Intel ARC graphics cards take on NVIDIA, AMD Radeon GPUs! Can do gaming and editing

Intel is now jumping into a game where NVIDIA and AMD have defined the rules. After making a splash with the Iris Xe graphics on thin and light ultrabooks, the new ARC series of graphics cards offer a step-up in performance for those who need more. The ARC series has a wide range of mobile GPUs on offer, and Intel has currently launched only the entry-level ARC 3 GPUs; the ARC 5 and ARC 7 GPUs will arrive later in the year.

In general, the Intel ARC graphics bring native support for DirectX 12, XeSS super sampling, and dedicated ray-tracing hardware; not to forget increased performance in comparison to Iris Xe graphics. The ARC 3 cards are meant for basic editing and casual gaming purposes, while the ARC 5 and ARC 7 are meant for professional apps and hardcore gaming purposes.

Intel ARC graphics to offer more performance

As part of the new lineup, the ARC 3 series graphics cards consists of the A350M with six Xe cores and A370M with eight Xe cores, with higher power range of up to 50W max and 25W minimum. These cards come with 4GB of GDDR6 memory and 64-bit Memory Bus width. The ARC 5 series has the A550M that comes with 16 Xe cores and up to 8GB GDRR6 VRAM, and up to 80W power range. The ARC 7 is the most powerful lineup, with the A730M having 24 Xe cores and A770M having 32 Xe cores. The A770M has a power raying of up to 150W and has up to 16GB VRAM.

But the most important question we all have is whether the new ARC GPU are more powerful than NVIDIA’s RTX 30 series cards, or less capable? Intel has only shared data for the ARC 3 graphics cards and it says they are better than the integrated Iris Xe graphics. No comparison has been drawn yet with rivals from NVIDIA and AMD yet, or even Apple’s M1 chip.

The graphs promise 1080p gaming of up to 90 fps on popular titles such as Fortnite, GTA 5, Rocket League and Valorant. More demanding games such as Hitman 3, Doom Eternal F1 2021 and The Witcher are said to offer 1080p gaming slightly above 60 fps on combination of Medium to High settings.