Intel’s 1st Gen Core Ultra CPUs had a disappointing debut, with AMD’s Ryzen 7000 chips beating them comfortably. Not only is Meteor Lake slower than its year-old Phoenix rivals, but it also draws more power. This is despite new core architectures (It’s a Tic) and the 4nm-class Intel 4 process node. There is some good news. According to UltrabookReview, a new BIOS update improves not only the performance but the power efficiency as well.
![](https://www.hardwaretimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Intel-Meteor-Lake-H-720x406.jpg)
Upon updating the Zenbook 14 OLED to BIOS 203, a 12.5% performance uplift was observed in Cinebench. The single and the multi-core scores improved while seeing a reduction in average power consumption. This indicates that future updates may further optimize lightly and heavily threaded workloads, leaving latency-sensitive applications as the weak point.
In Cinebench R23, the CPU starts at 50W and ends up around 35W for the best-effort run. For the 10 min loop, it starts at 50W and then gradually drops and stabilizes at around 28W (after about 5-6 minutes it gets to 28W).
- 201: CineBench R23: CPU 12357 pts (best run), CPU 11342 pts (10 min loop test), CPU Single Core 1751 pts (best run);
- 203: CineBench R23: CPU 13873 pts (best run), CPU 12132 pts (10 min loop test), CPU Single Core 1761 pts (best run);
All review units were distributed with pre-release firmware, which, according to multiple testers, suffers from unoptimized power delivery. The latest firmware update fixes a scheduling problem caused by early power measurement, granting nifty gains.
![](https://www.hardwaretimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/intel-meteor-lake-720x405.jpg)
Right now, it’s hard to tell how much improvement we can expect from software and firmware optimizations. From early reviews, it’s clear that the Core Ultra Meteor Lake CPUs have a higher peak power consumption than AMD’s Ryzen 7000 parts. Some OEMs may optimize their designs to leverage this flaw, and we may see better-performing notebooks in the future.