Getting my hands on this machine was a bit of a fluke. I’d been messing around with running LLMs on Intel hardware, using the Xe Linux graphics driver, and every time I filed a bug with Intel I got the same sneering response: “The Xe driver is for LNL and BMG. We don’t care about your ARL integrated graphics.” Truth is, plenty of Xe driver bugs have nothing to do with LNL or BMG—they’re just bugs. And cards from the Arc 140T / A770 era benefit hugely from the Xe driver too; the performance gains are real, and using them makes far more sense than clinging to TGL-era stuff. Getting unceremoniously dumped by Intel pissed me off, so I vented: “Should I buy a Lunar Lake laptop just so I can complain about Intel?” And then this Lunar Lake device showed up for testing. Special thanks to Cat Dad—here’s his blog, packed with good stuff, go check it out.

Honestly, I never had a strong need for a laptop. Back in college I was like most students — I really wanted one, because it’s portable, it’s fashionable, it’s badass. But as I got deeper into using computers, I started to dislike laptops, because they’re just so un-upgradeable. Who doesn’t want to upgrade the GPU, RAM, or CPU every now and then? With a laptop, basically you can upgrade the RAM and that’s it. Still, right now I’ve got a renewed need for a laptop, and the reason is a bit silly: I often want to find a quiet, empty place and just use a computer in peace. I already have a cheap Dell laptop, but the eye-searing screen, the garbage keyboard feel, the pathetic i3 SNB performance, and the tragic battery life even with a 9-cell — none of that meets what I need. Especially the screen. Anything can be bad, but how can the screen be bad? So my requirements for a laptop were basically set: high performance + good screen + strong battery + good keyboard + portable.