Intel Processor N50 vs Intel Core i3-N300

Intel Processor N50

The Intel Processor N50 is an entry-level mobile CPU for thin and light laptops from the Alder Lake-N series. It was announced in early 2023 and offers no performance cores and 2 of the 8 efficient cores (E-cores, Gracemont architecture). The chip does not support HyperThreading and clocks with up to 3.4 GHz. The performance of the E-cores should be similar to old Skylake cores (compare to the Core i7-6700HQ). All cores can use up to 6 MB L3-cache. 

Performance

The performance is clearly lower than the Processor N100 (4 cores, 3.4 GHz) due to the reduced core count. The single thread performance however, should be similar. Compared to older processors, the N50 should be comparable to dual core Skylake based CPUs like the Intel Core m3-8100Y (2x 3.4 GHz, 5W).Features

The Alder Lake-N chips only support single channel memory with up to DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 or LPDDR5-4800. The chip also supports Quick Sync and AV1 decoding (most likely same engine as in Alder Lake). Furthermore, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 are partly integrated (but no Thunderbolt). External chips can be connected via PCIe Gen3 x9 (via the PCH).

The integrated graphics adapter is based on the Xe-architecture and offers only 16 of the 32 EUs (Execution Units) operating at only up to 750 MHz. Due to the single channel memory, low clock speeds, and low shader count, the gaming performance of the iGPU is very limited.

Power consumption

The N50 has a base power consumption of only 6 W and is therefore suited for fanless cooling. The CPU is built with a further improved 10nm SuperFin process at Intel (called Intel 7).

Intel Core i3-N300

The Intel Core i3-N305 is an entry-level mobile CPU for thin and light laptops from the Alder Lake-N series. It was announced in early 2023 and offers no performance cores and 8 efficient cores (E-cores, Gracemont architecture). The chip does not support HyperThreading and clocks with up to 3.8 GHz (single core, 3 GHz all core Turbo). The performance of the E-cores should be similar to old Skylake cores (compare to the Core i7-6700HQ). All cores can use up to 6 MB L3-cache. 

Performance

The performance depends on the cooling and TDP settings and should be somewhere similar to the old  Alder Lake Pentium 8500 (1 performance core, 4 efficiency cores, max. 4.4 GHz and 8 MB L3-cache). The multi-threaded performance should be quite good with the 8 cores but will suffer due to the low TDP. Single thread performance will suffer due to the missing P-cores and relatively low boost clock speeds.

Features

The Alder Lake-N chips only support single channel memory with up to DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 or LPDDR5-4800. The chip also supports Quick Sync and AV1 decoding (most likely same engine as in Alder Lake). Furthermore, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 are partly integrated (but no Thunderbolt). External chips can be connected via PCIe Gen3 x9 (via the PCH).

The integrated graphics adapter is based on the Xe-architecture and offersall 32 EUs (Execution Units) operating at up to 1.25 GHz. In addition to the single channel memory, the gaming performance is very limited of the iGPU.

Power consumption

The i3 has a base power consumption of 7 W and is therefore even suited for fanless cooling. The CPU is built with a further improved 10nm SuperFin process at Intel (called Intel 7).