Qualcomm has attacked Intel for its « misleading » claims made during the marketing of its Lunar Lake processors, citing tests by PCWorld as evidence. In a presentation to journalists, Qualcomm cited a PCWorld video review, « Did Intel Just Save x86?, » as a source to debunk its claims, including the benchmark results that Qualcomm claimed could only be achieved using samples of the Core Ultra Series 200 (Lunar Lake) laptops sent to journalists, not available for sale in the open market.
Qualcomm executives used a video clip posted by Gordon Mah Ung from PCWorld as evidence, specifically because he was able to get two nearly identical laptops from Dell, with the same capacity, battery life, and screen size. The only difference between the two laptops was the choice of processor, a relatively rare occurrence in the laptop world, allowing for a direct comparison between the two chips.
Sriram Dixit, Qualcomm’s engineering director, highlighted something shown in the Lunar Lake print review that he said Intel ignored: when the Lunar Lake laptop was tested on battery power only, performance decreased.
Dixit briefed journalists shortly before Qualcomm announced the second generation of Snapdragon Oryon cores for smartphones, claiming that it could outperform the Lunar Lake PC. Qualcomm did not mention whether the Oryon core would reach personal computers, and the company spokesperson declined to comment on the company’s roadmap.
Qualcomm made deceitful claims from the start. PCWorld’s Ung tested both the Core Ultra 258V and the Core Ultra 9 288V. Dixit claimed that the latter was a chip that could not be purchased in the open market. In fact, Dixit from Qualcomm said that he had to cite PCWorld instead of buying a laptop for independent confirmation. When a manufacturer releases a chip but does not ship it, historically it has been referred to as « paper launch, » a term Dixit did not specifically use.
Dixit said of the Core Ultra 9 288V: « We could not find it retail. » « It’s not available retail. »
Qualcomm also believes that Intel was deceptive in that it needed more power to meet its performance demands – about 113% more than the Arm architecture that Qualcomm’s Snapdragon consumes battery power from. Dixit said that when running on wall power, both Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite and the Lunar Lake chip were very close in performance. In terms of battery power, performance decreased on both chips – but the Core Ultra performance decreased significantly.
This is the same result I found when conducting my own battery and wall power benchmarks for PCWorld. In some tests – for example, Procyon Office, which measures performance across a variety of Microsoft Office tasks – performance decreased by almost half.
Dixit said: « Yes, you do get, as you know, better battery life than (wall power), but that comes at the expense of a significant decrease in Intel’s performance. »
If you’re confused, you can go directly to the source: PCWorld’s Lunar Lake review, and the Lunar Lake video as well. Both support Qualcomm’s claims but also add more context. It’s not a clear win for either side.
