Intel’s Arc alchemists are built on the chipmaker TSMC’s N6 nodes. It’s a new edition of the N7 node used on AMD RX 6000 graphics cards. Xe HPG is Xe core which features up to the mark of 16 vector units and 16 Xe Matrix Execution Units(XMX). The Intel Arc GPU combines four Xe cores into a render slice. This also adds up to the L1 cache. These slices are what will separate various Arc Alchemists. The arc is based on Intel Xe-HPG microarchitecture. This is specifically designed for advanced graphics processing. This provides you with performance, efficiency, and scalability for gamers and creators. Typically, Xe cores on an HPG chip will contain 256-bit Vector Engines and 1024-bit Matrix Engines to accelerate workloads.
Real-time Ray Tracing or Rasterization:
This technology makes 3D movies more stunning. The Intel Arc Graphics suite comprises Xe Supersampling or HDR and VDR support. Ray tracing refers to the method for simulating how light behaves and light paths getting traced by each pixel. It allows super realistic shading, reflections, refractions, and shadows in a traditional rasterization graphics pipeline.
Let’s deep dive into ray-tracing technology:
Take an example of Ghostwire: Tokyo is a great example of ray-tracing with loads of lights. It offers persistent and crisp images with the help of screen space reflections. This technology deals with ray divergence and combines rays to maximize utilization of Xe-Cores.
XeSS Supersampling:
Intel XeSS or Xe Super Sampling is basically an upscaling feature of Intel Arc Alchemist Graphics Cards. This technology works by rendering your game at a lower resolution and then upscaling it using machine learning and dedicated AI hardware. This helps in improving performance while maintaining as much quality as possible. XeSS works on the basis of NVIDIA’s Deep Learning SuperSampling(DLSS). The key difference is that Intel XeSS supports graphics cards from a range of vendors conversely, DLSS is limited to Nvidia Graphics Cards. The Intel Arc technology is likely to perform better due to the advanced upscaling model. This is also boosted by Xe Matrix Extension(XMX) AI Cores. Intel XeSS has competition from NVIDIA DLSS and AMD FSR, but it looks to combine both pieces of tech under a single roof. The XeSS technology supports both Intel and third-party graphics cards.
XeSS doesn’t have compatibility with FSR. It covers a lot more ground compared to NVIDIA DLSS technology. You get XeSS through a plugin in Unreal Engine that makes it easy for developers to implement different game scenarios. Alongside ray-tracing, Intel Arc GPU technology offers TAA to smooth the image after it has been scaled. XeSS can run smoothly on dedicated XMX cores or general hardware supporting DP4a instruction. DLSS technology can also run on true tensor cores such as 30-series and 40-series graphics cards.
How Does Intel XeSS Work?
XeSS isn’t too complicated to understand. Instead of running a game at native resolution, it takes various inputs from the game at low resolution. The XeSS upscaling engine includes an AI model to boost upscaling. It takes the game’s depth, motion, color, and lightning inputs.
Let’s explore the list of Intel XeSS games:
- Chivalry II
- Death Stranding: Director’s Cut
- DioField Chronicle
- Dolmen
- Ghostbusters Spirits Unleashed
- Ghostwire Tokyo
- Gotham Knights
- Hitman III
- Naraka: Bladepoint
- Redout 2
- Shadow of The Tomb Raider
- Super People
- The Riftbreaker
- The Settlers
Deep Link Technology:
One of the most significant potentials of intel arc is its deep link technology. A deep link is an AI-powered software that combines integrated and discrete GPUs to handle resource-intensive tasks smoothly. It guarantees to manage extra workloads on less hardware capacity.
Thanks to effective power sharing, technology drove through the feature of dynamic power sharing. This allotted more power and thermal resources to the CPU when the GPU runs idle. Typically, Intel claims that CPUs can experience up to a 20% increase in performance with the help of Dynamic Power Sharing.
Bottom Line:
Undoubtedly, the Intel Arc GPU powers up your gaming with ultra-advanced graphics. With the functions like AI-based editing, hardware-enabled processing, real-time ray tracing, integrated graphics technology, and so on. Besides gaming, you can perform various resource-intensive tasks like editing, designing, video streaming, etc.