Intel Arc ‘Alchemist’ Graphics Cards: A Lost Generation?

The slow debut, patchy (practically only in Asia with the A380 model) and not free from major software problems of desktop video cards 1st generation Intel Arccode name Alchemist, is something that is now there for all to see. To make the situation worse, the arrival in the next period of the new generation of AMD and NVIDIA with GPUs ready to take a further step forward in performance.

As if the understandable doubts about competitiveness weren’t enough, they arrive new indiscretions from Igor’s Lab that they throw further shadows on Intel’s offering and its strategypainting a scenario for Alchemist GPUs that – putting it crudely – is “dead man walking“, to be sentenced to death.

Companies operating in the video card sector (from manufacturers to AIB partners, up to resellers), are currently facing a problem: on the market there are too many GPUs to dispose of, an important inventory of products. This means that there is a lot of firm capital, potential money that must be made to bear. A situation that, according to Igor’s Lab, “leaves little financial space for experiments like the market launch of a new line of video cards “.

Il second problemclosely related to the former, is that Intel would have suggested to AIB partners to forgo retail and “focus on system integrators and OEM customers“A business that, by its very nature, would guarantee smaller margins than retail. This, coupled with the fact that Intel would not offer advantageous terms in terms of purchase price, RMA and other aspects, would have meant that there wouldn’t be many companies interested in marketing PCs with Arc GPUs.

The absence of a commercial outlet, in turn, would be impacting the interest of potential AIB partners, who would find no sense in bringing Intel’s GPUs to the market. “I also wonder what may have prompted ASRock to give up its status as AMD’s exclusive AIB partner”, is the consideration that can be read on Igor’s Lab.

Finally, the site reports that a “big” partner would have even completely stopped production of Intel cards for “quality problems“unspecified (useless to speculate, it could be anything).

Based on what we have seen so far and based on these rumors, the first generation of Arc video cards may almost not appear on the market, unless Intel decides to change strategy drastically. Even so, though, there would remain the problem of effective competitiveness with the new range of AMD and NVIDIA solutions. In short, the Alchemist range could be configured as the “lost generation”.