China is reacting to new outbreaks of the Omicron variant of the Coronavirus with partial lockdowns. This could further delay the availability of laptops with 12th Gen Intel Core processors and NVIDIA's Ti graphics cards, which debuted at the beginning of the year. The first factories have already been closed in Suzhou in the east of the country. Supply chain and logistics bottlenecks, a shortage of certain chip types and price increases are already on the horizon.

Following Intel's Alder Lake H launch, XMG presents the XMG NEO 15 (E22), a new generation of gaming laptops designed for mobile high performance. However, the 15.6" device kicks off with more than just an update to Intel's Core i7-12700H and graphics cards up to the brand new GeForce RTX 3080 Ti.Along with the laptop, XMG offers an optional external liquid cooling system that significantly expands the cooling resources and promises quieter and ultimately faster operation at lower temperatures-throwing aside the physical limitations of conventional laptop cooling systems.

In XMG's laptop portfolio, the NEO model series rounds off the product range as a mobile high-end device. With Intel's Core i7-12700H, the NEO 15 from the new E22 generation (Early 2022) integrates one of the fastest representatives of Intel's latest 12th Core generation with hybrid design. Based on the big-little principle of Alder Lake-H, the CPU combines six performance and eight efficiency cores -making it one of the first mobile processors with a total of 14 cores.On the graphics card side, XMG focuses on NVIDIA's ray tracing-capable RTX3000 chips.

XMG introduces an additional configuration variant to the high-end NEO range of gaming laptops with Intel's new Tiger Lake H45 processors. The eight-core CPUs from the 11th Core generation not only offer higher performance compared to their predecessors, but also boast the advantages of a completely updated platform. These includes support for PCI Express 4.0 and Thunderbolt 4 - features that the AMD version of the XMG NEO cannot offer. In addition, the models utilising the new Intel processor also benefit from a slight performance increase on the graphics card side. The GPU in the XMG NEO 15 and NEO 17 (M21) now operates with a TGP of up to 165 instead of 150 watts.

Following today's launch of the latest graphics card and processor generation from NVIDIA and AMD, XMG not only updates the gaming laptops from the NEO and PRO product lines to significantly more powerful components, but also fundamentally redesigns both series. While the maximum performance-focused XMG NEO 15 and NEO 17 feature AMD's Ryzen 9 5900H and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Max-P in each of their top configurations, the XMG PRO 15 and PRO 17 aim to perfectly combine performance and mobility. The new PRO series now measure less than 20 mm in height and thus offers significantly improved portability than the previous generation. For this reason, XMG utilises a combination of graphics cards up to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Max-Q and Intel's Core i7-10870H.

In the latest E21 version, the XMG NEO 15 and NEO 17 offer more performance than ever and feature a double upgrade. On the graphics card side, the laptops designed for the highest mobile gaming performance possible, make the leap to NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3000 series in the form of the RTX 3080, 3070 and 3060 - with 16, 8 and 6 GB of GDDR6; each in the full Max-P configuration with TGP of 135 (RTX 3080), 125 (RTX 3070) and 115 watts (RTX 3060), plus a dynamic boost of an additional 15 watts. But XMG does not only introduce the NEO laptops as mobile high-performance 3D powerhouses.

By introducing the latest versions of the XMG NEO 15 and NEO 17 gaming laptops, XMG is among the first manufacturers worldwide to offer high-resolution WQHD displays featuring a refresh rate of 165 Hz. Since the launch of the first series in 2018, XMG NEO laptops have been providing maximum gaming performance following a long tradition of innovation and integrating cutting-edge technology ahead of the competition. As part of a sales promotion for Black Friday, the company is offering both laptops at a substantial discount via its own online store bestware.com.

The demand for fast, high-resolution and fully gaming-ready displays in laptops has been on the rise among the gaming community for several years now. This comes as no surprise, since mobile processors and graphics cards from NVIDIA, Intel and AMD have recently been able to catch up with their desktop counterparts in terms of overall gaming performance. While Full HD displays were previously the established standard even in most high-end devices, XMG now believes that the time has come to switch to a higher resolution: the NEO 15 and NEO 17 are therefore now available with a 165 Hz WQHD IPS display, complementing the existing 240 Hz Full HD option. The new high-resolution display offers razor sharp image quality thanks to its impressively high pixel density of 188 ppi (15.6 inch) and 170 ppi (17.3 inch) respectively. For comparison, external 4K UHD monitors in the popular 27 inch size class offer no more than 163 ppi. While the excellent sRGB colour space coverage is almost 100 percent, the brightness reaches well above 300 nits.

XMG's NEO 15 and NEO 17 receive a significant performance upgrade: initially available with the Intel Core i7-10750H with six cores, the NEO model series can now be configured with the eight-core Intel Core i7-10875H. The application of liquid metal thermal compound will continue to ensure optimal processor cooling and consequently lower fan speeds. In their top configuration, both gaming laptops utilize NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, with the XMG NEO 17 also featuring a larger 62 Wh battery.

Whilst up to now available with the sole option of an Intel Core i7-10750H, the NEO range will soon be available with over 25% more processing power. The Core i7-10875H offers eight physical cores, 16 threads and a basic and boost clock rate of 2.3 and up to 5.1 GHz respectively. The upgrade is especially beneficial in multi-core-optimized scenarios, but will also ensure that the 15.6- and 17.3-inch gaming laptops are future-proof in terms of performance in upcoming game titles. In CineBench R20, the XMG NEO 15 with Core i7-10875H scores 4,192 points, clearly outperforming the i7-10750H with 3,352 points.