Intel’s latest Core i9-12900HK processor may just have won the mobile x86 vs. Arm performance war, but it comes at a cost. The mobile 14-core Alder Lake chip has bested Apple’s M1 Max in multiple workloads, including a 30% win in a multi-threaded test, but the former is far more power-hungry than the latter.
We’ve already seen what the M1 Max can do in the latest 16-inch MacBook Pro, and the Core i9-12900HK, which powers MSI’s latest GE76 Raider gaming laptop, isn’t a slacker, either. Both processors leverage different architectures, with the Arm-based M1 Max residing exclusively inside Apple’s closed ecosystem, so an apples-to-apples comparison isn’t always straightforward.
