Right - show me an ambiently-cooled Intel laptop with the same performance as a MacBook Air M1, available for purchase in the market, metric-for-metric. It doesn’t exist.
But laptops shouldn’t need to draw 35 watts minimum. If it can’t scale down when idle I think I’d pass.
https://twitter.com/tomwarren/status/1478514671980269574
It doesn’t show the new Intel processors going below about 30 watts.
Then again I kind of doubt the M1 Max chips can’t get below 20 W.