Intel tries again to slam Apple with terrible ‘social experiment’ ad

I regret to inform you that Intel has once again done a terrible publicity to show how absolutely no fool it is to see Apple switch to its own processors. This one, called “Breaking the Spell,” follows a classic format: people are placed in a room and informed of the features that are supposed to come to MacBooks. Then, after they’re all excited, the twist! We were actually talking to them about Windows computers, powered (of course) by Intel. The people in the ad (who, according to the fine print, are “real people paid for their time and opinions”) are speechless and then clamor to buy or take the laptops, probably now that they have. realized the possibilities of the PC.

It’s an ad format that has never been great, but the real plus is that it makes absolutely no sense here. is old news by almost any standard.

If you’re brave, you can give her a watch below.

I know when it comes to tech news there can be kind of a bubble, with writers and readers thinking that some things are more known to the general public than they are. But really, if you’ve walked into Best Buy’s laptops section in the past decade, you probably would have seen some of the things that shock people in the ad: two-in-one laptops that fold. Becoming a tablet has been popular since the early 2010s, Intel has offered dual-screen laptops since 2018, and PC gaming predates the original IBM personal computer that popularized the term “PC”.

Image: Intel

As for Intel’s scalability argument, I agree. While I understand that Apple is putting RAM in the same chip as the processor probably has performance advantages, that means you can’t upgrade, especially when M1 laptops start with a paltry 8. GB and incurs a fee of $ 200 for the 16 GB upgrade. The problem is, however, that there is a good chance that the Windows laptop that this ad inspires you to buy also has non-removable memory. and not scalable. While you can find Windows laptops with swappable RAM or SSD, this is a notable feature these days rather than expected.

Maybe this ad would be at least more forgivable if it wasn’t a mix of another set of ads Intel did with “I’m a Mac” actor Justin Long (which people hated) and those commercials for Chevy trucks (which people hated too).

Wait, actually, yeah, that would still suck – because Intel is bragging about what you can find in laptops with chips from its other competitor, AMD. There are 2-in-1 flip-flop Ryzen chips out there, and our best gaming laptop for 2021 has both an AMD processor and a slot to add more RAM. “But what about dual-screen laptops with AMD,” probably no one asked, as this is a niche product category. Asus has you covered.

I don’t want this review to come from an Apple fan who is, as one person said in the ad, “100% loyal to Apple”. (Who’s talking like that?) While I mostly use Apple products, I’m also a shameless old ThinkPad lover who thinks Intel is right – if you can look past the condescension and embarrassment. of this advertising campaign. I wish Apple would give people more choice and scalability with their computers, and I think people should be more willing to try other computing platforms if they meet their needs better. But does an ad full of people acting like they’ve never seen a computer convince anyone?