Dell Pro Max 18 Plus Keeps AI Laptop Crown as Nvidia RTX Spark Launch Looms

TechRadar reported that Dell's RTX PRO 5000-equipped Pro Max 18 Plus reached 185.1 tokens per second on the Phi model, 140.5 tokens per second on Mistral, and 119.7 tokens per second on Llama 3, topping every other machine tested. The RTX Spark launch could unsettle those results, with Microsoft expected to offer the Surface Laptop Ultra from $2,599 and Dell bringing the XPS 16 Creator Edition from $3,799.99. Asus, HP, Lenovo and MSI are launch partners, while Acer and Gigabyte are expected to add models later.

Nvidia rates RTX Spark at up to 1 petaflop of FP4 AI performance, with 6,144 CUDA cores and up to 128 GB of shared memory. TechRadar noted that the 1 petaflop figure covers only FP4 calculations that exploit sparsity, an upper limit that everyday workloads may not reach. Nvidia also claims the chip can run large language models of about 120 billion parameters locally, with a context window of one million tokens. That is slightly above the 109 billion parameters that the Dell Pro Max 18 Plus can reportedly handle locally. Model capacity alone does not determine inference speed, so this does not automatically mean RTX Spark will outperform Dell's workstation in AI workloads.

The price Dell buyers paid for the lead has risen sharply. The Pro Max 18 Plus offers Core Ultra 5, 7, or 9 processors and RTX PRO 1000 to 5000 graphics, with prices starting at $3,488. Dell's top configuration, equipped with an RTX PRO 5000, 128 GB of memory and two 1 TB drives, cost $9,245.52 when the laptop launched. A similar configuration later appeared at roughly $14,000, while the laptop now sells for almost $18,600, double its launch price after 14 months.

The top model is built around the Intel Core Ultra 9 285HX processor with 24 cores, a 5.5 GHz boost clock and a 55 W rating. Its RTX PRO 5000 graphics chip has 24 GB of GDDR7, a 175 W power ceiling and a graphics clock of 1,807 MHz. Memory comes from a single 128 GB CAMM2 module running at 6,400 MT/s, while storage consists of two 1 TB Gen5 SSDs configured in RAID 0. The 18-inch QHD+ display runs at 2560 x 1600 and 120 Hz, covers 100% of the DCI-P3 color space and contributes to a minimum chassis weight of 7.17 lb.

Nvidia's case for displacing Dell rests partly on RTX Spark's shared memory, which can accommodate AI models exceeding Dell's 24 GB graphics capacity. However, Spark's shared memory delivers about 300 GB/s of bandwidth, compared with 896 GB/s for Dell's RTX PRO 5000. Spark also has 6,144 CUDA cores, fewer than Dell's 10,496. To overtake Dell, an RTX Spark laptop must beat its token-generation rates for Phi, Mistral and Llama 3 under the same UL Procyon tests. Matching those results while consuming 45 W to 80 W of chip power could also improve battery endurance beyond Dell's recorded three hours and 39 minutes.

Editor's Summary Dell's Pro Max 18 Plus remains the fastest AI laptop in current rankings, but Nvidia's RTX Spark launch on October 16, 2026, could challenge that position. Dell's top configuration has risen from $9,245.52 at launch to almost $18,600 after 14 months, while RTX Spark promises 128 GB shared memory and higher local model capacity. The outcome will depend on performance under the same UL Procyon tests, not model capacity alone.