After Apple shocked the affordable laptop market in March this year with the MacBook Neo priced at NT$19,990, competitors are finally fighting back. The first laptop equipped with Intel’s new Wildcat Lake processor: Honor
Wildcat Lake is coming: Intel Core Series 3 is officially here
Wildcat Lake is Intel’s new processor series aimed at the mainstream market and belongs to the Core Series 3 product line. The first wave of Honor X14 uses the Core 5 320 chip, equipped with a 6-core (2 performance cores + 4 low-power efficiency cores) architecture, with a maximum clock speed of 4.6 GHz, 6 MB cache and 35W TDP, and a built-in integrated GPU with 2 Xe3 cores.
In addition to Honor, Asus (Asus Fearless 14SE 2026) and HP (OmniBook 3) also launched Wildcat Lake notebooks equipped with Core 5 320, priced at approximately US$675 and US$750 respectively (including 13% VAT). However, Taiwan does not seem to have launched a corresponding model:
Comprehensive showdown of hardware specifications: Honor X14 vs MacBook Neo
Judging from the book specifications, Honor X14 does beat MacBook Neo in many key items:
- memory: 16GB LPDDR5X-7467 MT/s, double the Neo’s 8GB unified memory
- storage space: 512GB SSD, Neo base model only 256GB (higher specifications increase to $700)
- Battery: 60Whr, almost double the Neo’s 36.5Whr
- port: 1 USB-C 3.2 Gen2, 2 USB-A 3.2 Gen1, 1 HDMI, far richer than Neo’s only 2 USB-C
- price: About $571 (excluding tax), less than the Neo’s $599
However, MacBook Neo still retains obvious advantages in screen and body craftsmanship. The Neo has a 2408×1506 Retina display with a peak brightness of 500 nits, while the Honor X14 only has a 1920×1200 LCD, 60Hz refresh rate, and 300 nits brightness. In terms of body, the Neo’s 12.7mm thickness and 1.23kg weight are also better than the X14’s 16.9mm and 1.39kg, and the Neo uses an all-aluminum alloy body, which has a better texture.
The Performance Battle: Multi-Core vs. Single-Core
On the performance side, the situation is more complex. According to PassMark’s running score data, the higher-positioned Core 7 350 leads Apple’s A19 Pro by about 9% in multi-core tests, while the single-core performance of the Core 5 320 is close to that of the A18 Pro, which is enough to beat the A18 Pro currently used by the MacBook Neo.
However, the Apple A19 Pro still leads the Core Ultra 7 by about 19% in the single-core test. This reflects the fundamental difference in the design philosophies of the two chips: Apple’s iPhone chips are naturally designed for battery efficiency and fast response, with outstanding single-core performance; Intel’s chips are good at handling multiple tasks at the same time, and with the blessing of 16GB of memory, they may have more advantages in daily multitasking situations.
Wildcat Lake may be PC camp’s “best chance”
Moor Insights & Strategies analyst Patrick Moorhead said Intel’s Wildcat Lake represents the PC maker’s “best chance to build a laptop that can compete with the MacBook Neo.” In fact, Intel itselfLaunched reference design model, using an all-aluminum alloy body, a 6-core Wildcat Lake configuration and a 17 TOPS NPU, and the appearance design is obviously in line with the MacBook Neo.
However, MacBook Neo buyers, whether Apple fans or not, generally don’t need more performance. For tasks such as web browsing, multimedia, word processing, and typing notes, 8GB is enough (mainly for brand and ecological considerations). In other words, it is still unknown whether the PC camp’s “superiority” in specifications can actually be translated into consumers’ purchasing decisions.
Comparison of patterns: Apple’s calmness vs. Intel’s pursuit
From the perspective of the industrial structure, this is an asymmetric war. Apple has completely rewritten the rules of the game in the entry-level market with a $599 laptop – a thin and light all-metal body, a Retina screen, an iPhone-level chip, and a complete Apple ecosystem integration. Although the PC camp “doubles” in memory, storage, battery and other specifications, it still needs to continue to catch up in screen quality, body craftsmanship and ecosystem experience.
It is worth noting that these models equipped with Wildcat Lake processors are currently only available in China. If we want to truly compete head-on with MacBook Neo in the European and American markets outside China, we may have to wait until the Computex 2026 show in June.
Source: KOCPC Chinese