One of the reasons many of us expect Intel’s Intel Xe to launch as dedicated graphics cards is simply because of the duopoly between NVIDIA and AMD in this market. The appearance of a third player could therefore disrupt the graphics card market. Of course, for this the new participant must be competitive. Well, it looks like Intel Xe DG2 GPUs don’t perform very well in Geekbench.
Intel Xe DG2 disappoints on Geekbench
We must clarify that the results do not match the desktop version of the Intel Xe DG2, which will also be known as the Intel Xe-HPG. But we are talking about a reference obtained from its version for laptops, which we learned a short time ago, in particular the 256 EU configuration, which will be sold in gaming laptops with the version of the Intel processor Alder Lake for laptops.
But what was the result and why was it so disappointing? While waiting to see the final drivers and the final version of this graphics card. It is surprising that in the Geekbench test based on OpenCL, which measures the computing power of the GPU. The result obtained by the Intel Xe DG2 GPU with 256 EU at 1.4 GHz is 18450 points. A score that places this model at levels close to a GeForce GTX 1050, which is today considered among NVIDIA GPUs as an entry-level graphics card. On the other hand, the version with 96 UE at 1.2 GHz obtained 6500 points under the same benchmark.
The results are disappointing when you take into account that the latest rumors suggest that the Intel Xe DG2 from 512 EU will compete with the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti and RTX 3070. Fortunately, as we have already mentioned before, this does not. is not a benchmark run Final version of Intel’s dedicated GPU. So there is hope for improved performance in the version that will be included in gaming laptops.
Are we doomed to an NVIDIA-AMD duopoly in gaming GPUs?
There is no doubt that Intel intends to reach the gaming GPU market with its Intel Xe-HPG range, based on its Xe-DG2 architecture, but it is a very competitive market where the fact that your graphics card does not reach the expected performance. means it’s less valuable, which translates to a lower selling price and much lower margins.
The PC gaming hardware market is very lucrative, but it is both very competitive and requires high levels of investment due to the strong competition. A third participant, even the almighty Intel, must have a product up to the task if it is not to be part of the huge collection of cadaver companies in the gaming graphics card market.
In any case, not all fish are sold, it is better to wait for the launch of the new Intel GPUs to be able to judge their performance in games.