techspot Intel Arc GPUs off to a very bad start

[UltraMega]

Quote

Our own Steve Walton recently looked at the entry-level Arc 3 A380, the only card in the series released so far—and it's only available in China. The card is expected to cost somewhere between $120 to $130, making it one of the cheapest new GPUs out there, but the results do suggest a 'get what you pay for' scenario. And that's being generous: the 5-year-old RX 570 that was originally $170 outperforms it.

 

Are Intel Arc graphics cards dead on arrival?

WWW.TECHSPOT.COM

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Igor Wallossek of Igor's Lab writes that he has spoken to some dealers, potential distributors, and manufacturers in the European area about Intel's Arc cards, and there...

 

Finally, a 1050Ti replacement... kinda... 

 

TLDR: As I understand it, there are two main reasons these new GPUs are struggling so much. One, Intel took a unique architecture approach that can be described as Intel going wide where competitors go tall, or vice versa. And the second reason being that, in part due to their unique architecture, the drivers and game optimization is down right terrible. Intel vastly underestimated the complexity of driver implementation, and they are realizing that they're years behind and offer no incentive to devs to optimize for their hardware. I think Intel will keep pressing on until they get it right, but it could be several years before they get there. 

[ENTERPRISE]

2 hours ago, UltraMega said:

 

Are Intel Arc graphics cards dead on arrival?

WWW.TECHSPOT.COM

---

Igor Wallossek of Igor's Lab writes that he has spoken to some dealers, potential distributors, and manufacturers in the European area about Intel's Arc cards, and there...

 

Finally, a 1050Ti replacement... kinda... 

 

TLDR: As I understand it, there are two main reasons these new GPUs are struggling so much. One, Intel took a unique architecture approach that can be described as Intel going wide where competitors go tall, or vice versa. And the second reason being that, in part due to their unique architecture, the drivers and game optimization is down right terrible. Intel vastly underestimated the complexity of driver implementation, and they are realizing that they're years behind and offer no incentive to devs to optimize for their hardware. I think Intel will keep pressing on until they get it right, but it could be several years before they get there. 

For these exact reasons. The first gen was NEVER going to be particularly competitive, even at entry level. It is going to take a while for drivers to mature and be better adopted by devs. Anyone who was thinking Intel was going to bring any hurt, is going to be disappointed. I will revisit Intel at 3rd/4th gen as I reckon we will see performance uptick by that time.

[UltraMega]

12 minutes ago, ENTERPRISE said:

For these exact reasons. The first gen was NEVER going to be particularly competitive, even at entry level. It is going to take a while for drivers to mature and be better adopted by devs. Anyone who was thinking Intel was going to bring any hurt, is going to be disappointed. I will revisit Intel at 3rd/4th gen as I reckon we will see performance uptick by that time.

Isn't this technically their second gen? I thought the DG1 was basically the gen1 beta. You'd also think they would be more prepared from having so many iGPUs out in the wild but I guess this goes to show how neglected their iGPU driver have also been. 

[pio]

I'm going to be a little bit of an outlier here I think, but it looks promising to me.  It's comparable to the RX 6400, which is also an entry level GPU, which that's what the A380 is too (supposedly).  Sounds like they need some more work on the drivers, but that's to be expected on a brand new card, even from Nvidia or AMD.  I dunno, I'm still kind of excited to see another player in the GPU market, so I'll be optimistic.   

 

Then again, I'm perfectly happy with the RX 6400's performance for where it is in the lineup too.  A low end "1080p / low / medium" gaming card doing exactly what its advertised to do.  Seems the A380 is similar.  I don't understand the complaints here honestly.  Let's not forget that the RX 570 and the GTX 1660 that they're trying to compare it to, or even the 1050Ti.....those weren't "low end" cards, they were mid to higher end cards from years past.  That's not entirely fair, but the A380 is doing a decent job keeping up too though.

 

It's like trying to game on a GT 210 waaaay back in the day.  Or an 8400GS, or a HD5450.  Except this time, you can actually expect to have a playable experience at 1080p / low or medium.  The writer of this article needs to go read up on what a "low end" card actually is.  Horribly misleading title, and bias included in the entire article.  Of course an RX 570 or GTX 1660 is faster.  The fact that this card can even attempt to keep up is absolutely fantastic.

 

EDIT:  I also noticed that the A380 has higher 1% minimums than the other cards mentioned in a lot of the tests.  This means a smoother gameplay.  Something people don't talk about with the RX 6400 and 6500 cards either.  Yeah, the 570 and 580 are faster on average, but the newer cards give a smoother gaming experience.

Edited August 5, 2022 by pioneerisloud

[schuck6566]

a better comparison choice would be with the new Nvidia GTX1630 that's costing between $160-$200 with these kinda specs :

 

 

 

 

At least they'd be comparing in close to the same price range for "new" cards (I use the term loosely regarding the nvidia card... "

Edited August 5, 2022 by schuck6566

[UltraMega]

1 hour ago, schuck6566 said:

a better comparison choice would be with the new Nvidia GTX1630 that's costing between $160-$200 with these kinda specs :

 

 

 

 

At least they'd be comparing in close to the same price range for "new" cards (I use the term loosely regarding the nvidia card... "

The AMD 6400 goes for $170. 6500 for $190. 

 

2 hours ago, pioneerisloud said:

I'm going to be a little bit of an outlier here I think, but it looks promising to me.  It's comparable to the RX 6400, which is also an entry level GPU, which that's what the A380 is too (supposedly).  Sounds like they need some more work on the drivers, but that's to be expected on a brand new card, even from Nvidia or AMD.  I dunno, I'm still kind of excited to see another player in the GPU market, so I'll be optimistic.   

 

Then again, I'm perfectly happy with the RX 6400's performance for where it is in the lineup too.  A low end "1080p / low / medium" gaming card doing exactly what its advertised to do.  Seems the A380 is similar.  I don't understand the complaints here honestly.  Let's not forget that the RX 570 and the GTX 1660 that they're trying to compare it to, or even the 1050Ti.....those weren't "low end" cards, they were mid to higher end cards from years past.  That's not entirely fair, but the A380 is doing a decent job keeping up too though.

 

It's like trying to game on a GT 210 waaaay back in the day.  Or an 8400GS, or a HD5450.  Except this time, you can actually expect to have a playable experience at 1080p / low or medium.  The writer of this article needs to go read up on what a "low end" card actually is.  Horribly misleading title, and bias included in the entire article.  Of course an RX 570 or GTX 1660 is faster.  The fact that this card can even attempt to keep up is absolutely fantastic.

 

EDIT:  I also noticed that the A380 has higher 1% minimums than the other cards mentioned in a lot of the tests.  This means a smoother gameplay.  Something people don't talk about with the RX 6400 and 6500 cards either.  Yeah, the 570 and 580 are faster on average, but the newer cards give a smoother gaming experience.

If you follow some of the details about their driver struggles I think you will find the situation to be far worse than simple growing pains.

 

Keep in mind the 6400 has less ram and uses less power than the arc gpu, and it still beats it by a lot.

Edited August 5, 2022 by UltraMega

[pio]

7 hours ago, schuck6566 said:

a better comparison choice would be with the new Nvidia GTX1630 that's costing between $160-$200 with these kinda specs :

 

 

 

 

At least they'd be comparing in close to the same price range for "new" cards (I use the term loosely regarding the nvidia card... "

Very good point.  I didn't know about the 1630.  I was thinking also the 1030 over the 1050Ti as another example, but yeah, you got what I meant.   

 

 

5 hours ago, UltraMega said:

The AMD 6400 goes for $170. 6500 for $190. 

 

If you follow some of the details about their driver struggles I think you will find the situation to be far worse than simple growing pains.

 

Keep in mind the 6400 has less ram and uses less power than the arc gpu, and it still beats it by a lot.

Agreed about the driver struggles.  I don't think Intel was QUITE ready on that front.  It's one thing to create a new bit of hardware, its an entirely different beast to try to make it work right with every single possible title out there.

 

And yeah, there's the VRAM thing, but still.....the A380 is within margin of error there with the 6400.  It's a really close race between those two, and the A380 is cheaper by quite a bit.....with early release drivers that Intel clearly wasn't ready for.  I think Intel might actually have something promising here.

[ENTERPRISE]

On 04/08/2022 at 20:43, UltraMega said:

Isn't this technically their second gen? I thought the DG1 was basically the gen1 beta. You'd also think they would be more prepared from having so many iGPUs out in the wild but I guess this goes to show how neglected their iGPU driver have also been. 

 

That is true, I had completely forgot about the DG1 ! 

 

I still look forward to Intel bringing the competition when they can, a third real contester would be great in the GPU space, hell we could do with a third in the CPU space. 

[schuck6566]

3 hours ago, ENTERPRISE said:

 

That is true, I had completely forgot about the DG1 ! 

 

I still look forward to Intel bringing the competition when they can, a third real contester would be great in the GPU space, hell we could do with a third in the CPU space. 

(sigh) Intel & Nvidia have been trying to cut each others throats for years now,Nvidia with them trying for a decent x86/64 cpu and intel with a decent graphics chip. It will be nice if either can manage to really get a strong competing chip into the party. Nvidia's Tegra line didn't do so well for consumer use, BUT the Grace line might put some pressure on server side cpu's. " https://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-outs-grace-cpu-superchip-arm-server-lineup-ships-in-early-2023 "

 

[Lancer VI]

I don't care how bad it is. Please, dear God; keep trying Intel. The space desperately needs a 3rd player.

 

Where are Matrox, 3dfx, S3, Rendition, Chromatic Research, Cirrus Logic when you need them? Seriously?

[Sir Beregond]

41 minutes ago, Lancer VI said:

I don't care how bad it is. Please, dear God; keep trying Intel. The space desperately needs a 3rd player.

 

Where are Matrox, 3dfx, S3, Rendition, Chromatic Research, Cirrus Logic when you need them? Seriously?

Exactly. Of course the drivers are going to suck first go around. Hope they keep at it.