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Intel Discloses Its Forthcoming Discrete GPU Strategy and Design Efforts (hothardware.com) (hothardware.com)

MojoKid writes: Intel has been uncharacteristically vocal about its most recent plans to enter the discrete GPU market. Over the last year or so, the company has disclosed a few morsels of information and made some high-profile hires, in its bid to build-up and flesh-out its latest discrete GPU plans. This week, Intel decided to have a sit down with HotHardware, offering the opportunity to chat with Ari Rauch, Vice President of the Core And Visual Computing Group at Intel, to discuss what makes this most recent endeavor different from the company's previous and now discontinued attempts in the discrete GPU space. As a follow up, HotHardware also enlisted readership questions to engage with Intel about its upcoming GPU plans, compiling responses in a Q&A format.

In short, this isn't Larabee 2.0, not by a long shot. Intel is gearing up for a traditional GPU architecture design, coupled with some of the company's own strategic IP that it can bring to the table, to help differentiate its products. Further, Rauch noted Intel "will bring discrete GPUs to both client and data center segments aiming at delivering the best quality and experiences across the board including gaming, content creation, and enterprise. These products will see first availability over a period of time, beginning in 2020."

When questioned on their current silicon fabrication hiccups and delays and how it might affect Intel's ability to execute in this highly competitive space, Rauch noted, "we feel very confident about our product roadmap across software, architecture, and manufacturing." Based on some of the responses to product positioning questions, it also appears Intel is gearing up to address all performance envelopes as well, from entry-level to midrange and high-end graphics cards.

3 of 92 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Information-Free Article by _merlin · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'll believe Intel can build a discrete GPU worth buying when I see it. Every attempt so far has been flawed (Real3D i740 starved for texture bandwidth), weak (Silicon Image GMA950 with terrible performance and even worse drivers on Windows), or vapourware (Larrabee). There's no indication that it'll be different this time.

  2. Fuck nVidia by KiloByte · · Score: 1, Insightful

    At least we know the drivers will be ok from day one. It's not humanly possible to suck more than current GPU makers.

    nVidia not only doesn't provide documentation for its cards, but even actively interferes with nouveau on its new cards (encrypting and signing crap). On every card, it's random whether either their proprietary drivers or nouveau will work without crashing. The proprietary drivers are useless if you even dabble in kernel development -- they get ported to current kernels 0-6 months after a .0 release; some of us would want -rc or next. Oh, and support gets dropped within 5 years of a cards's launch. For this reason, Debian keeps forks of a number of discontinued drivers, but perhaps you'd want to run them with current kernels or X, ha ha? And, "drivers exist" doen't mean they actually work. Even basic crap like enabling xfce's compositor causes a crash, while there's that random crash from time to time. Oh, and even physically the cards suck. Out of 3 nVidia cards I went through recently, the middle one went out in flames. Literally. With thick smoke covering the entire room.

    Compare Intel. At the family home I visit on weekends, I recently had to bring out an ancient machine (monitor problems -- none of 1864518746 SoCs I own want to talk to either my new monitor nor any (ancient) backups), with an Intel 910GL. Despite the card's age, it worked perfectly, including compositing and stuff. So does the integrated card in a spanking new machine at work. No need to think about drivers, everything is in the current kernel and X.

    I haven't tried ATI/AMD in a decade. Their drivers used to suck -- I'm told AMD very recently (as in, a year ago) rewrote their driver stack so it's actually usable. I seriously hope so as I urgently need to rebuild my rig, and I'm not waiting till 2020. So it'll be AMD for me.

    --
    The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
  3. Re:All fluff and no substance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    And yet the video speaks for itself. Unless you idiots are going to say that's not really him but some obese diaper wearing manchild body double? Pathetic. You're a coward, you ARE the muffington lol. Feckless Republicans.

    Mueller will handle you soon.