Intel reveals Xe-HPG graphics architecture and manufacturing at TSMC

During Intel’s Architecture Day 2021, a cavalcade of news will be delivered, where perhaps most interesting are further details about Intel’s first graphics card – Arc. The graphics card is based on the Xe architecture, which has already been introduced integrated into Intel’s processors. It was about the Xe-LP (Low Power) variant, while the game-oriented use the upscale Xe-HPG (High Performance Gaming) variant.

The first graphics circuit goes by the name Alchemist (formerly DG2) and has in its full-featured version 512 vector units and 512 matrix units, the latter called Xe Matrix Extensions. These are divided into 8 so-called Render Slice, which are the building blocks Intel can use to produce other circuits with more or fewer computing units. The vector units are those that are often called Execution Units (EU) alternatively calculation units, where previous reports claimed that Alchemist should get just 512 pieces.

Each Render Slice houses 4 Xe cores, which house 16 vector units with a 256-bit width, 16 matrix units of 1,024 bits, Load / Store and L1-level cache. There are also four pieces here ray tracingunits and functions for sampling, geometry and rasterization. Here, Intel is careful to point out that all features provide full support for DirectX 12 Ultimate.

Intel does not specifically mention any performance figures, but still makes an interesting comparison with Xe-LP, which is integrated in the company’s processors. Intel’s flagship for laptops, Intel Core i7-1185G7, has 96 computing units of architecture Xe-LP at up to 1.35 GHz and with Xe-HPG the ceiling is raised by 50 percent. The result should thus be somewhere around 2.0 GHz.

The Xe-LP architecture was also Intel’s first sharp attempt at Xe, which the company had time to optimize when developing Xe-HPG. In terms of energy efficiency, Intel is talking about 50 percent higher clock frequencies at the same power consumption. The measurement is probably made at an optimal level of the frequency curve, where the efficiency gradually decreases as the clock frequencies are increased.

Intel also takes the opportunity to confirm that the production of Alchemist does not take place in its own factories, without the help of TSMC. The choice of manufacturing technology is not TSMC’s most modern 5 nanometers, but 6 nanometers which is a refined variant of 7 nanometers with higher transistor density, performance and energy efficiency.

The first graphics cards from the Alchemist generation will be launched in the first quarter of 2022. Intel also presents the plans for the coming years, where Battlemage is next in line, followed by Celestial and Druid.

Read more about Intel Xe-HPG and Arc “Alchemist”: