Intel — a new leader in the portable gaming console market? Core Ultra 7 258V crushes all AMD processors under heavy power restriction

Intel's Lunar Lake processors, thanks to their combination of powerful iGPU and low power consumption, are well-suited for portable gaming consoles. There are currently no such devices, but Chinese bloggers tested a Lenovo Yoga Air 15 laptop based on the Core Ultra 7 258V, limiting the processor's power to just 12W. For comparison, the Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally based on the Z1 Extreme, and some systems with Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and Core Ultra 9 185H were also tested. All systems were set to 720p resolution for the games.

In the end, the new Intel chip simply demolished all other chips, showing a huge performance boost. In some games, the Core Ultra 7 258V was even twice as fast, pushing portable consoles to a completely new level.

Of course, we need to wait for finished devices and see how the new CPUs will be implemented there, but for now, there are serious arguments for Intel being the leader in the portable console segment.

However, if we look at comparisons in high TDP modes, here, Lunar Lake doesn't always lead, but it's precisely due to the significantly lower power limit.