The computer industry has no direct competition for Apple to reach $600 MacBook Neo– at least not yet. Intel’s latest low-end chips may provide PC makers with their best chance to take on Apple, but it won’t be easy. Apple’s rivals will have to do more than just focus on budget performance to offer something as compelling as the Neo’s design.
The MacBook Neo has “only” 8 GB of internal memory and runs on the iPhone chip A18 Pro. Nevertheless, he became one of them Best selling laptops of the year. Intel has released details of its new product in an effort to get back at Apple Wildcat Lake processors earlier this month. They are built on the same Intel 18a process node as the company’s Panther Lake chips. Intel Core Ultra Series 3 chips you’ve probably seen your of laptops already this year.
First look at the Intel Wild Cat Lake laptop in the wild. 2 Cougar Cove P + 4 Darkmont E cores 17 W PL1 and 35 W PL2 / 22 W PL1 Max / 11 W fanless
17 TOPS NPU
2 Xe nucleus
Slim and light design
Looks like the perfect laptop for the beach, innit 🌊🏖️ pic.twitter.com/MCsCVbpM4A— Vaidyanathan S (@Geeky_Vaidy) April 23, 2026
No, we don’t yet have a Wildcat Lake laptop to compare with the MacBook Neo. However, Notebookcheck’s managing editor Vaidyanathan Subramaniam shared images of an early reference laptop Intel introduced it at a showcase in India. The chip inside this laptop has two Cougar Cove P (performance) cores and four Darkmont low power E (efficiency) cores. It is powered by two Xe3 GPU cores and 17 TOPS NPUs built for minute background AI tasks. The chipmaker said that processors such as the Intel Core 7 360 promise 20% and twice the performance in some benchmarks compared to the previous generation Intel Core 7 150U low-end chips.
Will it be enough to take on Apple’s debut A18 Pro chip? iPhone 16 Prois an open question. But that reference laptop in the pictures is already attractive thanks to the soft blue to white gradient on the laptop lid. The main attraction of the MacBook Neo is its soft pink, indigo and yellow tones. The colorful chassis is catnip to anyone tired of the same old silver or black shell.
Windows computers are no longer cheaper than Mac computers
Josh Newman, Intel’s general manager of consumer computing, said at the unveiling of the Core Series 3-powered laptops that they are designed for “value-oriented computing with exceptional battery life” for use in schools or small businesses. All major PC manufacturers have promised Wildcat Lake PCs from their existing or future laptop lines. Most of these are retreads of existing productivity laptops with matte gray shells. Shiny “space blue” devices like Lenovo’s Ideapad Slim 5i currently cost $900. The upcoming version with the Qualcomm Snapdragon X2 Plus chip will cost $850.
Wildcat Lake is designed to be inexpensive. For the first time in years Intel is not in a financial hole. The chip maker announced its latest Panther Lake chips to hit the ground running this past quarter. But Intel Core Series 3 computers are the most expensive lightweight laptops you can buy today. You can’t make a PC with a premium aluminum chassis, a quality screen, powerful speakers, and solid controls and still cost $600 without a relatively inexpensive chip. At the same time, any PC hoping to match the price of a MacBook Neo will have to factor in the price of a Windows 11 license, which can add more than $100 to the product’s price tag.
Anshel Sag, a computer industry analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, told Gizmodo in an email that Intel’s new chips are Windows PCs’ “best chance” against the MacBook Neo. “The memory crisis has completely changed the equation at the lower end of the market to the point where I believe entire categories could disappear,” he said. He added that 18A throughput is “improving” and that Panther Lake and Wildcat Lake could become more accessible “unless Intel reallocates more 18A capacity to data centers and servers.”
Apple has vertical integration on its side. Using leftover iPhone 16 Pro chips with the A18 Pro allows the tech giant to translate those savings into a better-feeling laptop. Because of its dominant position in technology, Apple has more leverage over memory suppliers. Big computer manufacturers like Lenovo, Dell and so on Microsoft itself there is raised prices between them the game and productivity platforms Increasing the cost of RAM.
We may not have to wait long to see Wildcat Lake in action. The annual Computex technology conference is approaching in Taipei, Taiwan. We may see a new generation of super cheap PCs from brands like Dell. Time will tell. The final price of these upcoming devices will tell us more.
