6 ms·

Asus' first Snapdragon X Elite laptop (mostly) blows away the MacBook Air M3

35 points by neogodless 2y ago

neogodless 2y ago
Definitely a better showing from a higher end Samsung exclusive unit clocked at 4.2 Ghz. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40738902 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40738902 (YouTube video linked). Geekbench 6 Single Core MacBook Air (M3) 3082 Samsung Galaxy Book4 2838 Surface Laptop 7 2765 Asus Vivobook S 15 2418 Geekbench 6 Multi-core Samsung Galaxy Book4 15351 Asus Vivobook S 15 14352 Surface Laptop 7 14220 MacBook Air (M3) 12087 Though, oddly, the Surface did much better on battery than the Samsung. (Possibly bad choice of power plans.) Further comparison betweeen the Surface Laptop 7 and Macbook Air (M3) here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYGUG_2Oge8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYGUG_2Oge8 Cinebench Multi-core Surface Laptop 7 841 MacBook Air (M3) 550 The Surface seemed to be about 4°C warmer on the surface (47 vs 43) in comparison during the Cinebench runs.
BluebirdTech 2y ago
I bought the Asus Vivobook S and was disappointed. Windows 11 Copilot was not what they demo'd and the emulation is still substandard. If I only wanted to run benchmarks, I would probably be happy, but I had hoped for a product that performed as advertised.
jasonvorhe 2y ago
Funny how they're only comparing these laptops (equipped with a fan) to a laptop with a fan-less design (MBA).
- ndiddy 2y ago
  I would imagine they did it based on price range rather than presence of a fan. The cheapest Macbook Pro with a fan and the same amount of RAM and storage (16GB/1TB) is $2000, while the Asus only costs $1300.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- mdasen 2y ago
  Yea, and the MacBook Air is 27.5% faster for single-core while the Snapdragon X Elite is only 18.7% faster for multi-core. It looks like the Qualcomm is also designed for 15% higher TDP wattage so it could simply be that Qualcomm went for more heat (possibly for bragging rights in benchmarks). These laptops might end up being great, but Apple's M-series laptops aren't just fast. They feel hugely different to use than any Intel based laptop I've had. I think that people also underestimate the importance of single-core performance. Most workloads simply aren't well designed for multi-core and single-core performance is one reason that the iPhone is so nice to use.
  - donny2018 2y ago
    Well, I think nobody can argue that Apple's tech is still better, but this is the first time someone was able to offer some competition that doesn't look like a joke in comparison to Apple's M series.
Kelteseth 2y ago
What I would like to know is how good the graphic drivers are. We had to deal with a ton of Intel Windows OpenGL driver issues in the last 10 years...
gigatexal 2y ago
Competition is good. It means we will get better hardware from Apple maybe.
- PaulRobinson 2y ago
  Competition is great, free markets are superb, agree. I'm a big Apple fan and well into that ecosystem on every device from watch to desktop and everything in between, but I doubt that Apple will care, because customers like me don't care. I don't buy a Macbook because of its performance vs a windows machine. I buy one because of its performance vs my old Macbook. It's not just about the silicon. It's what Apple and its customers tout as "vertical integration" - I don't have to worry about drivers and chipsets and configuring things, it all just works. Apple isn't right for everyone, but they know who they're right for, and they're great at shipping product to them. What will be interesting with the new Snapdragon chips is Linux and BSD support. I don't want or need Windows, or Copilot+, or any other MS nonsense. But if I can have a blazing fast FLOSS machine for a little less money than the MB[P]s with M3, it might turn my head, maybe.
  - w0m 2y ago
    I'm probably the target market on both ends. I've mostly worked off a MBP over the last 15 years, though currently coding on a Surface Book for compatibility reasons and generally avoid walled ecosystems as it feels unhealthy. My personal laptop is an i7 11" MBA that works fine but is in dire need of a refresh. I've been eyeing a 16gb MBA; but have been hesitating as I really like the 11" form factor and things like Framework look really tempting. Now; Snapdragon is looking tempting. I'll probably buy something this summer, glad to have options. That Yogi looks interesting.
    - gigatexal 2y ago
      if you can stomach it the apple silicon macbook airs are really really nice. I do wish they'd bring back a 11 or 12 inch option but actually I super enjoyed the extra screen real estate of the 15 macbook air I just liked the macbook pro keyboard so much more I spent 2.5x or more on a macbook pro lol
pjc50 2y ago
A vendor page: https://uk.store.asus.com/asus-vivobook-s-153388-25323.html https://uk.store.asus.com/asus-vivobook-s-153388-25323.html £1300. Big minus point: Qualcomm. Also AI Windows 11. I wonder how (if?) this thing runs Linux.
- janice1999 2y ago
  > I wonder how (if?) this thing runs Linux. Yes, there is a heavy and ongoing upstreaming effort. https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-linux-kernel-support-for-the-snapdragon-x-elite https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-...
- yaantc 2y ago
  > I wonder how (if?) this thing runs Linux. See there: https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-linux-kernel-support-for-the-snapdragon-x-elite https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-... Should be good after all this has landed in upstream Linux and all the distros (which may take a bit of time, as usual).
  - w0m 2y ago
    As an interim, I really want to see WSL performance. Hopefully in the next few days we get some clarity there; not a really an MBA competitor for me until then.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
JodieBenitez 2y ago
Ah... the famous "macbook killer", 2024 edition.
scrlk 2y ago
The keyboard feel might be good according to the reviewer, but the layout (as with many other modern laptops) is poor: https://www.notebookcheck.net/fileadmin/_processed_/7/8/csm_Vivobook-S-15-OLED_Product-photo_2S_Cool-Silver_12_16daed90ee.jpg https://www.notebookcheck.net/fileadmin/_processed_/7/8/csm_... Manufacturers need to stop putting the power button on the keyboard deck, you're one fat finger away from turning off your laptop by accident. IMO, the old ThinkPad 7-row keyboard is still the gold standard.
- zenethian 2y ago
  I loathe this keyboard. Smashing a tiny tenkey onto there is just awful.
- jitl 2y ago
  The power button placement is a total non issue. It’s not like a single tap of the power button instantly powers off the laptop, usually it brings up a power menu with off/sleep/restart/logout options or locks the screen, and it takes a 5-second hold to hard power off.
  - Kon-Peki 2y ago
    I've got a laptop that the kids spilled some milk on. For the first time ever (in my experience), removing the keyboard and cleaning it with isopropyl alcohol made things worse. But there are no spare keyboard assemblies available from the manufacturer or elsewhere, and eBay only has buy-it-now options for parts-donor laptops at prices exactly equal to flawless laptops. So now I have a perfectly fine (actually really nice) laptop with a malfunctioning keyboard that insists on constantly inserting phantom keypresses. My thought was to use the 3D printer at the library to create a new topcase and turn the thing into a SFF PC. Oh, well, except for that one thing: the power button is part of the keyboard assembly. So the whole thing is just e-waste now.
- thefz 2y ago
  > Manufacturers need to stop putting the power button on the keyboard deck, you're one fat finger away from turning off your laptop by accident. Action to take on power button press is configurable on every major OS, and to be honest very few people use it to turn the computer off.
dtx1 2y ago
> Geekbench 6 single-core > Snapdragon X Elite 2418 > m3 3082 Tells you all you need to know about this chip. And I bet Microsoft's ARM Translation layer will be Garbage as usual.
frankjr 2y ago
- It loses in single-core benchmark (2418 vs 3082) - It wins in multi-core (14352 vs 12087) and transcode (6:50 vs 7:19) while requiring 4 more cores (12 vs 8 (4+4)) and active cooling Where's the blowing away part?
- solnyshok 2y ago
  the fan
- rsynnott 2y ago
  I mean, it makes a better headline than "meh, it's kinda competitive", I suppose... But yeah, hard to characterise this as 'blowing away' (also a little suspect that they don't present a graphics comparison).
  - bfrog 2y ago
    It’s dead in the water from my perspective. Tied to windows baggage, not actually faster, arm windows apps are… yeah not exactly vast in number.
- antisthenes 2y ago
  > Where's the blowing away part? That would be the active cooling.
bearjaws 2y ago
Laptop with fan barely beats laptop without a fan on a 6 minute benchmark, more at 11. The M3 is throttling and almost keeping pace, Tomshardware actually knows this since they have the Geekbench score for the M3 Macbook pro, which of course beats the X-elite. It's a huge leap for Qualcomm, but I think the comparison is kind of ruined when its obviously been staged to thermal throttle and has parroted the same benchmarks that Qualcomm selected themselves...
- w0m 2y ago
  That's a bit unfair when not including a fan for the ~same price point is a pretty harsh anti-consumer move I think.
  - librasteve 2y ago
    err you pay to NOT have to listen to a fan
    - w0m 2y ago
      you pay for the right to feel smug and get thermal throttled if you open up too many chrome tabs.
      - librasteve 2y ago
        smug, me? I am a SWE with a MBA and I never get thermal throttled. What am I doing wrong?
    - ColonelPhantom 2y ago
      Then why is the fanless model, the Air, the cheapest laptop Apple is selling?
      - librasteve 2y ago
        I happily pay extra for an MBA (vs an equivalent pc) because there is no fan noise
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
okasaki 2y ago
I wouldn't buy a laptop with a 16:9 screen in 2024. Plus it's OLED, so higher power use, psychological pressure to make everything black, and danger of burn-in.
- LorenDB 2y ago
  And what's wrong with black particularly?
  - okasaki 2y ago
    Some of us prefer black text on white background over white text on black background.
chomp 2y ago
Why are they comparing a fan cooled 12 core laptop with a passive cooled 8 core laptop? This should be versus the MBP.
- jitl 2y ago
  I think it’s reasonable to compare at the price point - $1300.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - w0m 2y ago
    Sounds about right; similar spec'd MBP is ~2k currently.
poisonborz 2y ago
I think the question was always if the non-Apple world would finally, after all these years, get a valid M processor equivalent. The answer seems to be yes. And that's huge news.
- vessenes 2y ago
  I read this as ‘not yet’ - worse single core performance on a higher TDP with a fan, and conspicuously no GPU stats at all, just ‘it games fine’. Perhaps it wins on neural workloads, but no details here. To be clear, I would love a competitive chip because I’d like my next Apple chip to be better, and there’s so little competition that the m3 was considered a viable upgrade to the m2. But I don’t think this chip is going to press Apple to upgrade their minimum architectural specs. Hope I’m wrong though! EDIT: okay for ‘equivalent’ I may agree with you. For ‘competitive/leapfrog’ I’m at not yet.
bfrog 2y ago
I’m not seeing the numbers where it blows away the M3 myself, maybe I missed them? Some modest uptick over yesteryears part from Apple doesn’t blow me away.
TradingPlaces 2y ago
The more relevant comparison is to similarly priced Intel/AMD laptops, not the MacBook Air. And all these Copilot+ PCs have fans, so I think the 14” MacBook Pro is the more relevant comparison for a Mac.

35 points by neogodless 2y ago

Definitely a better showing from a higher end Samsung exclusive unit clocked at 4.2 Ghz. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40738902 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40738902 (YouTube video linked). Geekbench 6 Single Core MacBook Air (M3) 3082 Samsung Galaxy Book4 2838 Surface Laptop 7 2765 Asus Vivobook S 15 2418 Geekbench 6 Multi-core Samsung Galaxy Book4 15351 Asus Vivobook S 15 14352 Surface Laptop 7 14220 MacBook Air (M3) 12087 Though, oddly, the Surface did much better on battery than the Samsung. (Possibly bad choice of power plans.) Further comparison betweeen the Surface Laptop 7 and Macbook Air (M3) here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYGUG_2Oge8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYGUG_2Oge8 Cinebench Multi-core Surface Laptop 7 841 MacBook Air (M3) 550 The Surface seemed to be about 4°C warmer on the surface (47 vs 43) in comparison during the Cinebench runs.

BluebirdTech 2y ago

I bought the Asus Vivobook S and was disappointed. Windows 11 Copilot was not what they demo'd and the emulation is still substandard. If I only wanted to run benchmarks, I would probably be happy, but I had hoped for a product that performed as advertised.

jasonvorhe 2y ago

Funny how they're only comparing these laptops (equipped with a fan) to a laptop with a fan-less design (MBA).

ndiddy 2y ago
I would imagine they did it based on price range rather than presence of a fan. The cheapest Macbook Pro with a fan and the same amount of RAM and storage (16GB/1TB) is $2000, while the Asus only costs $1300.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
mdasen 2y ago
Yea, and the MacBook Air is 27.5% faster for single-core while the Snapdragon X Elite is only 18.7% faster for multi-core. It looks like the Qualcomm is also designed for 15% higher TDP wattage so it could simply be that Qualcomm went for more heat (possibly for bragging rights in benchmarks). These laptops might end up being great, but Apple's M-series laptops aren't just fast. They feel hugely different to use than any Intel based laptop I've had. I think that people also underestimate the importance of single-core performance. Most workloads simply aren't well designed for multi-core and single-core performance is one reason that the iPhone is so nice to use.
- donny2018 2y ago
  Well, I think nobody can argue that Apple's tech is still better, but this is the first time someone was able to offer some competition that doesn't look like a joke in comparison to Apple's M series.

Kelteseth 2y ago

What I would like to know is how good the graphic drivers are. We had to deal with a ton of Intel Windows OpenGL driver issues in the last 10 years...

gigatexal 2y ago

Competition is good. It means we will get better hardware from Apple maybe.

PaulRobinson 2y ago
Competition is great, free markets are superb, agree. I'm a big Apple fan and well into that ecosystem on every device from watch to desktop and everything in between, but I doubt that Apple will care, because customers like me don't care. I don't buy a Macbook because of its performance vs a windows machine. I buy one because of its performance vs my old Macbook. It's not just about the silicon. It's what Apple and its customers tout as "vertical integration" - I don't have to worry about drivers and chipsets and configuring things, it all just works. Apple isn't right for everyone, but they know who they're right for, and they're great at shipping product to them. What will be interesting with the new Snapdragon chips is Linux and BSD support. I don't want or need Windows, or Copilot+, or any other MS nonsense. But if I can have a blazing fast FLOSS machine for a little less money than the MB[P]s with M3, it might turn my head, maybe.
- w0m 2y ago
  I'm probably the target market on both ends. I've mostly worked off a MBP over the last 15 years, though currently coding on a Surface Book for compatibility reasons and generally avoid walled ecosystems as it feels unhealthy. My personal laptop is an i7 11" MBA that works fine but is in dire need of a refresh. I've been eyeing a 16gb MBA; but have been hesitating as I really like the 11" form factor and things like Framework look really tempting. Now; Snapdragon is looking tempting. I'll probably buy something this summer, glad to have options. That Yogi looks interesting.
  - gigatexal 2y ago
    if you can stomach it the apple silicon macbook airs are really really nice. I do wish they'd bring back a 11 or 12 inch option but actually I super enjoyed the extra screen real estate of the 15 macbook air I just liked the macbook pro keyboard so much more I spent 2.5x or more on a macbook pro lol

pjc50 2y ago

A vendor page: https://uk.store.asus.com/asus-vivobook-s-153388-25323.html https://uk.store.asus.com/asus-vivobook-s-153388-25323.html £1300. Big minus point: Qualcomm. Also AI Windows 11. I wonder how (if?) this thing runs Linux.

janice1999 2y ago
> I wonder how (if?) this thing runs Linux. Yes, there is a heavy and ongoing upstreaming effort. https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-linux-kernel-support-for-the-snapdragon-x-elite https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-...
yaantc 2y ago
> I wonder how (if?) this thing runs Linux. See there: https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-linux-kernel-support-for-the-snapdragon-x-elite https://www.qualcomm.com/developer/blog/2024/05/upstreaming-... Should be good after all this has landed in upstream Linux and all the distros (which may take a bit of time, as usual).
- w0m 2y ago
  As an interim, I really want to see WSL performance. Hopefully in the next few days we get some clarity there; not a really an MBA competitor for me until then.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

JodieBenitez 2y ago

Ah... the famous "macbook killer", 2024 edition.

scrlk 2y ago

The keyboard feel might be good according to the reviewer, but the layout (as with many other modern laptops) is poor: https://www.notebookcheck.net/fileadmin/_processed_/7/8/csm_Vivobook-S-15-OLED_Product-photo_2S_Cool-Silver_12_16daed90ee.jpg https://www.notebookcheck.net/fileadmin/_processed_/7/8/csm_... Manufacturers need to stop putting the power button on the keyboard deck, you're one fat finger away from turning off your laptop by accident. IMO, the old ThinkPad 7-row keyboard is still the gold standard.

zenethian 2y ago
I loathe this keyboard. Smashing a tiny tenkey onto there is just awful.
jitl 2y ago
The power button placement is a total non issue. It’s not like a single tap of the power button instantly powers off the laptop, usually it brings up a power menu with off/sleep/restart/logout options or locks the screen, and it takes a 5-second hold to hard power off.
- Kon-Peki 2y ago
  I've got a laptop that the kids spilled some milk on. For the first time ever (in my experience), removing the keyboard and cleaning it with isopropyl alcohol made things worse. But there are no spare keyboard assemblies available from the manufacturer or elsewhere, and eBay only has buy-it-now options for parts-donor laptops at prices exactly equal to flawless laptops. So now I have a perfectly fine (actually really nice) laptop with a malfunctioning keyboard that insists on constantly inserting phantom keypresses. My thought was to use the 3D printer at the library to create a new topcase and turn the thing into a SFF PC. Oh, well, except for that one thing: the power button is part of the keyboard assembly. So the whole thing is just e-waste now.
thefz 2y ago
> Manufacturers need to stop putting the power button on the keyboard deck, you're one fat finger away from turning off your laptop by accident. Action to take on power button press is configurable on every major OS, and to be honest very few people use it to turn the computer off.

dtx1 2y ago

> Geekbench 6 single-core > Snapdragon X Elite 2418 > m3 3082 Tells you all you need to know about this chip. And I bet Microsoft's ARM Translation layer will be Garbage as usual.

frankjr 2y ago

- It loses in single-core benchmark (2418 vs 3082) - It wins in multi-core (14352 vs 12087) and transcode (6:50 vs 7:19) while requiring 4 more cores (12 vs 8 (4+4)) and active cooling Where's the blowing away part?

solnyshok 2y ago
the fan
rsynnott 2y ago
I mean, it makes a better headline than "meh, it's kinda competitive", I suppose... But yeah, hard to characterise this as 'blowing away' (also a little suspect that they don't present a graphics comparison).
- bfrog 2y ago
  It’s dead in the water from my perspective. Tied to windows baggage, not actually faster, arm windows apps are… yeah not exactly vast in number.
antisthenes 2y ago
> Where's the blowing away part? That would be the active cooling.

bearjaws 2y ago

Laptop with fan barely beats laptop without a fan on a 6 minute benchmark, more at 11. The M3 is throttling and almost keeping pace, Tomshardware actually knows this since they have the Geekbench score for the M3 Macbook pro, which of course beats the X-elite. It's a huge leap for Qualcomm, but I think the comparison is kind of ruined when its obviously been staged to thermal throttle and has parroted the same benchmarks that Qualcomm selected themselves...

w0m 2y ago
That's a bit unfair when not including a fan for the ~same price point is a pretty harsh anti-consumer move I think.
- librasteve 2y ago
  err you pay to NOT have to listen to a fan
  - w0m 2y ago
    you pay for the right to feel smug and get thermal throttled if you open up too many chrome tabs.
    - librasteve 2y ago
      smug, me? I am a SWE with a MBA and I never get thermal throttled. What am I doing wrong?
  - ColonelPhantom 2y ago
    Then why is the fanless model, the Air, the cheapest laptop Apple is selling?
    - librasteve 2y ago
      I happily pay extra for an MBA (vs an equivalent pc) because there is no fan noise

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

okasaki 2y ago

I wouldn't buy a laptop with a 16:9 screen in 2024. Plus it's OLED, so higher power use, psychological pressure to make everything black, and danger of burn-in.

LorenDB 2y ago
And what's wrong with black particularly?
- okasaki 2y ago
  Some of us prefer black text on white background over white text on black background.

chomp 2y ago

Why are they comparing a fan cooled 12 core laptop with a passive cooled 8 core laptop? This should be versus the MBP.

jitl 2y ago
I think it’s reasonable to compare at the price point - $1300.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- w0m 2y ago
  Sounds about right; similar spec'd MBP is ~2k currently.

poisonborz 2y ago

I think the question was always if the non-Apple world would finally, after all these years, get a valid M processor equivalent. The answer seems to be yes. And that's huge news.

vessenes 2y ago
I read this as ‘not yet’ - worse single core performance on a higher TDP with a fan, and conspicuously no GPU stats at all, just ‘it games fine’. Perhaps it wins on neural workloads, but no details here. To be clear, I would love a competitive chip because I’d like my next Apple chip to be better, and there’s so little competition that the m3 was considered a viable upgrade to the m2. But I don’t think this chip is going to press Apple to upgrade their minimum architectural specs. Hope I’m wrong though! EDIT: okay for ‘equivalent’ I may agree with you. For ‘competitive/leapfrog’ I’m at not yet.

bfrog 2y ago

I’m not seeing the numbers where it blows away the M3 myself, maybe I missed them? Some modest uptick over yesteryears part from Apple doesn’t blow me away.

TradingPlaces 2y ago

The more relevant comparison is to similarly priced Intel/AMD laptops, not the MacBook Air. And all these Copilot+ PCs have fans, so I think the 14” MacBook Pro is the more relevant comparison for a Mac.