ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger OC “Battlemage” Graphics Card Review – 10 GB Vs 8 GB RTX 4060 For $80 US Less

Gaming Benchmarks (VULKAN)

Intel entered the discrete graphics card market two years ago with its Alchemist architecture. The launch was highly anticipated, as the company entered a market dominated by NVIDIA and AMD for decades. But not everything went as planned.

Intel's Arc A-series "Alchemist" graphics cards launched after much delay & even a delayed launch couldn't help the blue team's case as it was plagued with severe driver issues, software problems, and general gaming issues. This left a sour note in the minds of folks who had been waiting to see what Intel had to offer.

Following the launch, there were several rumors that Intel would eventually cancel its discrete graphics card lineup but one good thing that came out of the GPU division was the software team which worked day and night to optimize applications and games. The Fine Wine story for Intel has been witnessed by our very eyes and Arc also saw some significant price drops in the coming months approaching the sub $300 US segment with 16 GB of VRAM.

But despite all of that, the competition went on to release their next-gen offerings. This time, Intel is the first in line to offer a next-gen product ahead of the mainstream launches that are planned for the first half of next year. Meet the 2nd Generation Arc family codenamed Battlemage or the B-Series.

The Intel Arc Battlemage lineup addresses the most significant problems within the first-gen Arc architecture, all the while focusing on enhanced support for modern APIs and that with a range of new features. Today, Intel is launching the Arc B570, its second 2nd Gen Battlemage graphics card and it starts at $219 US. We test out the ASRock Challenger OC variant of the B570 graphics card.

At ITT 2024, Intel squashed all rumors around the cancelation or delay of its GPU and Arc lineup. Tom Petersen gave one of the most charged presentations during the event which was centered around the next-generation Xe2 architecture. Starting with the details, Intel is making things simpler, and instead of using LP, LPG, HP, and HPG naming schemes, the company is simply calling its next-gen lineup Xe2. Internally, these chips will still feature these codenames but it won't be used for the client side anymore.

Some of the goals with Xe2 for Intel were to achieve higher utilization, improved work distribution, and less software overhead. It is a design from the ground up and has fixed several major issues that were noticed with Xe "Alchemist" GPUs. Right off the bat, Intel wowed the audiences with an IP performance efficiency chart that shows gains of up to 12.5x which are quite significant and we have this deep dive to showcase what is Xe2 and how Intel is achieving these gains.

Intel states that the Xe2 architecture, just like Xe, is highly scalable which will lead to its integration within low-power mobile SOCs such as Lunar Lake and up to higher-end Arc graphics cards with discrete options that come out later.

Intel Xe2 Architectural Deep-Dive

So beginning our deep-dive, the second generation Xe core or Xe2 comes with several compute resources that are repartitioned into native SIMD16 engines for increased efficiency.

The Xe2 core features:

• 8 512-bit Vector Engines
• 8 2048-bit XMX Engines
• 64b atomic ops support
• 192KB Shared L1$/SLM

The Vector Engine has also been updated which includes:

• SIMD16 native ALUs - Support for SIMD16 and SIMD32 ops
• Xe Matrix Extensions (Support for INT2, INT4, INT8, FP16, BF16)
• Extended Math & FP64 - Transcendentals: SIN, COS, LOG, EXP
• 3-way co-issue - FP + INT/EM + XMX

The Xe Matrix Engines or XMX units were also present on Alchemist "Xe" GPUs but what has changed now is that they support more data types and run much faster with FP16 rated at 2048 OPS/clock & INT8 rated at 4096 OPS/clock.

With those two out of the way, let's see how these new engines stack within the Xe2 render slice which are the fundamental blocks of the Xe2 GPU. These Render slices can be stacked and scaled as needed and are optimized to reduce latency, remove stalls, and improve HW/SW handshake. These Render Slices are connected to a Command Front End which natively supports Execute Indirect.

The render slice also includes a new Geometry engine with 3x vertex fetch throughput and 3x mesh shading performance (with vertex re-use), new L1$/SLM cache for out-of-order sampling (with compressed textures), 2x throughput for sampling without filtering & Programmable offsets, a new HiZ unit which has 50% more cache and supports Early HiZ culling of small primitives. Lastly, there are two new Pixel Backends which offer twice the blending throughput, a 33% increase in pixel color cache, and renders the target pre-fetch to L2$.

Xe2's Latest Ray Tracing Unit Improves Upon Xe1

A major block of the Xe2 core is its RTU (Ray Tracing Unit) which features 3 traversal pipelines, 18 box intersections (6 per Box intersection & 3 boxes per RTU), and 2 triangle intersections.

So that's the low-level summary of Intel's Xe2 GPU architecture which offers:

• 2nd Gen Xe2 Cores
• Enhanced Vector Engines
• Deeper Caches
• New XMX Engines
• Performance & Efficiency - Optimized front-end
• Native hardware support for exectue indirect commands
• Larger Ray Tracing Units

Overall, Intel's Xe2 GPU architecture is designed to be more compatible with games and achieve higher utilization. The new Execute Indirect block is used by games to accelerate draw calls and gaining a 12.5x jump bodes well for gamers since it is used by engines such as Unreal Engine a lot.

Intel Lunar Lake Gets The First Xe2 GPU IP, Full Deep-Dive of Integrated Xe2

The first product to feature Xe2 GPUs is Lunar Lake and it comes in the integrated configuration. Several blocks within Lunar Lake are tied to the GPU  such as the Media Engine and the Display Engine.

Before we get into those, let's talk about the Xe2 configuration for Lunar Lake:

• 8 Xe2 Cores
• 64 Vector Engines
• 2 Geometry Pipelines
• 8 Samplers
• 4 Pixel backends
• 8 ray-tracing units
• 8 MB L2$

The Lunar Lake Xe2 GPU features 8 Xe2 cores and each Xe2 core has 8 XMX and 8 Vector units, a Load/Store unit, a Thread Sorting Unit, and a dedicated L1/L$ cache. Each of these four Xe2 cores makes a single Render Slice.

So how does this all scale in terms of performance compared to Meteor Lake's Xe GPU. Intel states that the Xe2 GPUs achieved 50% higher performance at ISO and significantly lower power with the same performance.

The XMX block is also a significant portion that sees the influx of 67 peak INT8 TOPS which adds to the overall AI prowess offered by the Lunar Lake CPUs. The chip in total offers 120 platform TOPS which include 48 TOPS from the NPU4 and 5 TOPS from the CPU itself.

Xe Display Engine For Lunar Lake

Now we shift from the GPU to the other blocks on the Lunar Lake CPU itself, starting with the Display Engine. The Display Engine comes with 3 Display Pipes with up to 8K60 HDR support, up to 3x 4K60 HDR support, and up to 1080p360 or 1440p360 support. The display engine supports HDMI 2.1, DisplayPort 2.1, and the new eDP 1.5 capabilities.

The front end of the Display Engine includes Decode/Decrypt and a Streaming Buffer Zone. For the pixel processing pipeline, you are getting 6 planes per pipeline with hardware support for color conversion and composition while being flexible & power efficient.

There's also an additional Low-Power optimized pipeline with Panel Replay (power gating during idle frames) and a new Brightness sensor with LACE (Local Adaptive Contrast Enhancement). On the compression and encoding side, you get a display stream compression engine with 31 visually lossless compressions and transport encoding (stream encoding for HDMI and DisplayPort protocols). Router and Ports include Stream assembly and Port Routing with up to 4 ports supported for added flexibility.

Coming back to eDP (eDisplayPort) 1.5 with Panel Replay, it's being referred to as an evolution of panel self-refresh with selective updates with early transport and adaptive sync support. The new display capability offers reducer Judder and improved playback while offering higher power efficiency.

Xe Media Engine For Lunar Lake - VVC Support, Side-Cache & Better Encoding

The last block of the Lunar Lake SOC that is connected to the Xe2 GPU is the Media Engine which now comes with its own dedicated 8 MB of shared side cache. This new cache can be used by the rest of the chip but there's no need for it since the rest of the cores have a dedicated cache themselves.

This side-cache allows Lunar Lake a lot of bandwidth savings since there's reduced traffic to system memory across media workloads. This also allows significant power reductions for encode workloads.

Diving into the Media Engine, it supports up to 8k60 10-bit HDR decode, up to 8k60 10-bit HDR encode, AVC, VP9, H.265 HEVC, AV1 and a brand new VVC engine. The VVC engine significantly reduces bitrate while delivering the same quality as AV1 (up to 10% file size reduction). It also supports Adaptive Resolution Streaming and Screen content coding.

And lastly, we have the Windows GPU software stack which is ready for Xe2 GPUs. Intel said that it spent a lot of time tuning the API-level performance of its Alchemist "Xe" GPUs, especially DX9, but all of that software work is moving over to Xe2 with support of all the latest APIs and Frameworks along with their runtimes.

That wraps things up for Xe2, a brand new graphics architecture that brings huge performance improvements, the latest feature sets, and a lot more to both integrated solutions such as Lunar Lake and discrete options with the upcoming Arc Battlemage lineup.

Starting with the details of the Xe2-based BMG-G21 SoC, the chip features a maximum of five render slices which include four Xe2 cores each for a total of 20 Xe2 cores. Each Xe2 core has 8 512-bit vector engines, 8 2048-bit XMX engines, 64b atomic ops support, and an upgraded 256KB L1$/SLM cache. The Xe2 cores also include a dedicated RT (Ray Tracing) unit, and each render slice carries four Sampler, Geometry, Rasterizer, HiZ, and two Pixel Backend blocks.

The BMG-G21 SoC measures 272mm2 and features a total of 19.6 million transistors, making it 33% smaller than the Alchemist ACM-G10 die which featured 21.7 million transistors. The chip itself has been fabricated on the TSMC 5nm (N5) process node.

According to Intel, the Battlemage BMG-G21 discrete GPU offers an incredible 70% performance improvement per Xe core and a 50% performance per watt uplift versus the prior generation. The updated Xe2 IP leads to lower execution time versus the Alchemist architecture, allowing for better utilization of the silicon and faster performance than its predecessors. So, with the architecture bits out of the way, let's start with the hardware.

Today, Intel is announcing two variants of its Battlemage B-Series lineup, the Arc B580 and the Arc B570. Both of these chips are based on the same BMG-G21 SoC with slightly different specs & price points.

Intel Arc B580 GPU Specifications - 20 Xe2 Cores & 12 GB VRAM

The Intel Arc B580 graphics card is the top offering for now, with up to 20 Xe2 cores packed in 5 render slices with 20 RT units, 160 XMX AI Engines, and a clock speed of up to 2670 MHz. The card includes 12 GB of GDDR6 memory running across a 192-bit interface and offers a bandwidth of up to 456 GB/s.

The card has a peak TBP of 190W and is powered by a single 8-pin connector and uses a PCIe 4.0 x8 interface. The GPU supports all the latest HW acceleration engines such as AV1, HEVC, AVC, VP9, and XAVC-H and comes with three DP2.1 (UHBR13.5) & one HDMI 2.1 output.

Intel Arc B570 GPU Specifications - 18 Xe2 Cores & 10 GB VRAM

The second card is the Intel Arc B570 which features 18 Xe2 cores with 5 render slices, 18 RT units, 144 XMX AI Engines, a clock speed of up to 2500 MHz, 10 GB of GDDR6 memory running across a 160-bit interface, and a peak bandwidth of 380 GB/s. The card comes with a 150W TBP and has the same connectivity specs as the B580.

Intel Arc B580 & B570 "Battlemage" GPU Performance

In terms of performance, the Intel Arc B580 is claimed to be 24% faster than the Arc A750 on average, which is a decent uplift considering the Arc A750 was priced at the same $249 price. Meanwhile, compared to the competition, the Intel Arc B580 is said to be 10% faster than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060, which sells for around $50 US more while featuring 8 GB VRAM.

Other comparative points made by Intel include a look at both raster and ray tracing performance versus the competition from NVIDIA (RTX 4060) and AMD (RX 7600). The Arc B580 offers up to 32% faster rasterization performance at a lower price point while delivering faster RT performance than the competition.

The extra VRAM does help Intel's case of marketing this as a 1440p card. With 10+ GB VRAM, the Arc B580 and B570 graphics cards can enable faster performance when running at higher texture quality or RT quality. Intel offering higher VRAM to gamers at mainstream prices is a solid move to attract the gaming masses who have been waiting to upgrade to higher VRAM options in the sub $250 US segment.

Arc B580 For $249 & Arc B570 For $219

As for availability, the Intel Arc B580 will retail for $249 US on the 13th of December with various options to select from, including a Limited Edition flavor, while the Intel Arc B570 will be available starting 16th January 2025 for $219 US on a wide variety of custom models.

The Intel Arc B580 "Battlemage" Limited Edition graphics card features a brand new cooling and shroud design with a dual-slot and dual-fan form factor, offering solid performance outside the box, increased airflow, and whisper-quiet operation while offering overclocking capabilities beyond 3 GHz.

Intel Arc Battlemage GPU Lineup

GPU Name	Arc B580	Arc B570
Family	Battlemage B-Series	Battlemage B-Series
Process	TSMC 5nm	TSMC 5nm
Die	272mm2	272mm2
Transistors	19.6 Million	19.6 Million
Cores	20 Xe2	18 Xe2
RT Units	20 RTU	18 RTU
XMX Engines	160	144
Clock Speed	2670 MHz	2500 MHz
VRAM	12 GB GDDR6	10 GB GDDR6
Memory Bus	192-bit	160-bit
Bandwidth	456 GB/s	380 GB/s
TBP	190W	150W
Connector	1x 8-Pin	1x 8-Pin
Interface	PCIe 4.0 x8	PCIe 4.0 x8
Price	$249	$219
Launch	13th December 2024	16th January 2025

The ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger OC graphics card comes in a standard cardboard package with black and purple hues.

The front of the package has a picture of the graphics card along with various labels such as XeSS, XMX support, and the OC Edition design which means that the card comes witha  clock speed bump out of the box.

Inside the package, you will find the graphics card wrapped in anti-static cover and that's about it.

The ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger OC is a very compact solution and looks nice with its dual-slot and dual-fan design.

After the package is taken care of, I can finally start talking about the card itself. The ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger OC adopts an all-black color scheme which looks fantastic. Only the logos on the black are colored white.

The graphics card is a compact variant in terms of size and weighs 720 grams. The card measures 249x132x41mm and takes up 2 slots worth of space for installation.

The cooling shroud extends beyond the PCB and the card being a SFF-compliant design makes it easy to install in almost all cases and even ITX form factors.

The back of the card features a solid backplate with a black color tone.

The ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger OC graphics card features the new Striped Axial Fan which has a total of 11 blades and comes with a Stripe structure to increase airflow. There are two of these fans on the card.

ASRock also features 0db fan technology on the fans. This feature won’t spin the fans on the card unless they reach a certain threshold.

I am back at talking about the full-coverage backplate that the card uses. The whole plate is made of metal and feels very nice. The brushed matte-black finish on the backplate gives a unique aesthetic. The graphics card also comes with a compact PCB design which means that the shroud, heatsink, and backplate are all extended beyond the PCB. The second fan blows air through the heatsink and blows it out from the cutouts that are situated at the very end of the backplate.

With the outside of the card done, I will now start taking a glance at what's beneath the hood of the graphics cards. The first thing to catch my eye is the large fin stack that's part of the heatsink that this card utilizes.

The large fin stack runs from the front and to the back of the PCB and is so thick that you can barely see through it.

Talking about the heatsink, there are two blocks of aluminum fins that are interconnected by three heat pipes running through the copper base plate and heading out toward the dual heatsink blocks.

There are several heat pads included for the VRMs and memory chips. They are full-sized, making full contact with the components to offer stable and efficient heat transfer. The card is powered by a single 8-pin connector.

Underneath the shroud, we get a better look at the heatsink which utilizes ASRock's high-density metal welding design for improved heat dissipation.

The contact base is a nickel-plated design that has three copper heat pipes leading to the center that make direct contact with the GPU.

As for the PCB, ASRock is using its high-end Super Alloy components which include SPS Power Stages, Japanese SP-Caps, Premium Power chokes, & a 2oz copper PCB with a high-density glass fabric design. The PCB features five memory sites for a total of 10 GB VRAM and the large BMG "Battlemage" G21 GPU can be spotted in the center. There's space for an additional DRAM but that's reserved for the higher-end Arc B580 models since the PCB is the same for both cards.

I/O on the graphics card sticks with the reference scheme which includes three Display Port 2.1 (UHBR 13.5/10) & a single HDMI 2.1 port. The card also uses a PCIe 4.0 x8 interface.

We used the following test system for comparison between the different graphics cards. The latest drivers that were available at the time of testing were used by AMD and NVIDIA on an updated version of Windows 11. All tested games were patched to the latest version for better performance optimization for NVIDIA and AMD GPUs.

The Wccftech Test Bench

CPU	Intel Core i9-13900K @ 5.0 GHz
Motherboard	MSI MEG Z790 ACE
Video Cards	ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger OC Intel Arc B580 Limited Edition GALAX GeForce RTX 4070 OC 2X (GDDR6) NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER FE MSI RTX 4070 Ti Gaming X NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER ASRock Radeon RX 7800 XT Phantom Gaming ASUS GeForce RTX 4070 Ti TUF Gaming NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 FE NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti FE MSI GeForce RTX 4060 Ti Gaming X Trio GALAX GeForce RTX 4060 Ti EX Gamer PNY GeForce RTX 4060 Ti Dual MSI GeForce RTX 3080 SUPRIM X MSI GeForce RTX 3070 Ti SUPRIM X MSI GeForce RTX 3070 Gaming X Trio MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Ti Gaming X MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Gaming X MSI GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Lightning MSI Radeon RX 6950 XT Gaming X Trio MSI Radeon RX 6900 XT Gaming Z Trio MSI Radeon RX 6800 XT Gaming X Trio MSI Radeon RX 6650 XT Gaming X
Memory	G.SKILL Trident Z5 RGB Series 32GB (2 X 16GB) CL38 7200 Mbps
Storage	Teamgroup T-Force A440 Pro 2 TB Gen 4
Power Supply	MSI MEG Ai1300P 1300W PSU
OS	Windows 11 64-bit
Drivers	AMD Radeon Adrenalin Edition 24.2.1 NVIDIA GeForce 560.81 WHQL Intel Driver 6256

• All games were tested at 3840x2160 (4K) resolution.
• Image Quality and graphics configurations are provided with each game description.
• The "reference" cards are the stock configs except where mentioned otherwise.

Speed Way

Developed with input from AMD, Intel, NVIDIA, and other leading technology companies, Speed Way is an ideal benchmark for comparing the DirectX 12 Ultimate performance of the latest graphics cards. 3DMark Speed Way’s engine is assembled to demonstrate what the latest DirectX API brings to ray-traced gaming, using DirectX Raytracing tier 1.1 for real-time global illumination and real-time raytraced reflections, coupled with new performance optimizations like Mesh Shaders.

Firestrike

Firestrike is running the DX11 API and is still a good measure of GPU scaling performance. In this test, we ran the Extreme and Ultra versions of Firestrike which runs at 1440p and 4K and we recorded the Graphics Score only since the Physics and combined are not pertinent to this review.

Time Spy

Time Spy is running the DX12 API and we used it in the same manner as Firestrike Extreme where we only recorded the Graphics Score as the Physics score is recording the CPU performance and isn't important to the testing we are doing here.

Port Royal

Port Royal is another great tool in the 3DMark suite, but this one is 100% targeting Ray Tracing performance. It loads up ray-traced shadows, reflections, and global illumination to tax the performance of the graphics cards that either have hardware-based or software-based ray-tracing support.

Doom Eternal

DOOM Eternal brings hell to earth with the Vulkan-powered IDTech 7.  We test this game using the Ultra Nightmare Preset and follow our in-game benchmarking to stay as consistent as possible.

Red Dead Redemption 2

Developed by Rockstar San Diego, Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of the most visually stunning open-world games I've played to date that is backed up by a rich story set around the protagonist, Arthur Morgan. The game is based on the RAGE engine which features an insane amount of graphics fidelity but also requires a lot of power to run maxed out. For this test, we set the graphics settings to Ultra with AA turned disabled.

Wolfenstein: Youngblood

Wolfenstein is back in The New Colossus and features the most fast-paced, gory, and brutal FPS action ever! The game once again puts us back in the Nazi-controlled world as BJ Blazkowicz. Set during an alternate future where Nazis won the World War, the game shows that it can be fun and can be brutal to the player and to the enemy too. Powering the new title is, once again, id Tech 6 which is much acclaimed after the success that DOOM has become. In a way, ID has regained its glorious FPS roots and is slaying with every new title.

Alan Wake 2

Alan Wake 2 sets you up in a horror thriller that takes place between two dimensions and lets you play better two different protagonists, Alan himself and Saga, who once again have to find a way to fix the darkness that erupted in Bright Falls.

Atomic Heart

Atomic Heart is set in an alternate universe where the Soviet Union achieved incredible technological breakthroughs thanks to a scientist named Dr. Sechenov, who invented a liquid programmable module called Polymer that links robots in a so-called Kollektiv network.

Battlefield V

Battlefield V brings back the action of the World War 2 shooter genre. Using the latest Frostbite tech, the game does a good job of looking gorgeous in all ways possible. From the open-world environments to the intense and gun-blazing action, this multiplayer and single-player FPS title is one of the best-looking Battlefields to date.

Baldur's Gate III

2023's GOTY is well-deserved its title. The creation from Larian Studios is a turn-based RPG that has gorgeous interiors and exteriors shown through a bird's eye top-to-bottom view. You can sink in countless hours in the game and if you're a fan of the D&D playstyle, then this epic is just for you.

Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk 2077 is an action role-playing video game developed by CD Projekt Red and published by CD Projekt. The story takes place in Night City, an open world set in the Cyberpunk universe. Players assume the first-person perspective of a customizable mercenary known as V, who can acquire skills in hacking and machinery with options for melee and ranged combat. The game uses CD Projekt Red's in-house Red Engine which is one of the most visually breathtaking and also one of the most graphics-intensive engines designed to date.

Dead Space (Remake)

Remaking Dead Space was a bold choice but I would say that the team at EA Motive nailed every bit and piece of this horror classic. The remake makes the USG Ishimura twice as scarily beautiful. The gore, the endless corridors of terror, the void of space, all of it looks incredible while the game remains true to its core to the original Dead Space formula. Modern cards can run the game well but it can also be demanding if you crank the settings to the max with ray tracing enabled.

Death Stranding

Sam Porter Bridges has delivered one of PS4's most anticipated games to the PC community and opened a whole new world of possibilities. This was the first game to feature the Decima Engine on PC and unarguably did it the best. Death Stranding may not feature ray tracing effects, but it does showcase that DLSS can be used effectively even when RT isn't around. We tested this one just like we did in our launch coverage with DLSS enabled.

Forza Horizon 5

Forza Horizon 5 carries on the open-world racing tradition of the Horizon series.  The latest DX12-powered entry is beautifully crafted, amazingly well executed, and a great showcase of DX12 games.  We use the benchmark run while having all of the settings set to non-dynamic with an uncapped framerate to gather these results.

Halo Infinite (DX12 Highest)

Next up, we have the latest entry in the Halo franchise, Halo: Infinite, which uses the brand new Slipspace engine (although there are rumors it will be ditched in the future for Unreal Engine) based on the DX12 API. The game rocks some incredible environments for Master Chief to visit on the Halo ring.

Hitman III (DX12 Highest Settings)

Hitman III is the highly acclaimed sequel to the 2016 Hitman & 2018 Hitman II, which was a redesign and reimaging of the game from the ground up. With a focus on stealth gameplay through various missions, the game once again lets you play as Agent 47. The game runs on the IO Interactive Glacier 2 engine which has been updated to deliver amazing visuals and environments on each level while making use of DirectX 12 API.

Metro Exodus

Metro Exodus continues Artyom's journey through Russia's nuclear wasteland and its surroundings. This time, you are set over the Metro, going through various regions and different environments. The game is one of the premier titles to feature NVIDIA’s RTX technology and does well in showcasing the ray-tracing effects in all corners.

Resident Evil Village

Resident Evil Village is the latest in the horror franchise that was wonderfully rekindled with RE7 and onto the RE2 Remake. But now the RE Engine is back and better than ever with Ray Traced Reflections and Lighting that makes the world just come to life, unironically. The game was tested in the center of the village itself with all graphical settings maxed out and with raytracing enabled.

Resident Evil IV Remake

The remake of the beloved and highly acclaimed Resident Evi IV is here, boasting the latest RE engine which adds stunning visuals and even better ray tracing effects, the game looks just as incredible as it plays.

Starfield

Bethesda's latest RPG epic is set in space and takes place across a vast universe, filled with lots of planets to explore. Based on the latest iteration of the Creation Engine, Starfield offers a great amount of visual fidelity, whether you are exploring an abandoned base or just roaming a planet on which you just laid your foot.

No graphics card review is complete without evaluating its temperatures and thermal load.

Intel's second Battlemage graphics card has finally launched and just like the Arc B570, it delivers great performance and value for mainstream gamers. Designed for 1440p audiences with its 10GB VRAM, the card also works superbly at 1080p resolution, really pushing those frame rates at or above 60 FPS in major AAA titles.

The Battlemage architecture has brought two key features, improved ray tracing performance and added frame-generation support. These are the staples of the current generation of gaming. With the higher RT capabilities, you can get a good RT experience at a budget price while the XeSS frame-gen support means that you can further push the performance up in a range of titles that support the said feature.

In terms of overall performance, the Intel Arc B570 still trades blows with the RTX 4060 but ends up faster than the AMD options in the same price range.

This makes it a compelling option since you are getting more VRAM capacity than the 4060 while staying ahead in a handful of titles. The lowest price RTX 4060s still retails for $300 US so you're better off getting an Arc B580 and still saving $50 US. Getting the Arc B570 saves you $80 which can go into other components such as faster memory or a better CPU which can give your system more lifetime when upgrading to a better GPU in the future. Also, with reports of the RTX 5060 and RX 9060 sticking to 8 GB, the 10 GB VRAM on the Arc B570 sounds much better and we have already seen some games not even supporting 8 GB VRAM cards.

 

In terms of design, the ASRock Intel Arc B570 Challenger is a very compact graphics card, rocking the dual-slot and dual-fan design in a sleek black design with excellent cooling and it even rocks a traditional 8-pin connector so no 16-pin connector fuss with this card. The graphics card does come with a PCI Express 4.0 x8 interface which is enough for a product of this tier. Maybe we'll see Gen5 or x16 lane used on a higher-end variant in the future.

The biggest update that Battlemage brings with it is a stronger software suite and driver support. We encountered no major issues with the Arc B570 throughout our testing. The GPU software ran great and Intel should be applauded for its commitment to the software side for the Arc family. In addition to that, the Battlemage family brings with its XeSS2 support with technologies such as frame generation and low-latency modes which will soon be enabled in a range of AAA games. It's not only discrete GPUs but the integrated Xe2 family that will take advantage of these features & that's a big plus for PC gamers and handheld/mobility users.

The things we loved about the Intel Arc B570 graphics card:

• Great Value
• Good Cooling Solution From ASRock
• 10 GB VRAM
• Great Performance at 1080p, and even does well at 1440p
• XeSS2 support with frame-gen & low-latency mode
• HDMI 2.1 & DP 2.1 Support
• Driver & software support significantly improved

Things that we would have liked to see:

• Idle & average power could be lower
• More games with XeSS2 support
• A $199 US price point would've made it a killer product

While the Intel Arc B570 might be overshadowed by the Arc B580 and its also stunning value, for users on a tight budget, the new graphics card delivers another compelling budget option with a great 10 GB VRAM. With no mainstream options from the competition in sight for the next few months, the Arc Battlemage lineup has all it needs to become a budget PC builder delight. We'll have to see if NVIDIA and AMD can offer the same value with their next-gen offerings.

 

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