Intel Arc Alchemist flagship GPU could be a match for Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti

Intel’s Arc Alchemist flagship graphics card could rival the performance of Nvidia’s RTX 3070 Ti, if a fresh leaked benchmark is anything to go by.

The SiSoftware benchmark, as spotted by prolific Twitter leaker Tum_Apisak (via VideoCardz), shows that the Intel desktop GPU scored 9,017 Mpix/s compared to 8,369 Mpix/s for the 3070 Ti, meaning that the former is almost 8% quicker. In individual compute tests, both cards win two categories apiece, so it’s a split decision when breaking things down in that manner (Team Blue won in the double-float and quad-float tests).

While this is just a single benchmark result – and we must be cautious about whether it is genuine, as ever with the rumor mill – it does suggest that the Arc Alchemist GPU will be in the ballpark of the RTX 3070 Ti’s performance.

What’s also spilled here is the purported spec of the Alchemist graphics card, which is 512 EUs (4,096 cores) as previously rumored, with a clock speed of 2.1GHz (it’s not clear whether that’s base clock or boost). As for VRAM, SiSoftware shows 12.8GB, but doubtless that’s not reporting correctly, and the memory loadout will likely also be as previously speculated – 16GB.

Analysis: Yet more evidence to be hopeful for the Arc flagship

None of this represents confirmation of any specs, of course, but the evidence is certainly getting weightier now, with all this backing up what the rumor mill has previously asserted.

In terms of expected performance, Intel pitching the flagship Arc Alchemist graphics card at the level of the RTX 3070 or thereabouts is what the GPU grapevine insisted was the case some time ago now (ever since the Xe card, codenamed DG2, was first powered on). Although now it seems we might get something slightly better than that in terms of a challenger for the 3070 Ti, but of course, these Nvidia cards are in the same ballpark, and we can’t presume to read much into a single benchmark (particularly not a leaked one).

The question remains: when will we actually see this flagship GPU appear? And of course the others for that matter – Intel’s budget Alchemist GPU could be the really crucial one, especially when you look at the seeming flop which AMD’s new supposedly wallet-friendly RDNA 2 GPU has turned out to be (at least at launch). We desperately need new GPU blood at the lower-end of the market, and an offering from Intel should (hopefully) help shore things up alongside Nvidia’s RTX 3050 (which is due imminently).

Intel has consistently said to expect the first Arc Alchemist card in Q1 2022, so March at the latest in theory, and benchmark leaks like this are a good sign that things are readying up. However, a recent change to Intel’s website whereby the mention of a ‘Q1’ launch was removed in several places has led to some doubt that the release could slip to Q2 (maybe April), perhaps.

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