Feature Dell copied Apple’s best MacBook Neo ideas. Windows may ruin it Dell’s new XPS 13 borrows the MacBook Neo’s best ideas with premium hardware, long battery life, and a sharp OLED screen. But with only 8GB of RAM, Windows may still keep it from matching Apple’s budget laptop breakthrough. , PDT Intel Wildcat Lake processor built to enable cheap laptops. Even if it can’t match the Neo, I’m sure it’ll work fine in day-to-day use. Roman used the MacBook Neo to edit the Macworld Podcast’s YouTube video — something you’d hate to do on an 8GB Windows laptop. Foundry The memory, though. Using the MacBook Neo as a daily driver has been a revelation because Apple’s MacOS handles memory allocation and app switching so much better than Windows does. The Neo’s combination of a fast CPU and MacOS’s fantastic memory management lets it punch so, so far above its weight class. My Macworld pal Roman Loyola pushed his MacBook Neo to the limit, subjecting it to 4K video editing workloads and opening a whopping 59 browser tabs at once. It didn’t break. I’ve used my Neo the same way I use my blinged-out gaming PC, hot-swapping between Apple TV streams, Xbox Game Pass games, Spotify, Discord, and a tab-laden Chrome instance throughout the day. It never sputters. It never falters. It always feels fast. Roman summed it up well: “[The MacBook Neo] is a great Mac for everyday tasks, and will even handle the occasional pro app. I’m sure there’s a ceiling to what you can do with it, but with so much headroom, there’s a good chance you’ll never get anywhere near it.” Wachiwit / Shutterstock.com Meanwhile, Microsoft’s big project for 2026 is to make Windows 11 less shitty. I’m not joking – the focus is on “performance, reliability, and craft” after years of bloat led to user outrage and Linux migrations. Windows 11’s memory handling is egregiously bad compared to MacOS. Even if the rest of the Dell XPS 13 experience holds up to the MacBook Neo’s lofty new standards, I would be utterly shocked if it feels as good in minute-to-minute use. Many of my colleagues refuse to use a Windows PC with 8GB of RAM, claiming those machines bog down to unusable speeds. I don’t necessarily agree – as a Chromebook advocate surrounded by normal people who use computers as necessities, not hobbies, an 8GB Windows laptop holds up perfectly fine for basic tasks and web browsing with a handful of tabs open. I think the Dell XPS 13 will shine brightly if used in that way, feeling and looking fantastic all the while. Cheap Windows laptops need a more premium Windows Pixar/Disney/Microsoft But I suspect Windows – and thus the XPS 13 – will crumble the second you throw punishing workloads at it. I could never multitask the way I can on the MacBook Neo with any of my past $500 laptops, and Microsoft is a big part of the reason why, not just the hardware. Interestingly, in an interview this week, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said “we never got there” in terms of software optimization during the prime PC era – developers just assumed the next generation of processors will be ever-faster, rather than tweaking their programs to run better. It feels like Windows fell victim to the same trend, and until Microsoft fixes it, cheap Windows laptops fundamentally can’t match the MacBook Neo’s user experience, no matter how heavenly their hardware is. Microsoft is working on making Windows better. Hopefully the changes come fast and furious because Dell understood the assignment. The XPS 13 mirrors the MacBook Neo’s most appealing hardware decisions. Heck, it even outshines Apple in some ways! But until Windows gets its act together, MacBook Neo rivals aren’t even playing the same game. They’ll still need to be used like cheap laptops. The MacBook Neo is a cheap laptop that looks, feels, and handles like a premium experience. That’s a huge difference. : Brad Chacos, Executive , Brad Chacos spends his days digging through desktop PCs and tweeting too much. He specializes in graphics cards and gaming, but covers everything from security to Windows...
