The launch of Intel’s Arc B580 felt like a much-needed breath of fresh air, providing a proper good value graphics card in the budget space. It remains just that for those with modern systems, but performance issues have since come to light that should sadly give those with older processors pause.
According to benchmarks conducted by YouTube channel Hardware Canucks, Arc B580 frame rates can “fall off a cliff” when paired with an older CPU – in this case an Intel Core i5-9600K. This unfortunately isn’t an isolated incident, as fellow YouTubers Hardware Unboxed were able to replicate similar performance drops using an AMD Ryzen 5 2600X.
It should come as no surprise that GPU performance declines moving to an older, slower processor. However, the degree to which Arc B580 frame rates fall relative to the likes of GeForce RTX 4060 or Radeon RX 7600 is the issue.
Take benchmarks in Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 and Hogwarts Legacy as a prime examples. Partnered with a Ryzen 7 9800X3D, there are just a few frames separating the aforementioned graphics cards. However, Arc B580 performs more like a GeForce GTX 1660 Super once CPU duties fall to Core i5-9600K instead. More worrying still, the Battlemage pixel pusher goes from the fastest graphics card of the bunch in Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered to trailing behind the budget Turing model.
It’s important to note that only some game exhibited markedly depreciated frame rates, with the likes of Alan Wake 2, Doom Eternal, and others painting Arc B580 in a better light. Comparing the problematic titles with these examples, Hardware Canucks notes that GPU utilisation is much lower in the former.
It’s unclear whether this is an architectural or driver-related issue. Either would cause problems for Intel, particularly given its “comfortable” position on the quality of its software. However, that’d be more preferable than a hardware-level headache that’s naturally much harder to fix. Intel is investigating the issue according to the outlet, and I’ve reached out to the company for comment on behalf of Club386.
This is a disappointing state of affairs for Intel and budget builders alike as these problems muddy the value Arc B580 offers. Worse still, similar issues will undoubtedly affect Arc B570 too. I hope this is something a driver or firmware update can resolve, but I advise thinking twice about picking up the card in the meantime if you have an older system.
I’ll update this piece once Intel provide a statement to me, but give Club386 a follow on Google News to make sure you don’t miss any developments on Arc, Radeon, GeForce or any other tech talk.
