Image Credit – Intel
Intel has just lowered the price of their ARC A750 GPU to $249, while simultaneously releasing updated drivers that improve performance in older games.
ARC has a had a rocky start, and rumors still circulate of its impending doom. Considering the high costs of Nvidia and AMD offerings right now, no one in their right mind would want to reduce competition in the GPU market. The days of getting a $200 card that plays every game at Ultra settings at 1080P are behind us at least according to AMD and Nvidia. Intel however, is appealing to the value minded gamer with the A750 GPU by claiming 52% better performance per dollar than a RTX 3060. Of course, that is loaded with a number caveats and fine print. Independent testing several months ago typically put the A750 a little slower than the RTX 3060 at 1080P, and neck and neck at 1440P.
A quick check at New Egg (USA) shows the least expensive RTX 3060 8GB costing $329, while the ARC A750 is indeed only $249 for the Intel model. That’s not too shabby for a GPU that can output 120FPS at 1080P in Spider-Man Remastered at high settings (per Hardware Unboxed – Link).
Aside from the price cut, Intel has gone back and reworked their DX9 drivers, and is now claiming a substantial performance improvement. Intel claims that CS:GO gets up to a 77% boost in performance on the high-end, and Guild Wars 2 gets a 10% boost on the low end. Half-Life 2, a game that debuted in 2004, got a 71% performance jump.
You can check out Intel’s press release by clicking HERE..
Reaction: I’m happy to see Intel taking this seriously, as I was around the FIRST time Intel tried their hand in the dedicated GPU market with the I740 graphics cards in 1998. They gave up pretty quick. At $250, the A750 a hell of a deal for these expensive times.
On a different note, Half-Life 2 is almost 20 years old. That’s a bit of a kick in the gut. I remember when it came out new and everyone HATED Steam. I’m pretty sure I played it the first time on a system that would now be considered retro. AMD Athlon 2600XP, ATI Radeon 9800PRO, and Windows XP 32bit.
