Nvidia RTX Spark laptops arrive, testing the N1X chip for local AI

Nvidia's first processor designed for laptops, the N1X, has reached consumers under the RTX Spark brand, with devices going on sale in mid-October 2026. One of the first hands-on reviews, published on 16 October 2026, examined the 14-inch Asus ProArt P14 and put the chip's local AI ambitions to the test.

RTX Spark combines CPU and GPU in a single package that Nvidia calls a superchip, and its headline feature is fast unified memory of up to 128 GB. Nvidia unveiled the laptops with considerable fanfare at Computex in June, pitching them as a reinvention of the Windows PC.

Why unified memory matters

Conventional laptops usually pair slow system memory with a graphics card carrying around 8 GB of fast video memory, too little for capable language models. The review cited Qwen 3.8-27B, a 27-billion-parameter model that needs 14 GB even in its heavily quantised IQ4_XS form, before adding the context memory needed for real work. Unified memory shared between CPU and GPU addresses this, an approach Apple has used in its M chips since 2020 and AMD offers in its Ryzen AI Max Pro line. The reviewer noted that the NPUs Microsoft requires for Copilot+ PCs play essentially no role here, since such models run on GPU cores.

Almost every major laptop maker is shipping RTX Spark devices, including Microsoft with its Surface Laptop Ultra. Most are 16-inch machines, Lenovo's Yoga measures 15.3 inches, and Asus alone adds a 14-inch option in the ProArt P14.

Price, display and noise

The tested unit, with 32 GB of memory and a 1 TB SSD, retails for 3,300 euros. Versions with 64 GB start at 4,300 euros and 128 GB models at 6,700 euros. Although the chip is closely related to Nvidia's Linux-based DGX Spark workstations, the laptops ship with Windows 11 for Arm. The 2880 × 1800 OLED panel reached a measured 599 nits, and the battery lasted more than 19 hours of video playback at 200 nits.

Fan behaviour was the main complaint: the cooling system often spun up on an idle desktop and reached 2.7 sone under full load. A MacBook Pro with the top M5 Pro chip, seen as the main rival, peaks at 4.8 sone but only under heavy load. With 48 GB of memory that Apple configuration costs roughly 3,800 euros, placing the two platforms in a similar price bracket.