It has been a long time since we’ve seen a low end GPU market that offers good products, Intel says they are here to the rescue and promise much. With a good price to performance ratio and better features, they seem to be a good option to go for at this point in time especially if you are still on an old card such as the RX 470 or the GTX 1060.
So the code-name for the new GPU generation from Intel is “Battlemage” and the main selling point is supposed to be the best-in-class performance-per-dollar. I guess somebody finally figured out that a lot of money could be made in this entry level segment in which AMD and Nvidia are ripping customers off.
Release date has been revealed as well, the B580 will hit the market on December 13th, the B570 will come next year, will be avaliable from January 16th.
Specs
There are at the moment 2 announced GPUs, a ARC B580 and it’s trimmed down version, the ARC B570 with less Xe-cores, memory and RT cores.
| ARC B580 | ARC B570 | |
|---|---|---|
| Xe-cores | 20 | 18 |
| Shaders | 2,560 | 2,304 |
| XMX Cores | 160 | 144 |
| RT Cores | 20 | 18 |
| Maximum frequency | 2,850MHz | 2,750MHz |
| VRAM | 12 GB GDDR6 192-bit | 10GB GDRR6 160-bit |
| Bandwith | 456Gbps | 380Gbps |
| TDP | 190W | 150W |
| Price | starts from $250 | starts from $220 |
Performance
Let’s jump right in the most important thing about the GPUs and that is the performance that Intel is claiming. As this is their benchmark data, should be taken with a grain of salt as the real peformance numbers will be avaliable after the release.
First compared to the last gen flagship A750 card, the new B580 is on average 24% faster which is a great generation leap that has to be said.
Then compared to the competitors in this price range, in this case RTX 4060, it is 10% faster on average. While this gap seems to be small, it has to be said that the 4060 is a terrible card, first because of the price of around $320 at the moment and the dealbreaker part that has only 8 GB of VRAM which renders this card absolete in many new AAA games.
I think these numbers look really good and not a lot of people expected this kind of a generation gain, but since this is just the 2nd generation of this architecture, it is obvious there were a lot of places where it was room for improvement and fixes.
Raytracing
Raytracing seems to be also quite strong compared to the GPU options in this price range, the RX 7600 gets obliterated and the 4060 is not too far from that either.
They’ve also compared these new GPUs with the old 1060 and the 1660 Super. While the differences are huge, it is something that should be considered normal since the 1060 is very old at this point. Intel is tho aware there are a lot of gamers that are still stuck on such GPUs because all the current options are too expensive for what they offer and here they are letting them know B580 would be a great upgrade.
Architecture
The Intel Arc B-Series GPUs use Intel’s latest Xe2 architecture, optimized to deliver improved efficiency and higher performance per core with less software overhead. Second-generation Xe-cores deliver the solid compute capabilities required for modern workloads and include high-performance XMX AI engines. New Xe-cores are supported by more capable ray tracing units, better mesh shading performance and improved support of key graphics functions to significantly increase performance efficiency with the latest game engines.
XSS 2
Apart from the gains from the improved architecture, they’ve also made great steps in frame generation technology. The XSS 2 is a sort of a Nvidia’s DLSS equivalent, aimed to increase the FPS at minimal visual cost.
XSS 2 now features three advanced technologies: XSS Super Resolution, XSS Frame Generation, and X Low Latency.
- XSS Super Resolution: The core technology from the first-generation XSS, offering AI-based upscaling for over two years and now supporting more than 150 games.
- XSS Frame Generation: A new AI-driven feature that generates interpolated frames using optical flow and motion vector reprojection, ensuring smoother gameplay.
- X Low Latency: A cutting-edge integration with game engines that enhances responsiveness to players’ inputs.
When all three technologies are enabled, XSS 2 can boost frames-per-second output by up to 3.9x, delivering exceptional performance in demanding AAA titles.
AIB Partners
Intel doesn’t have many popular AIB partners, but if they find success with the new generations, likes of Sapphire, ASUS or MSI might join as a AIB partner.
Are these GPUs worth buying in current market?
To put it simply, it is hard to tell at this moment of time when the cards are not yet on the market and all we have is their claimed performance.
If the numbers are going to be as stated and price won’t be blown out of proportions by the AIB partners, it definitely would be a great buy because they really do have a very solid performance-per-dollar and features.
PC Gamers that are still stuck on old GPUs such as a RX 580, GTX 1060, GTX 1660 should seriously consider the B580 as an upgrade. Not only they will recieve a huge perfomance increase, they will also get the new features, most notably the Raytracing and the XSS2.
Some reviewers are stating that they are not really blown away by the value and that the new generation from AMD and Nvidia will probably level the playing field, but in my opinion this is far away, like really far away, because the new generation always starts with the flagship release and then we go down to the entry level and we might get next gen entry level cards around Q3 or Q4 of 2025.
With the more game compatibility compared to the last generation, that also shouldn’t be a factor anymore when considering Intel’s GPUs.
All in all, I’m very happy to see some real competiton brought to the entry level market, this will expose the anti consumer tactics from AMD and Nvidia even more. B580 looks very similiar to what once RX 480 was, a cheap and capable GPU that aged very well. I wish a lot of success to Intel and I might join the team blue once again.
In case you would rather get something from the existing GPU offers, feel free to check out this article about the options in each price bracket:
