Intel's Arc graphics card (opens in new tab) may have gotten a bad rap, but Intel is planning "more variations" of the Arc in 2023, Intel's graphics guru Raja Koduri says in an interview (via Gadget 360 (opens in new tab)) with tech website Koduri also noted that Intel's focus with the Arc is not to chase the competition with a 600W monster, but to develop a 200W to 225W single power connector GPU. He stated that Intel's focus with Arc is to nail core PC gaming users with 200W to 225W single power connector GPUs, rather than chasing the competition with 600W monsters.

That Intel remains committed to Arc is the most important point that emerges from this interview; rumors of partial or total cancellation of Arc graphics chips persist. So it is great to hear Koduri's unequivocal answer to the question of whether Intel will stick to its Arc roadmap, which includes the next generation Battlemage and Celestial GPUs. Yes, of course," Koduri said."

Koduri did not elaborate, but now that the hard work of creating the original Alchemist hardware architecture with cards like the Intel Arc A770 and A750 is done, Intel plans to release "more" Arc GPUs in 2023. variants to be released in 2023, he said. Koduri said, "We want to iterate quickly so we can keep up with the competition in all segments."

Koduri also stated that Arc's goal is to produce graphics cards that are efficient and easy to use.

"Performance per watt, or higher performance with less power, is my top priority. There will always be people with the technology to say, 'We'll provide more power,' but my focus is on low power. The other problem I see with just boasting benchmarks with more power is that while it's good from a marketing standpoint, there are only so many PC users who can buy and plug in such a card. The whole market would shrink dramatically, wouldn't it?

For Koduri, that means offering a GPU that works with a single power connector. My priority at this point is to get core users with a single power connector. And that can go up to 200-225W. Once you achieve that and a little above and a little below that, everything falls into the sweet spot," he says.

Koduri also emphasized that Intel is doing its best to fix driver issues that are degrading Arc's performance in older DX9 and DX11 games that rely on high-level drawing calls.

"The two APIs with the most difficult drawing calls are DirectX 9 and DirectX 11... An update to the DX9 driver should happen relatively soon, and DX11 shortly thereafter. Those are imminent. There will be some great announcements; we're not talking about 5 or 10 percent, but there will be a big [difference]. In some cases, it will be a much, much bigger difference," Koduri said.

And it's proving to be the case, with the latest driver releases offering up to 80% performance gains in some DX9 titles (open in new tab) The latest graphics cards released from Nvidia and AMD are very expensive and frankly inaccessible prices, so it is very important for Intel to come on board and target the mainstream of the market.

Intel's Arc A750 and A770 currently sell for $290 to $350, a fraction of the $1,000+ prices that the latest high-end cards demand. If Intel refines the Arc drivers sufficiently to provide truly consistent performance, these first-generation boards alone will be quite attractive, future GPUs notwithstanding.