the last timespan of forever.

 

[Alvar "Miles" Udell]

I don't agree with you on a lot, but I do on this. It's not that difficult even under non power usage situations to have 24GB RAM in use between chat programs, internet browsers, email clients, office programs, and so forth since Windows will prefer RAM over paging, and this is before VMs or any new memory heavy "AI" things are included.

Plus thinking forward, will 32GB RAM really be enough in just a few years?

 

[ThomasKinsley]

I'm going to take OP's side here. People telling him that 64GB is too much aren't using their PC like he is. VMs need large amounts of RAM. Extremely high res photo and video editing are the same way. We also know AI uses large amounts of RAM. Some LLMs need more than 90GB of RAM. It's actually tone-deaf of Intel to create a chip with an NPU, market it for AI, and then starve it of RAM. If you're a researcher working with large datasets or in production then you need a large amount of memory to do day-to-day tasks. These jobs benefit from having long battery life to get their work done. There is absolutely no legitimate reason to limit the RAM of these low-powered notebooks.

 

[USAFRet]

Plus thinking forward, will 32GB RAM really be enough in just a few years?

How many people buy a laptop, with the thought of upgrading in a few years?
Of that small segment, how many actually do? (even in laptops where you can upgrade)

 

[newtechldtech]

RAM on package with the same DDR5 tech is stupid ... either make them on package with something like eight channels connection or use HBM Technology ... more over what is the point of making them on package ? saving space only ? FINE then save space for 128GB of RAM INTELLLl

 

[thestryker]

I'm going to take OP's side here. People telling him that 64GB is too much aren't using their PC like he is. VMs need large amounts of RAM. Extremely high res photo and video editing are the same way. We also know AI uses large amounts of RAM. Some LLMs need more than 90GB of RAM. It's actually tone-deaf of Intel to create a chip with an NPU, market it for AI, and then starve it of RAM. If you're a researcher working with large datasets or in production then you need a large amount of memory to do day-to-day tasks. These jobs benefit from having long battery life to get their work done. There is absolutely no legitimate reason to limit the RAM of these low-powered notebooks.

If you're a performance/professional user why would you be considering something with 4P/4E that is optimized for efficiency in the first place?

 

[thestryker]

There's a shocking amount of ignorance on display in this thread. Intel made a product which is squarely aimed at the thin and light/MBA market. It has 4 P-cores and 4 LPE-cores (these are more powerful than MTL's, but still disconnected from the ring) with on package memory to minimize power consumption. These will likely outperform the prior U series parts and do so with a lower power envelope. These haven't been very performant parts since ADL though. The tradeoff being lower potential maximum DRAM seems like a very small price to pay.

Most regular users likely don't even need 32GB DRAM in their system. Those that are using more than 32GB have specific use cases that drive it up. For a singular line of CPUs it seems like a really weird thing for so many people to be upset by.

Personally speaking I've never had a problem with 16GB and only moved to 32GB because I was putting together a second machine and had to buy DRAM anyways. That being said I wouldn't buy LNL without 32GB, but that has to do with lack of upgradability of all LPDDR driven laptops rather than LNL itself.

As for a lack of upgradability the only laptops with LPDDR that can be upgraded period are ones with LPCAMM modules. I believe there is one laptop from Lenovo that has these. This is not a real argument as it doesn't broadly exist today and has never existed in the past. SODIMMs are capped at 5600 and it's unlikely they'll go past that which means they're not a viable option for anything that needs additional memory bandwidth.

 

[Kondamin]

Sure you want to run virtual machines on a 4 core ultra mobile system and that’s why you need 64GB of ram.

I take it you also want a second 2.m drive for the vms and 2 SATA bays so you can do some journaling of those vms.
Don’t forget about your second 10G Ethernet port and the spf ports for optimal network connection

 

[TheSecondPower]

I've thought my next lapto might have 64 GB or more memory partly because LLMs require oodles of memory and partly because many laptops don't have upgradable memory. But I don't think I need that much as a developer. I can't imagine trying to keep 80 tabs open. I do all my Node development in Linux so I don't need WSL or a VM. And if I want to try a Linux or Widows OS in a VM, 32 GB would be plenty: 16GB for the VM and that leaves a healthy 16GB for the host (although today I'd give 10 or 12GB to the guest), I just wouldn't be able to run Android Studio at the same time. 64GB is for the LLMs and whatever the future holds.

After considering more and hearing arguments here, I do think 16GB Lunar Lake is a bad value; most such laptops start at $1k, and that's a lot to ask for an entry-level amount of unupgradeable memory. 24GB ought to be the minimum.

 

[TheSecondPower]

If you're a performance/professional user why would you be considering something with 4P/4E that is optimized for efficiency in the first place?

I would. JS development is mostly single-threaded and I have a 4 core/8 thread laptop with Willow Cove cores, and it's working well. 4 Lion Cove cores + 4 Skymont cores would run circles around it. I really want the new Xe2 EUs more than the new CPU cores though.

Edit: to add to that, adding cores doesn't help performance much at low power. A core has a frequency at which it gets peak efficiency, and adding cores usually nudges laptops at their fixed maximum sustained power closer to that ideal frequency, by lowering the frequency of all the cores. But there's a point of diminishing returns. If moving from 8 cores to 16 cores changes the frequency from 4 GHz to 3 GHz, then 100% more cores means 50% more performance. I'm sure Ryzen 370 laptops will tend to be faster in threaded workloads than Intel 288V laptops. But I doubt it will be anywhere near the difference 200% more threads would suggest. In fact I doubt it'll even be the difference 50% more cores would suggest. And in lightly threaded workloads, there'll be no difference. (Assuming Lion Cove + Skymont is equivalent to Zen 5 + Zen 5c, which is not the case. But it's probably close.)

 

[sjkpublic]

The BIG issue here is that the CPU company (Intel) decides what memory chip to use. This effectively KILLS some degree of competition in the memory chip market. A very sad thing.

 

[USAFRet]

The BIG issue here is that the CPU company (Intel) decides what memory chip to use. This effectively KILLS some degree of competition in the memory chip market. A very sad thing.

The REAL question is....Are there any other laptops available?
With more possible RAM, or a better CLU?

Answer - YES.
Obviously.


So, if your use case and needs do not meet what this laptop can provide....buy something else.

 

[ThomasKinsley]

If you're a performance/professional user why would you be considering something with 4P/4E that is optimized for efficiency in the first place?

There are professionals who require battery life over raw processing power. Working all day on the go is necessary in some positions, and if you're stuck next to a wall outlet sipping power then you're not where you're supposed to be. But if we're all being honest: RAM is dirt cheap and everyone knows it. Manufacturers are either gouging by charging hundreds of dollars for additional memory or not even offering the next step up (such as in this case). Laptops would last longer if this changed. There's no excuse for that.

 

[NightLight]

What has happened to Tom's HW... The standard has been low the last few years.

 

[Pierce2623]

I have a 64GB laptop and never had used more than 20GB, running AutoCAD, REVIT and Office Apps at the same time, filling up 64GB will be a rare case use. 32GB seem good for most users.

Really? My job has AutoCAD models as big as 100GB. On those even with 64GB you can only load about half the layers at once.

 

[Mama Changa]

Sounds like a you problem. If you're running out of RAM, have you tried closing what you're not using? Many problems can be solved by adjusting your habits. If you require portability and battery life, you're naturally trading away performance. If you need all the performance all the time, you'll have to carry around something heavier and a power cable. There's also the option of replacing your current machine's battery, replacing the thermal paste and carrying on as normal if you so desperately insist on clinging on to 64GB RAM.

You clearly don't do photo or video editing. 64GB is IMO the bare minimum for Adobe products when processing high res camera stills and 4K+ video. So "it 's a you problem" for him, so instead he should be more like you that doesn't need 64GB.

 

[thestryker]

There are professionals who require battery life over raw processing power. Working all day on the go is necessary in some positions, and if you're stuck next to a wall outlet sipping power then you're not where you're supposed to be.

If you have such a job and don't have a portable battery pack you take with you just in case then you're a fool. These parts are narrowly aimed at a specific segment and what you're talking about absolutely isn't it. If they had more than a single configuration you might be onto something, but they don't.

But if we're all being honest: RAM is dirt cheap and everyone knows it. Manufacturers are either gouging by charging hundreds of dollars for additional memory or not even offering the next step up (such as in this case). Laptops would last longer if this changed. There's no excuse for that.

DRAM itself is cheap, but adding more when you're utilizing on package is not. This is part of the reason why Apple segments their memory the way they do: limited package size and adding more memory packages is expensive. LNL is obviously not going into super premium priced laptops given the limitation of 4P/4LPE so what you're wanting would end up costing a lot more for minimal return which would be a very stupid business decision on Intel's part.

I would. JS development is mostly single-threaded and I have a 4 core/8 thread laptop with Willow Cove cores, and it's working well. 4 Lion Cove cores + 4 Skymont cores would run circles around it. I really want the new Xe2 EUs more than the new CPU cores though.

Does this laptop use LPDDR and have over 32GB of it? This is the point people keep seeming to make is that somehow a crime is being committed by limiting to 32GB DRAM. The amount of laptops available in this segment that can even potentially have 64GB DRAM is very small and it's extremely expensive to add. If you're a power user who needs over 32GB DRAM these are obviously not parts for you and they don't need to be.

(Assuming Lion Cove + Skymont is equivalent to Zen 5 + Zen 5c, which is not the case. But it's probably close.)

With the LNL Skymont implementation being LPE they shouldn't be close (even with the clockspeed advantage) so it would be up to the Lion Cove to do the heavy lifting and I'm not sure that'll be enough.

 

[ThomasKinsley]

If you have such a job and don't have a portable battery pack you take with you just in case then you're a fool. These parts are narrowly aimed at a specific segment and what you're talking about absolutely isn't it. If they had more than a single configuration you might be onto something, but they don't.

The whole point of these laptops is to be light and portable. Your answer is to use a heavier laptop that uses more battery AND they have to bring a battery pack on top of that? Tech should be bending to the wants and needs of customers, not customers to the wants and needs of tech. I'm not asking for something ridiculous. 64GB in a portable laptop is doable, and quite honestly, should be close to standard now.

DRAM itself is cheap, but adding more when you're utilizing on package is not. This is part of the reason why Apple segments their memory the way they do: limited package size and adding more memory packages is expensive. LNL is obviously not going into super premium priced laptops given the limitation of 4P/4LPE so what you're wanting would end up costing a lot more for minimal return which would be a very stupid business decision on Intel's part.

Apple is known for gouging their customers. Nobody should use them as an example to emulate for pricing, but at least in their defense they have a unique software platform that they can leverage. Other companies can't copy that strategy using Windows and expect to reap the same rewards. It's not an equal comparison. And as for Intel, they're already dying. They need to change their business model to offer as many useful features as possible to save what little fanbase they have left, and I say this as someone who is still one of their customers. They're in no position to act like Apple.

 

[wwenze1]

*Laughs in Rembrandt 64GB*

 

[rluker5]

There are a small fraction of people that need more than 32GB ram. A small fraction of them want that on a thin and light laptop with better battery life than a MacBook Air.

A large fraction of laptop buyers prioritize battery life so long as the performance is good for their uses.

Intel is trying to make the products that as many people want as possible. In pursuing the battery life many want Intel made the choice to have on package ram. This gave many what they wanted at the expense of the few who already have less efficient products from Intel and AMD to choose from. You can't have the efficiency benefits of on package ram without on package ram.

I'm glad Intel went with pleasing as many customers as they can. From what I've heard from laptop manufacturers (on videos) these Lunar Lake laptops not only make AMD look inefficient, not only Windows on Arm, but even Apple's fully optimized, bespoke and paired ARM/Linux combination is less efficient. This is on standard Windows. And I'm talking about general use, not every single possible benchmark at the same time. And Apple is no slouch. I doubt they have left a lot on the table as far as efficiency.

But we will have to wait a bit more for reviews to confirm this.

 

[thestryker]

Apple is known for gouging their customers. Nobody should use them as an example to emulate for pricing, but at least in their defense they have a unique software platform that they can leverage. Other companies can't copy that strategy using Windows and expect to reap the same rewards. It's not an equal comparison. And as for Intel, they're already dying. They need to change their business model to offer as many useful features as possible to save what little fanbase they have left, and I say this as someone who is still one of their customers. They're in no position to act like Apple.

Yet you want Intel to spend a lot more money to appease a very small segment which would force the prices up disproportionately. I also didn't say anything about Apple's pricing, but rather the very real physical limitations of design being utilized. It's why there aren't higher DRAM options on the MBA regardless of the pricing (what I mean here if you don't get it is that to maintain their margins they'd have to cost as much as the MBP so they'd rather you bought that anyways).

I'm not asking for something ridiculous. 64GB in a portable laptop is doable, and quite honestly, should be close to standard now.

You actually are asking for something completely ridiculous given the design being used. The design uses on package memory so going from two to four memory packages would increase the design cost as they'd be spinning up a one off or making every single SKU more expensive. 64GB is still a relative anomaly in the thin and light space which is probably due to the very narrow market appeal.

The whole point of these laptops is to be light and portable. Your answer is to use a heavier laptop that uses more battery AND they have to bring a battery pack on top of that?

Or just buy a different laptop with similar weight characteristics that does have 64GB? Since in your hypothetical compute doesn't matter. The point about the battery pack is that if you're traveling and worried about battery life to such a huge degree you should always have something to cover should something go wrong. You can keep making spurious arguments all day and I can keep slapping them down no problem.

Tech should be bending to the wants and needs of customers, not customers to the wants and needs of tech.

In an ideal world, yes, however we live in one where public companies are controlled by "investors" who don't care about long term viability. When the customer exists in a segment too small to be profitable (or today not profitable enough) they don't matter and may as well not exist.

 

[TheSecondPower]

With the LNL Skymont implementation being LPE they shouldn't be close (even with the clockspeed advantage) so it would be up to the Lion Cove to do the heavy lifting and I'm not sure that'll be enough.

I think Skymont LPE deserves more credit. It'll even put Crestmont regular E-cores to shame. It's not on the ring bus or L3 cache but it's on the same die as the P-cores and has a lot else going for it.

	Crestmont LPE	Skymont LPE
Cores	2	4
Node	TSMC N6	TSMC N3B
Memory-side cache	none	8 MB
boost frequency	2.5 GHz	3.7 GHz
IPC	100%	150%