Well slap my backplate and call me CUDA, because not only are Intel’s Arc Battlemage graphics cards not dead – having once been mired in production trouble rumours – but they’ve got names and are out from next week. The CPU makers’ second batch of dedicated gaming GPUs (following the decent budget-end Alchemist series) will comprise the Arc B580, releasing December 13th at $249, and the Arc B570, which arrives on January 16th from $219.
These prices tell us that Battlemage will, as Alchemist did, attempt to bite into the sub-$250 slice of gaming GPU market share pie that Nvidia and AMD seem content to leave uneaten. This time, however, Intel say they’re aiming for speedy 1440p play, which would suggest a huge performance upgrade over 1080p-focused Alchemist models like the Arc A750. “Best-in-class performance-per-dollar”, no less, according to the marketing bumf.
To that end, the Arc B580 and Arc B570 will come packing more VRAM – 12GB and 10GB respectively – and support for XeSS 2. This is new version of Intel’s upscaler that includes a DLSS 3/FSR 3-style frame generation feature, generating inserting interpolated frames “using optical flow and motion vector reprojection”. Nice? I think? With all the bells and whistles running, XeSS 2 can supposedly multiply framerate output by by 3.9x, though I’d wait to see this in action before slapping down money for a pre-order. Democratising the advantages of frame generation is a noble goal in the face of Nvidia keeping DLSS 3 support for only its latest RTX 40 series GPUs, but FSR 3 has never quite matched it on visual quality or input lag management. Thus, grudgingly, we must accept some truth in the idea that frame gen needs very specific, cutting-edge hardware to work comfortably.
Anyway, I’m more interested in straight-up, traditionally rendered framerates, and specifically whether Intel really can pull off a proper 60fps@1440p card – or two – at such a low price. Or, as we would have said in 2016 or so, a price. The last few years have seen GPU costs rise, yet the GPU themselves sometimes struggling to keep up with the ever-increasing demands of high fidelity games, to the extent that you can easily end up dropping £500/$500 or more to get a truly capable Quad HD engine. We probably can’t expect the Arc B580 to knock the RTX 4070 Super off its premium perch, but given the dearth of compelling options in the lower budget ranges, I’m certainly willing to watch it take a shot.
In other graphics card news, Nvidia are widely expected to reveal the GeForce RTX 5090 at Las Vegas’ CES show in early January. It will probably cost more than $219. Just a bit.