Intel Graphics, with its latest Graphics Drivers 31.0.101.3222, changed the coverage of its latest driver updates. The company would be providing game optimizations and regular driver updates only for its Gen12 (Iris Xe), and Arc "Alchemist" graphics products. Support for Gen9, Gen9.5, and Gen11 iGPUs integrated with 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th generations of Intel processors, namely "Skylake," "Kaby Lake," "Coffee Lake," "Ice Lake," and "Cascade Lake," will be relegated to a separate, quarterly driver update cycle, which only covers critical updates and security vulnerabilities, but not game optimizations.

Intel's regular Graphics Driver cycle that includes Day-0 optimizations timed with new game releases, will only cover the Gen12 Xe iGPUs found in 11th Gen "Tiger Lake," "Rocket Lake," and 12th Gen "Alder Lake" processors; besides the DG1 Iris Xe graphics card; and Arc "Alchemist" discrete GPUs. Version 31.0.101.3222 appears to be a transitioning point, and so it has drivers from both branches included within a 1.1 GB package (the main branch supporting game optimizations for new GPUs, and the legacy branch for the older iGPUs). You can grab this driver from here.

Intel has been working with its partners to release the Intel Iris Xe DG1 GPU for use in prebuilt computers. ASUS is one of these partners along with GUNNIR who have both announced versions of the card. The ASUS DG1 was the first of these cards to release as part of the "Gamer Xtreme Gaming Desktop" from CyberPowerPC in May. The ASUS DG1 found in that system has recently been tested by ETA PRIME in various games and synthetic benchmarks. The DG1 is only compatible with select motherboards so the card was tested with the Intel Core i5-11400F and ASUS PRIME H410M-A/CSM motherboard included in the computer.

The ASUS DG1 features 80 Execution Units for 640 shading units running at a speed of 1.5 GHz, along with 4 GB of LPDDR4X memory running at 4266 MHz. The card only draws 30 W so features a fully passive design with no additional power connectors. The ASUS DG1 scored 1630 points in the 3DMark Time Spy test, 5837 points in Fires Strike, and 21313 points in Night Raid. The card was also tested in a variety of games including Forza Horizon 4, Injustice, Overwatch where it managed 1080p low 60 FPS performance. These performance numbers are comparable to a Radeon HD 7870 or a GTX 760 while drawing significantly less power. You can view the complete video from ETA PRIME testing the card below.

Chinese manufacturer GUNNIR has recently announced their "Blue Halberd" Iris Xe DG1 graphics card a few months after Intel announced the discrete GPU. GUNNIR joins ASUS in releasing the only two discrete Iris Xe graphics cards based on the DG1 GPU however, these products are only available to OEM and general retail availability is unlikely. The low-profile GPU features a single HDMI and VGA connector along with a 45 mm fan which will keep the 30 W TDP card cool. The card comes with a base frequency of 1.2 GHz and a boost clock of 1.5 GHz while the 4 GB of LPDDR4X memory is clocked at 4267 MT/s.

The discrete GPU market has been a duopoly for quite some time, and when Intel announced that the company is rebooting plans for its discrete GPU lineup, another player was about to break that duopoly. Today, that has been changed forever and Intel has officially become the third manufacturer of discrete GPUs, as we can see on the online listing. On BestBuy, CyberPowerPC has listed "Gamer Xtreme Gaming Desktop" powered exclusively by Intel components. When it comes to the CPU choice, Intel's 6C/12T Core i5-11400F CPU model is present without iGPU. Now comes the interesting part. The GPU powering the system is Intel Iris Xe discrete graphics card, which is a DG1 GPU based on Xe-LP SKU.

This model features 80 EUs, resulting in 640 shading units. While this is not any gaming beast, casual 1080p gaming should be just fine on this configuration. The system is listed for 750 US Dollars, and it is sold out, as of the time of writing this. While the performance of this configuration may not be something monumental, it is an important step towards Intel's inclusion in the discrete GPU market. By using OEMs, the GPU will reach a very large market without any major problems. We are waiting to see the first reviews of the system, which will surely take a good look at the card and examine its performance.

Intel has partnered with ASUS and Colorful to design and launch Intel Iris Xe discrete desktop graphics cards. The two new DG1 boards are targeted towards mainstream users and small to medium-size businesses. The cards will only be available to system integrators who will offer Iris Xe discrete graphics as part of pre-built systems.

These new desktop cards follow the launch of Intel Iris Xe MAX for notebooks, including many of the same features and specifications. The cards feature 80 execution units and 4 GB of LPDDR4X video memory which is 16 execution units less than the notebook version however we are unsure of what clock speed they will be running at. The desktop cards also feature the same three display outputs, hardware video decode and encode acceleration, including AV1 decode support, VESA Adaptive Sync, and Display HDR support along with artificial intelligence capabilities.

Update Jan 28th: Colorful has recently published an official statement clarifying that they will not be releasing an Intel Iris Xe Desktop Graphics Card, this means that Intel's other launch partner is currently unknown.

Intel has apparently begun shipment of its discrete Iris Xe LP-based DG1 graphics card to OEMs and system integrators, which means we will soon see these graphics cards hitting the market - in a manner of speaking. The quantities aren't yet known, but considering Intel's intentions of only shipping it to OEMs, volume shouldn't be quite significant. It remains to be seen whether DG1-toting systems will even be available to the general public, or if these will be sold primarily to business customers. However, considering that the discrete DG1 only offers entry-level performance due to its 80 EUs (less than even the 96 available through integrated graphics on Intel Tiger Lake CPUs), hopes placed on this particular graphics card as somewhat remedying the current industry ailment of undersupply won't materialize.

One interesting tidbit, however, is that system integrators will have to use specific hardware on the systems they build that carry Intel's DG1, as the blue giant has specified that these graphics cards will only work pending specific firmware updates that enable them to function on certain chipset and processor products. Namely, and according to Intel speaking to Legit Reviews, "The Iris Xe discrete add-in card will be paired with 9th gen (Coffee Lake-S) and 10th gen (Comet Lake-S) Intel Core desktop processors and Intel B460, H410, B365, and H310C chipset-based motherboards and sold as part of pre-built systems. These motherboards require a special BIOS that supports Intel Iris Xe, so the cards won't be compatible with other systems."

Intel's first discrete gaming graphics card based on the Xe-HPG graphics architecture, will be built on a TSMC 7 nanometer silicon fabrication node, according to a Reuters report citing sources "familiar with the matter." The first such discrete GPU is being referred to internally by Intel as the DG2. Recent reports suggest that Intel will give the DG2 formidable specs, such as 4,096 unified shaders across 512 execution units, and 8 GB of GDDR6 video memory. Back in 2020, the company launched the DG1 under the Intel Iris Xe MAX marketing name, targeting only the mobile discrete GPU market. The DG1 has entry-level specs, with which Intel is eyeing the same pie as NVIDIA's fast-moving GeForce MX series mobile GPUs. Interestingly, the other major client of TSMC-N7 following Apple's transition to N5, is Intel's rival AMD.

In its Q3 earnings, Intel disclosed that it is now shipping Intel's first discrete GPU - DG1. Codenamed Intel Iris Xe MAX, the GPU is set to arrive in ultraportable laptops and designs. It is based on Xe-LP design, which is Intel's GPU configuration for iGPUs and low-power models. However, to satisfy the needs of gamers, Intel will not be good with just this GPU configuration. The company would need something faster and ore power-hungry to power the highest framerates and highest resolutions. Enter the world of Xe-HPG DG2 GPU. Made for gamers, it features all the hardware-enabled features you would expect in such a GPU, like raytracing, etc. This GPU is manufactured outside Intel's fabs, most likely at TSMC's facilities. Right now, this GPU is in the alpha phase and is booting in Intel's labs, meaning that the final silicon is just a few months away.

ASUS unveiled a special variant of its 2020 VivoBook Flip 14 convertible notebook, which features the "First Intel Discrete Graphics," expected to be the Iris Xe DG1 discrete GPU based on the Xe LP architecture. Intel appears to be promoting the combination of the Iris Xe dGPU with its 11th Gen Core "Tiger Lake" mobile processors, as a potent ultra portable computing solution with rich graphics and mobile gaming. This eats into the markets of entry-level dGPUs by NVIDIA and AMD. Intel is also developing an iGPU+dGPU Multi-Adapter technology that could leverage asymmetric explicit multi-GPU to accelerate gaming performance. The VivoBook Flip 14 TP470EZ features a 14-inch Full HD (1920 x 1080 pixels) display, and so the combination of the "Tiger Lake" Xe LP iGPU and dGPU could take a swing at Full HD AAA and e-sports gaming.

TechPowerUp today released the latest version of TechPowerUp GPU-Z, the popular graphics sub-system information and diagnostic utility. Version 2.35.0 adds support for new GPUs, and fixes a number of bugs. To begin with, GPU-Z adds support for AMD Radeon RX 6000 series GPUs based on the "Navi 21" silicon. Support is also added for Intel DG1 GPU. BIOS extraction and upload for NVIDIA's RTX 30-series "Ampere" GPUs has finally been introduced. Memory size reporting on the RTX 3090 has been fixed. The latest Windows 10 Insider Build (20231.1000) made some changes to DirectML, which caused GPU-Z to report it as unavailable, this has been fixed.

TechPowerUp GPU-Z 2.35.0 also makes various improvements to fake GPU detection for cards based on NVIDIA GT216 and GT218 ASICs. Hardware detection for AMD Radeon Pro 5600M based on "Navi 12" has been fixed. Among the other GPUs for which support was added with this release are NVIDIA A100 Tensor Core PCIe, Intel UHD Gen9.5 graphics on the i5-10200H, and Radeon HD 8210E and Barco MXRT-6700. Grab GPU-Z from the link below.

DOWNLOAD: TechPowerUp GPU-Z 2.35.0The change-log follows.

Another day, another Intel Tiger Lake and Xe graphics leak. This time, it comes courtesy of secret benchmark spotter extraordinaire TUM_APISAK, who spotted an Intel Tiger Lake CPU with integrated graphics on SiSoftware. Tiger Lake will ship with a graphics capability that reaches at least 96 Execution units (which boils down to the referred 768 Shading Units), which corresponds to the graphics prowess available on Intel's (currently discrete) DG1-SDV. The Iris Xe graphics on this benchmark are running at 1.3 GHz, with a 6.3 GB of memory on their elbow.

Intel's ambitious Xe graphics architecture is expected to make its first commercial debut as an iGPU that's part of the company's 11th gen Core "Tiger Lake" mobile processors, but it already received a non-commercial distribution as a discrete GPU called the DG1, with Intel shipping it to its independent software vendor ecosystem partners to begin exploratory work on Xe. One such ISV paired the card with a Core i7-8700 processor, and put it through Geekbench. While the Geekbench device identification doesn't mention "DG1," we lean toward the possibility looking at its 96 EU configuration, and 1.50 GHz clock speed, and 3 GB memory.

The Geekbench run only covers OpenCL performance of the selected device: "Intel(R) Gen12 Desktop Graphics Controller." The total score is 55373 points, with 3.53 Gpixels/s in "Sorbel," 1.30 Gpixels/sec in Histogram Equalization, 16 GFLOPs in SFFT, 1.62 GPixels/s in Gaussian Blur, 4.51 Msubwindows/s in Face Detection, 2.88 Gpixels/s in RAW, 327.4 Mpixels/s in DoF, and 13656 FPS in Particle Physics. These scores roughly match the 11 CU Radeon Vega iGPU found in AMD "Picasso" Ryzen 5 3400G processors.

Intel's 10 nm Xe DG1 silicon made its first public appearance as the DG1-SDV (software development vehicle), a desktop PCIe graphics cards that Intel shipped out to its ISVs (independent software vendors), allowing them to begin preparing software for the Xe architecture. Argonne National Laboratory, the organization behind the Aurora Supercomputing Project that implements Xe HP "Ponte Vecchio" super-scalar compute processors, in its presentation, took a brief technical detour talking a bit about the DG1-SDV.

In the presentation, it is revealed that Intel will indeed monetize (or "productize") the silicon at the heart of the DG1-SDV, only not as a desktop graphics card. The chip will be sold as a mobile GPU, not even as an MXM, but as a GPU meant to be hardwired along with its dedicated memory onto notebooks' mainboards. We predict Intel is attempting to tap into the market segment where NVIDIA sells its GeForce MX300 line of entry-level discrete GPUs. Earlier this week, we spotted a discrete GPU with the specs of the DG1 having significantly increased 1.50 GHz GPU clocks, resulting in a FP32 throughput rivaling the AMD Radeon RX 560 or the "Vega" based iGPU of "Renoir." The Xe architecture will also be released as an iGPU solution, powering Intel's "Tiger Lake" Core mobile processor. Find the Aurora presentation here (PDF).

An Intel Gen12 Xe GPU, possibly a discrete- DG1 prototype, showed up on the SiSoft SANDRA online database. The GPU is detailed by SANDRA as having 768 unified shaders across 96 execution units (EUs), a 1.50 GHz GPU clock speed, 1 MB of on-die L2 cache, and 3 GB of dedicated video memory of an unknown type (likely GDDR6). This is probably a different chip from the DG1-SDV, which caps out at 900 MHz GPU clock, although its SIMD muscle is identical.

At a clock-speed of 1.50 GHz, the chip would feature an FP32 throughput of 2,303 GFLOPs (we know this from the DG1-SDV offering 1382 GFLOPs at 900 MHz). If the software-side optimization backs this hardware, the resulting product could end up with performance in the league of the 8 CU Radeon "Vega" solution found in the AMD "Renoir" APU, or the Radeon RX 560 discrete GPU, which are just about enough for PUBG at 1080p with medium settings.

A leaked Intel internal slide surfaced on Chinese social networks, revealing five new products the company will build on its 10 nm silicon fabrication process. These include the "Alder Lake" heterogenous desktop processor, "Tiger Lake" mobile processor, "Ice Lake" based Xeon Scalable enterprise processors, DG1 discrete GPU, and "Snow Ridge" 5G base-station SoC. Some, if not all of these products, will implement Intel's new 10 nm+ silicon fabrication node that is expected to go live within 2020.

"Alder Lake" is a desktop processor that implements Intel's new heterogenous x86 core design that's making its debut with "Lakefield." The chip features up to 8 larger "Willow Cove" or "Golden Cove" CPU cores, and up to 8 smaller "Tremont" or "Gracemont" cores. This 8-big/8-small combo lets the chip achieve TDP targets around 80 Watts. Next up is "Tiger Lake," Intel's next-generation mobile processor family succeeding "Ice Lake." This microarchitecture implements "Willow Cove" CPU cores in a homogeneous setup, alongside Xe architecture based integrated graphics. "Ice Lake-SP" is Intel's next enterprise architecture that places mature "Sunny Cove" CPU cores in extreme core-count dies. Lastly, there's "Snow Ridge," an SoC purpose built for 5G base-stations. Image quality notwithstanding, these slides don't appear particularly new, and it's likely that COVID-19 has destabilized the roadmap. For instance, "Alder Lake," and "Ice Lake-SP" are expected to be 10 nm++ chips, a node that doesn't go live before 2021.

A reportedly leaked Intel slide via DigitalTrends has given us a load of information on Intel's upcoming take on the high performance graphics accelerators market - whether in its server or consumer iterations. Intel's Xe has already been cause for much discussion in a market that has only really seen two real competitors for ages now - the coming of a third player with muscles and brawl such as Intel against the already-established players NVIDIA and AMD would surely spark competition in the segment - and competition is the lifeblood of advancement, as we've recently seen with AMD's Ryzen CPU line.

The leaked slide reveals that Intel will be looking to employ a Multi-Chip-Module (MCM) approach to its high performance "Arctic Sound" graphics architecture. The GPUs will be available in up to 4-tile configuration (the name Intel is giving each module), which will then be joined via Foveros 3D stacking (first employed in Intel Lakefield. This leaked slide shows Intel's approach starting with a 1-tile GPU (with only 96 of its 128 total EUs active) for the entry level market (at 75 W TDP) a-la DG1 SDV (Software Development Vehicle).