Last month, Intel launched new power-optimized drivers for handheld devices, touting performance gains across various titles. With the latest Arc graphics driver version 32.0.101.6874, Intel is expanding these optimizations to all Core Ultra 200V-powered devices, across laptops and mini-PCs.
Since Intel's Arc is still in its early stages, many initial launches have improved with age due to subsequent driver improvements. This has been evident with Alchemist. Furthermore, despite Battlemage offering a relatively stronger and more stable platform at launch, it's clear there is still untapped potential, as shown by these software-driven improvements.
Intel's Arc graphics driver 32.0.101.6734 introduced notable low-power mode optimizations for Lunar Lake-powered handhelds, specifically the MSI Claw 8 AI+. After extensive validation and testing, Intel is expanding the scope of these optimizations to all devices, whether laptops or mini-PCs. First-party metrics suggest a 10% bump in performance across the board in nine titles, with the Core Ultra 7 258V at 17W, but your mileage will vary.
We'll have to verify these claims through independent testing. It's important to note these improvements are specifically for Intel's low-power Arc 130V and Arc 140V offerings, not the desktop-based Battlemage Arc B-series. The new drivers also address a slew of bugs across various productivity applications and games.
A noteworthy detail in the patch notes is the increased memory allocation for integrated Arc GPUs across Core Ultra Series 1 (Meteor Lake) and Series 2 (Arrow Lake and Lunar Lake) product lines, now supporting up to 57% compared to the previous 50% cap. Thus, a 16GB host system can allocate 9.12GB to the iGPU, as opposed to 8GB previously.
This isn't the first time Intel has offered improved performance through software updates, as a previous driver release from last October increased FPS by as much as 24%. This builds on earlier optimizations for the Arc platform, so we'll probably see further, likely less pronounced improvements down the road. Most software divisions are likely hard at work preparing the groundwork for next-generation Celestial (Xe3) graphics, set to be introduced with Panther Lake early next year.
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