I Tested Three Windows Laptops In The Macbook Neo’s Price Range — There’s No Contest

When nan MacBook Neo arrived past month, I knew Windows laptop makers were successful trouble. For $599, nan Neo offers awesome build value and coagulated capacity successful a sleek and ultra-portable package. Windows laptops successful this value scope thin to beryllium ugly, cheap-feeling, and a small slow.

Despite years of rumors, nan MacBook Neo still seemed to return nan Windows world by surprise. I expect due competitors to popular up conscionable arsenic soon arsenic nan companies tin manage, but I wanted to spot what nan title successful nan PC abstraction is for illustration now.

So I asked a bunch of laptop manufacturers to nonstop maine their champion answers to nan MacBook Neo.

The MacBook Neo is simply a 13-inch, 2.7 lb all-aluminum laptop pinch an A18 Pro iPhone spot for its processor and conscionable 8GB of RAM, starting astatine 256GB of (slow) storage. It costs $599 (or $499 for students and teachers), and for $100 much you get double nan retention and a Touch ID fingerprint sensor successful nan powerfulness button. There aren’t immoderate all-aluminum, 13-inch Windows laptops retired location for $600. All of nan Windows laptops I tested person MSRPs supra $600 but are usually cheaper.

Asus sent a $700 Asus Vivobook 16 pinch an AMD Ryzen 7 processor (currently $530), Lenovo put up a $750 Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3x pinch a Snapdragon X spot (currently $550), and Acer sent an Intel Lunar Lake Acer Aspire 14 AI, which is down from $1,050 to conscionable $530. Dell and HP are betwixt laptop generations and didn’t person immoderate existent models to send.

By Windows fund laptop standards, these are each bully values. And connected paper, they should beryllium competitive. Each has an eight-core processor (versus six connected nan Neo), 16GB of RAM alternatively of 8GB, and betwixt 256GB and 1TB of retention — nan slowest of which is doubly nan velocity of nan Neo’s storage.

Let’s commencement pinch nan slightest expensive. The Asus Vivobook is simply a ample 16-inch laptop pinch a dull and plasticky build. Its chassis creaks and flexes astir anyplace you touch it. The surface is large, but thing displayed connected it looks drab, dim, and somewhat blurry. 1920 x 1200 solution is passable connected a 14-inch screen, but not stretched crossed 16 inches.

The news isn’t amended elsewhere. Its trackpad makes a large hollow sound pinch each click, while its keyboard feels a small mushy. Its speakers are besides audibly grating, making euphony and podcasts sound empty. And erstwhile connected a call, nan 720p webcam rendered a low-res, noisy image. It often struggled pinch backlighting from a model down my head, pinch nan image going from excessively acheronian to making maine look for illustration I was connected nan aboveground of nan sun.

The Vivobook’s AMD Ryzen 7 7730U processor has 8 cores, but nan Neo’s are 75 percent faster. The Ryzen CPU is serviceable for ray tasks for illustration web browsing and basal apps, but moreover pinch 16GB of RAM it sometimes hangs longer opening apps acknowledgment to its slower single-core performance. And nan artillery life isn’t thing typical either. Trying to get done a regular workday of mixed usage (Chrome tabs, Google Docs, streaming music, and a short video call) yielded a maximum of six hours earlier it died. It does person a beautiful bully larboard selection, including 3 USB-A (one 2.0 and 2 3.2), a headphone jack, HDMI 1.4, and 1 USB-C that tin besides beryllium utilized for charging — which is good, because different you’d person to bring nan Vivobook’s barrel-plug charger pinch you.

The $749.99 Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3x has a somewhat smaller, slightly better-looking surface than nan Vivobook, and it’s nan only touchscreen of nan bunch. But astatine 300 nits nan 15.3-inch show is arsenic dim and still middling quality. The keyboard present is better, pinch a touch of that tactile consciousness and deeper cardinal recreation that Lenovo is known for, but that’s astir nan only item of its build.

The trackpad feels stiff and sometimes difficult to click. And nan speakers are nan worst of this bunch. I for illustration to perceive to physics music, for illustration nan Marathon and Armored Core soundtracks, to focus, but nan speakers are truthful bladed and treble-y that nan repetitive beats, alternatively than letting maine fastener in, conscionable gave maine a headache.

The IdeaPad Slim uses a ace businesslike Arm-based Snapdragon X1-26-100 chip. While it’s nan lowest-end of Qualcomm’s X1 processors, it performs good for mundane tasks. An Arm spot intends you tin tally into separator cases of app incompatibility, but it’s progressively uncommon successful nan kinds of activity astir mundane users do connected a computer.

The agleam spot of nan IdeaPad and its spot is artillery life. It easy lasts a afloat workday and good beyond connected a azygous charge. It’s nan longest-lasting laptop of our artillery rundown web-browsing test, moving for complete 21 hours. You tin time off nan charger astatine location for nan time and not care, and that’s awesome because for illustration nan Asus it’s different tube plug. Also for illustration nan Asus, it’s sewage a decent larboard selection, pinch a USB-C that besides charges nan laptop, 2 5Gbps USB-A, HDMI 1.4, a 3.5mm audio jack, and moreover an SD paper slot.

The Acer Aspire 14 AI is nan smallest and fastest of nan Windows laptops I tested, and it has nan astir going for it — nary uncertainty because it’s primitively a $1,050 laptop. Thanks to its Intel Core Ultra 7 256V “Lunar Lake” processor, it’s faster than nan different 2 Windows laptops. It’s still slower than nan Neo connected single-core tasks, but its multicore capacity is better. When plugged successful it tin moreover grip a small gaming. I was capable to play Marathon decently capable to beryllium competitive. It was only workable connected nan lowest value settings, but that’s amended than nothing. And it has very bully artillery life. It doesn’t past arsenic agelong arsenic nan Lenovo, but it lasts longer than nan Neo — I saw almost 12 hours during ray use.

The spot is astir of what you’re paying for pinch nan Acer, on pinch nan larboard selection. While each 3 of these Windows laptops person a greater amount and assortment of ports than nan MacBook Neo, only nan Aspire 14 has Thunderbolt 4 and HDMI 2.1. Most of nan remainder of nan laptop is conscionable okay. We’re still successful subpar speaker territory. The keyboard isn’t arsenic bully arsenic nan Lenovo’s, but it’s sewage capable cardinal recreation to consciousness fine. The trackpad is besides passable compared to nan Asus and Lenovo, but it still sounds plasticky erstwhile you click. And nan laptop’s platform flexes arsenic you push down connected aliases astir nan trackpad.

But nan Acer’s biggest weakness is its display. The 1920 x 1200 solution connected nan 14-inch LCD sheet is fine, but it looks washed-out, and there’s noticeable ray bleed on immoderate of nan edges. It’s only visible erstwhile viewing acheronian backgrounds aliases scenes, but it’s unsightly.

The flaws shown by each 3 of these Windows laptops — lackluster screens, crummy-sounding speakers, and middling trackpads — are almost intolerable to debar connected laptops successful this value range. But nan crippled has changed: The MacBook Neo exists. And it smokes each of them successful quality-of-life territory. It’s sewage a brighter, much colorful screen; a trackpad you tin easy click anywhere; a crisp webcam that does your look immoderate justice; and speakers that don’t battle your ears. It moreover has a hinge you tin unfastened smoothly pinch 1 digit — nan Windows laptops threat closed aliases descent astir if you effort to do nan same.

This trio of Windows laptops each has 16GB of RAM to nan Neo’s 8GB, but it hardly makes a quality successful existent use. They excessively tin slow down a spot if you unfastened tons of Chrome tabs connected them conscionable for illustration nan Neo. The Neo moreover hit nan Lenovo and Asus successful our Premiere 4K export test, moreover though it’s short connected RAM and wholly fanless. Impressive.

The MacBook Neo is nan easy prime among these 4 laptops. It has its ain struggles; you tin wholly bog it down pinch tons of Chrome tabs aliases by multitasking while moving a heftier contented creation app for illustration Lightroom. But its single-core capacity is amended than immoderate Windows laptop here, making it much than accelerated capable for astir users. It’s besides colorful and fun, and its hardware is all-around awesome compared to different laptops successful this value scope (with nan mini objection that its keyboard is annoyingly not backlit). If I had to prime a Windows exemplary among this selection, I’d spell pinch nan Acer Aspire 14 AI. I’d besides link a rodent and keyboard, plug it into a show and speakers, and effort to usage it that measurement arsenic often arsenic I could (but that takes it retired of “budget” territory if you don’t ain each those peripherals already). It’s good rounded successful position of capacity and ports, but not successful hardware quality.

For immoderate folks, it’s besides worthy considering a bully Chromebook for illustration nan Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14. It’s not arsenic bully arsenic nan MacBook Neo, but it’s adjacent — it’s sewage a beautiful OLED screen, excellently tactile keyboard, bully speakers, and awesome artillery life. ChromeOS is good if you conscionable request to unrecorded successful a browser, aliases if you’re comfortable enabling its Linux virtual instrumentality to get entree to much apps. But you don’t get arsenic afloat featured of an operating strategy retired of nan container arsenic you do pinch macOS aliases Windows. It’s my favourite Chromebook, but these days I’d still conscionable return nan Neo and save money successful nan process. (It’s still chaotic to deliberation of a Mac arsenic nan cheaper replacement to a Chromebook.)

There’s conscionable nary competing pinch nan Neo astatine this price, astatine slightest astatine this time. There’s Microsoft’s Surface Laptop 13-inch, which is very adjacent successful value to nan Neo’s build, but it still can’t touch that A18 Pro chip’s single-core performance. It starts astatine $900, though you tin often find it for less. Climb into nan $1,200-plus scope (to nan world of Asus Zenbooks, Lenovo Yoga Slims, nan 13.8-inch Surface Laptop, etc.) and things get overmuch nicer pinch amended builds, OLED screens, and higher-end chips. But past you’re besides competing pinch nan MacBook Airs.

I’ve heard murmurs that immoderate PC laptop makers are aiming to merchandise due Neo competitors this year, but it’s going to beryllium difficult for immoderate PC institution to compete connected value and hardware quality. Apple manages it pinch nan Neo acknowledgment to its vertical integration, complete pinch its ain operating strategy and in-house chip. PC makers person to fig retired a measurement to extremity cutting nan incorrect corners, for illustration screens, trackpads, and speakers. And they request to do that without raising prices. That’s going to beryllium hard, particularly now. But if they can’t, nan Neo will beryllium nan easy reply again and again.

Photography by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge