By the first quarter of 2022, Intel Arc graphics products based on gaming-first Codename Alchemist SoCs will be available from global partners in desktops and notebooks. This was revealed in a video posted on the company’s website.
Intel has been developing its next-generation discrete graphics card series using the Xe-HPG microarchitecture for quite some time.
Xe-HPG has been dubbed DG2 and, most recently, Alchemist by those keeping track. The official brand name for the new scalable graphics solutions has been unveiled by Intel: Arc.
According to Intel, the Arc branding will span numerous generations, with Alchemist being followed by Battlemage, Celestial, and Druid. The business claims that first-generation Arc graphics cards, like the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 and Radeon RX 6000 families, would fully support DirectX 12 and make use of hardware-based ray tracing. In addition, Arc will use artificial intelligence to deliver Intel’s take on supersampling (i.e., NVIDIA DLSS and AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution).
Intel vice president and general manager of Client Graphics Products and Solutions, Roger Chandler, reveals as follows:
“We have teams doing incredible work to ensure we deliver first-class and frictionless experiences when these products are available early next year.” He added.
As previously reported, the first-generation Arc graphics cards (Alchemist) will be available in the first quarter of 2022, and we anticipate learning more about them tomorrow during Intel’s Architecture Day.
We don’t know if Intel will reveal any details regarding the Alchemist graphics cards’ performance. Still, prior rumors imply flagship SKUs with up to 512 execution units might compete with the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti.
If that story is true, and Intel can meet gamers’ demands – something NVIDIA and AMD are now unable to do – the Arc brand might surprise everyone next year.
