The big picture: Intel has been playing catch-up in the mobile processor market for years, watching from the sidelines as rivals like Apple made significant efficiency gains. However, if early previews are any indication, the chip giant's latest Lunar Lake lineup may finally help it regain lost ground. A wave of laptops powered by these new CPUs is about to hit the market, and the reported battery life figures are impressive.
The Lenovo PC YouTube channel recently put the upcoming Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition laptop through its paces, pitting its Core Ultra 7 258V Lunar Lake chip against Apple's M2 and M3 processors. The test involved playing a 1080p video at 24fps, with brightness locked at 150 nits and Wi-Fi disabled.
The M2 MacBook Air lasted 18 hours and 19 minutes, while the M3 model held out slightly longer at 18 hours and 32 minutes. However, the Yoga Slim 7i kept going, finally running out of power after an impressive 23 hours and 54 minutes.
It's worth noting that the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i had a slightly larger 70Wh battery compared to the 66.5Wh batteries in the MacBooks. However, the Lenovo still lasted nearly a third longer, making the battery size advantage negligible.
Of course, video playback is just one scenario. Real-world performance under heavier workloads will be the true test. Winning the battery life race isn't just about extending movie playback time - it's about achieving the perfect balance across a variety of tasks.
It's also important to mention that Lenovo's results are just a sample compared to what other Lunar Lake laptop makers are promising. Acer, for example, claims a staggering 29 hours of runtime on select models with 65Wh batteries. Asus is making similar claims for its upcoming ExpertBooks. And let's not forget that AMD's new Zen 5 chips and Qualcomm's highly efficient X-series chips will also be competing for top mobile performance.
The laptop Lenovo tested featured a Core Ultra 7 258V processor paired with 32 GB of LPDDR5X 8,533 MHz RAM on Windows 11 24H2. As one of Intel's top-tier Lunar Lake offerings, these results represent the higher end of performance.
The Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition boasts a 15.3-inch, 1,800p 120 Hz LCD. It might have performed even better with an OLED panel. Other key specs include 1TB of M.2 PCIe Gen 4 SSD storage, WiFi 7 support, and the 70Wh battery. Pricing starts at $1,279.99, and it's expected to hit the market in the coming weeks.