At CES 2026, Intel adopted an unusually aggressive tone when discussing its upcoming Panther Lake processors. In a public interview focused on the handheld gaming market, Intel executive Nish Neelalojanan openly described AMD’s current offerings as “old silicon.”
According to Neelalojanan, Panther Lake is not a scaled-down laptop chip, but a processor redesigned from the ground up specifically for handheld devices — a clear attempt to differentiate Intel’s strategy from AMD’s existing mobile lineup.
⚙️ Strategic Shift: Efficiency Over Peak Performance #
Intel’s confidence is closely tied to Panther Lake’s architectural direction. As the first SoC built on the Intel 18A process, Panther Lake emphasizes a flatter efficiency curve rather than chasing maximum single-core performance.
A major focus is the new Darkmont E-Cores, which introduce substantial changes in instruction throughput, cache hierarchy, and power management. These changes are designed to maximize performance per watt (Perf/W) in the low-to-mid power range — the most critical operating zone for handheld systems.
Handheld gaming devices face constraints that are far tighter than those of thin-and-light laptops:
- Strict power limits that cap sustained performance
- Minimal thermal headroom due to compact enclosures
- Highly dynamic workloads, with CPU and GPU loads fluctuating rapidly
Intel’s heavier reliance on E-Cores reflects a structural choice: prioritize stable, predictable performance for game logic and background tasks, rather than relying on high-boost P-Cores that risk power spikes and thermal throttling.
🔁 AMD’s Counter-Response #
AMD was quick to respond to Intel’s rhetoric. At the same CES event, AMD executive Rahul Tikoo stated that AMD does not view Panther Lake as a meaningful threat to its current roadmap.
Tikoo highlighted AMD’s broader product coverage:
- Ryzen AI Max (Strix Halo): Targeting high-end and professional workloads
- Mainstream Ryzen AI series: Covering the bulk of mobile and consumer use cases
He argued that Intel’s comparisons carefully avoid Strix Halo, which delivers near-discrete GPU-class performance in a mobile APU. By benchmarking Panther Lake primarily against AMD’s mid-range products, Tikoo suggested Intel is implicitly acknowledging a performance gap at the top end.
He also noted that pricing could become a major obstacle for Panther Lake in the highly cost-sensitive handheld market.
🧩 Key Specifications: Core Ultra X9 388H #
Despite the controversy, Panther Lake represents Intel’s most ambitious mobile platform in years. The flagship Core Ultra X9 388H includes:
- Hybrid CPU layout:
- 4 Cougar Cove P-Cores
- 8 Darkmont E-Cores
- 4 LP (low-power) cores
- Integrated GPU: 12 Xe-cores based on the Xe3 architecture (Arc B390)
- Memory support: Up to 96 GB of LPDDR5x-9600
Intel claims roughly a 10% performance uplift over Arrow Lake-H at equivalent power levels, with even larger gains compared to Lunar Lake.
🎮 Redefining Integrated Graphics with Xe3 #
Perhaps the most disruptive aspect of Panther Lake is its graphics performance. Intel claims that at a 60 W sustained power envelope, the X9 388H can deliver gaming performance comparable to an RTX 4050 Laptop GPU.
Even at 45 W, Intel reports consistently high frame rates. In public demonstrations, Cyberpunk 2077 running at 1080p High settings with XeSS in Balanced mode achieved approximately 80 FPS — a result that significantly stretches traditional expectations for integrated graphics.
If these figures hold in real-world devices, Xe3 could fundamentally alter how handheld gaming systems are designed.
🧠 Conclusion #
Intel’s assertive messaging around Panther Lake reflects a broader strategic shift. Rather than competing solely on peak performance, Intel is repositioning itself around efficiency curves, sustained output, and integrated graphics capability.
AMD continues to leverage a wide and flexible product stack, while Intel is making a focused bet: that the future of handheld gaming is not defined by raw speed, but by which architecture fits the device’s power and thermal envelope best.