Intel Arc series unveiled with the Alchemist dGPU to arrive in Q1 2022

[Angilion]

They may only be rumours but the longer this is delayed the more it is likely. The hangmans axe may be at the top but its moving slowly down. It must be costing them money in not getting it released and the PR is not good I wouldnt be surprised if this all comes to nothing. If thats a sample of the card going into volume production it looks awful like the outer casing is made out of thin bendy black plastic.

Would it matter if it was? The outer casing of a graphics card shouldn't be under any significant physical load.

I think Intel will dribble small quantities of Alchemist out. It's not competitive and they know it. But I don't think Intel will cancel Arc. I think Intel are committed to the architecture for the future. There's a big market for a massively parallel processor architecture and Arc is Intel's go at it. Their first swing has missed, but they're going to have to go to bat again. They can't keep selling x86 and nothing else and remain in the top tier forever. I think they'll try to learn from Alchemist and try to keep the Arc name kind of known and have another go with Battlemage. Hopefully they'll have realised in time that drivers matter and a last minute under-resourced cobbled together rewrite of notoriously bad iGPU drivers really doesn't cut it for dGPUs.

 

[varkanoid]

Would it matter if it was? The outer casing of a graphics card shouldn't be under any significant physical load.

Aesthetics is everything to a lot of people on this forum. Its the whole point of a clear side panel. You just have to look at the proud pictures people show off of their innards.

It looks like a black lego brick tile with two bright blue lights in the middle. Thats the best they could come up with after all this time ? Its def a card to be shut away in an OEM builders PC for sure.

 

[arknor]

Aesthetics is everything to a lot of people on this forum. Its the whole point of a clear side panel. You just have to look at the proud pictures people show off of their innards.

It looks like a black lego brick tile with two bright blue lights in the middle. Thats the best they could come up with after all this time ? Its def a card to be shut away in an OEM builders PC for sure.

have you seen nvidia FE cards?

 

[Angilion]

Aesthetics is everything to a lot of people on this forum. Its the whole point of a clear side panel. You just have to look at the proud pictures people show off of their innards.

It looks like a black lego brick tile with two bright blue lights in the middle. Thats the best they could come up with after all this time ? Its def a card to be shut away in an OEM builders PC for sure.

I'd rather they cared about functionality than whatever happens to be the idea of fashion this week. Maybe next week that card will be fashionable. For a week or two. As one fashion designer said, fashion is a thing so ugly that it has to be changed frequently.

I'd rather have a plain black box than a multicoloured splodge or swirl or whatever. I don't care much either way, but I have a slight preference for not faffing about with stuff that has nothing to do with functionality. I'd definitely rather have development resources allocated to functionality rather than paying a boatload of money to some people to decide what shape a swirly splodge should be and how many colours can be splattered onto it and how much extra they can charge people for it.

I understand that some people care about their PC looking pretty, but there's no telling what they'd consider pretty. Whatever the appearance is, some people will like it and some won't.

 

[Yaayuh!]

RgB eVerYtHinG!

 

[RavenXXX2]

 

[Freddie1980]

If MLID continues to spread FUD and/or malicious content doesn't he risk getting sued or perhaps having Youtube close his channel down?

 

[arknor]

If MLID continues to spread FUD and/or malicious content doesn't he risk getting sued or perhaps having Youtube close his channel down?

someone should aszk the SEC to investigate him

 

[Grim5]

If MLID continues to spread FUD and/or malicious content doesn't he risk getting sued or perhaps having Youtube close his channel down?

Clearly not because every other channel like this is still up even the ones that have been sued are up

 

[Hotwired]

If MLID continues to spread FUD and/or malicious content doesn't he risk getting sued or perhaps having Youtube close his channel down?

At best it's a rumour mongering leak bait entertainment channel. You'd have to give him some respect to sue him for his waffling.

 

[Jono8]

Seems like madness for them to quit when they are 80% of the way there.

They must be in some real trouble to have pumped in that amount of cash only to "cut their losses" at this point.

Can they even pick up their research at a later date? It's prolly all obsolete in a few years.

What a waste.

I guess, if they know it can't compete with the already established competition at a price that will make any sort of profit, what is the point?

 

[ltron]

If MLID continues to spread FUD and/or malicious content doesn't he risk getting sued or perhaps having Youtube close his channel down?

I fear he will be proved correct so Intel has no motivation to sue him. There may be a token release of some cards but it will all be smoke and mirrors.

 

[varkanoid]

have you seen nvidia FE cards?

if you mean the 3xxx cards

Yes they are absolutely stunning I had 2 of them.

 

[varkanoid]

I'd rather they cared about functionality than whatever happens to be the idea of fashion this week. Maybe next week that card will be fashionable. For a week or two. As one fashion designer said, fashion is a thing so ugly that it has to be changed frequently.

I'd rather have a plain black box than a multicoloured splodge or swirl or whatever. I don't care much either way, but I have a slight preference for not faffing about with stuff that has nothing to do with functionality. I'd definitely rather have development resources allocated to functionality rather than paying a boatload of money to some people to decide what shape a swirly splodge should be and how many colours can be splattered onto it and how much extra they can charge people for it.

I understand that some people care about their PC looking pretty, but there's no telling what they'd consider pretty. Whatever the appearance is, some people will like it and some won't.

understand what you are saying but this is a flagship launch, the first of a new range. I couldnt see Tesla or Porsche launching a new car and putting it in bin bag plastic. If Intel want to impress to sell that aint it.

 

[arknor]

understand what you are saying but this is a flagship launch, the first of a new range. I couldnt see Tesla or Porsche launching a new car and putting it in bin bag plastic. If Intel want to impress to sell that aint it.

is this the card from your sig?

Aesthetics is everything to a lot of people on this forum. Its the whole point of a clear side panel. You just have to look at the proud pictures people show off of their innards.

cos it looks like someone slapped some cheap chinese cheese plastic on it then whacked it in a microwave until it started to melt

 

[humbug]

I think that ^^^ looks better than this.

Honestly this looks like someone crossed out PNY and wrote EVGA on it in crayon, it looks cheap, and whats with the lipstick on the end of it? Did they think "Oh... VW Golf GTI, a cult classic, lets do that"

 

[varkanoid]

is this the card from your sig?




cos it looks like someone slapped some cheap chinese cheese plastic on it then whacked it in a microwave until it started to melt

no need to be offensive although I dont see your description at all. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I didnt buy it for the looks apart from the go faster stripes, everyone knows red ones go faster.

 

[arknor]

I didnt buy it for the looks

Then why complain so much about intels cards looking like bricks

 

[varkanoid]

Then why complain so much about intels cards looking like bricks

because it does. Never mind you dont get it.

 

[Angilion]

I guess, if they know it can't compete with the already established competition at a price that will make any sort of profit, what is the point?

That might be true for Arc Alchemist, but Intel can't afford to bin Arc entirely. Not if they want to remain a major player in the industry. The Arc project isn't just (probably not even mainly) about graphics cards for PC gaming. There are bigger markets now for massively parallel processors. Alchemist is even worse for those markets, but Intel has nothing that fits apart from Arc. Intel's choices are either develop Arc into something that can compete in those markets, develop an entirely new architecture from scratch to compete in those markets or give up on entering those markets. I think they'll go with developing Arc.

Graphics cards for PC gaming matter for two reasons. Firstly, there's profit in them. Secondly, there's publicity and brand recognition in them. So there is a point in Intel selling Arc graphics cards as graphics cards for PC gaming. Although maybe not specifically Arc Alchemist because it doesn't seem to be up to the job. So I think they'll do Alchemist on a small scale, partly to get the Arc brand name out there to some extent and partly to aid development of the next generation of Arc (Battlemage). Alchemist has taught Intel some valuable lessons on what they've done wrong. Well, it should have done. Maybe Intel will have properly functional drivers by the time Battlemage is ready, for example.