Conclusion
In today’s review, we have put the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition to the test and tested all gaming aspects, including 1440p, 1080p, Ray Tracing, and Intel XeSS upscaling. The Intel Arc A770 16GB Limited Edition video card has an MSRP of $349.99 and supports the latest modern technologies, including DX12 Ultimate features.
In this price range, its direct competition from NVIDIA is the 12GB GeForce RTX 3060 video card, and from AMD it is the 8GB Radeon RX 6600 XT. Prices do fluctuate, and there are versions of the Radeon RX 6600 XT which might be cheaper, but the GeForce RTX 3060 has remained at fairly high pricing, above its MSRP of $329.99. The EVGA GeForce RTX 3060 XC BLACK GAMING we used for comparison today is in fact $549 online right now, yes $549, and at its lowest has been $429, though its MSRP was supposed to be $329.
The lowest-priced GeForce RTX 3060 12GB video card on Newegg right now is $354 in February of 2023. We wanted to put this pricing in perspective for you since the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition is actually available at Newegg right now for $349.99. Therefore, you can clearly see that the GeForce RTX 3060 would be the closest card on the NVIDIA GPU side, not the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti which starts at +$400. Even then, most of the GeForce RTX 3060 12GB’s are much more expensive than the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition.
On the AMD side, things get a bit more muddied. The Radeon RX 6600 XT had an MSRP of $379 at launch, but its pricing has maintained its MSRP better than the GeForce RTX 3060, and in fact, has dropped in price since its launch. Now the MSI Radeon RX 6600 XT GAMING X 8G we used for comparison today is still riding high at $399 online, but it was at exactly $349 for several months before now, and this was a higher-priced RX 6600 XT, to begin with. The Radeon RX 6600 XT can actually be found for as low as $275, but its pricing does vary a lot and many cards are actually in the $330-$399 range. Due to its price fluctuating so much on the high side, that is why we also wanted to include the Radeon RX 6600 which has an MSRP of $329 but is cheaper than that now.
Therefore, as you can see the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition is in a unique position, actually available at its MSRP of $349.99. It sits in a place that NVIDIA nor AMD is occupying right now with new hardware, it competes in the range of the Radeon RX 6600 XT and GeForce RTX 3060 12GB video cards, a place only Intel is pushing forward right now with a new GPU.
Performance
Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition is a 1440p gaming video card. We wanted to first find out, in our testing, if the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition plays best at 1080p or 1440p, we wondered if it could truly allow an enjoyable 1440p resolution gameplay experience. Our testing indicates that it certainly does. In many games, even modern and graphically challenging games, the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition allowed a playable experience. In the games that were even more challenging, we could make them very playable by enabling Intel XeSS or AMD FSR upscaling technologies when the games supported that, which boosted up framerates quite nicely.
Forspoken was challenging, this is a new game, and there will be patches coming out to improve performance. That said, Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition did well with XeSS enabled, allowing a playable experience, but what’s even better, it outperformed every video card in our comparison, including the GeForce RTX 3060 by 18%. Dying Light 2, which is often very challenging, played well even without needing upscaling at 73FPS average. Again it beat the GeForce RTX 3060 and Radeon RX 6600 XT in performance by a great deal, 24%. Even Cyberpunk 2077 was playable as long as we used FSR, and it was still just a hair faster than the RTX 3060. In every other game, performance was at 60FPS or higher on Intel Arc A770, and this was 1440p.
At 1080p gaming the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition smashed gaming. Here we were able to get 60FPS in Forspoken without even needing upscaling. We got near 100FPS in Dying Light 2, and 60FPS in Cyberpunk 2077. All other games were 80FPS+ at 1080p, without upscaling. Then if you really needed more, upscaling is there for you, nearly 70FPS in Forspoken with XeSS.
We also experienced good things with Ray Tracing. In fact, we can definitively say Ray Tracing on Intel Arc A770 is superior to Radeon RX 6000 series (RDNA 2) performance, and rivals GeForce RTX 3060 Ray Tracing performance. At 1440p, new graphically challenging games are going to be iffy for a playable experience, even with upscaling, but this is typical of cards in this price range. We did find F1 2022 playable with FSR at 1440p and Ray Tracing, as well as Far Cry 6 and maybe Dying Light 2 with XeSS.
Where the Intel Arc A770 really shined was at 1080p with Ray Tracing enabled. Forspoken was challenging for it, but with XeSS it was nearly 60FPS. F1 2022 was playable with FSR enabled, and Dying Light 2 was as well with XeSS, but Far Cry 6 was playable without upscaling. Cyberpunk 2077 was with FSR, and what really surprised us was Metro Exodus Enhanced was playable at 1080p with Extreme Ray Tracing quality mode.
The thing that really shocked us though, with Ray Tracing was how much faster the Intel Arc A770 was at times compared to the GeForce RTX 3060. In Forspoken Intel Arc A770 was 14% faster than RTX 3060 with Ray Tracing at 1080p. In Dying Light 2 it was 15% faster, in Far Cry 6 it was 9% faster, in Watch Dogs Legion it was 18% faster, and in Metro Exodus Enhanced it was 59% faster.
The only downside was how inconsistent some performance was. There were games where the GeForce RTX 3060 and Radeon RX 6600 XT beat it, but then others where Intel Arc A770 smashed RX 6600 XT and RTX 3060. This back and forth is annoying, because it is so game dependent, and so the one you may be playing may not be well optimized with Arc A770, while others might and really show an advantage. In some games, you get more than your money’s worth, and in others, maybe not.
Frametimes
The best way to demonstrate the frametime comparison is to show these two screenshots above from Dying Light 2’s benchmark run. On the left side is the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition, and on the right side is the GeForce RTX 3060. The Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition has a faster framerate, and both video cards are tested at the same game settings. However, while the Intel Arc A770 is winning in framerate, note the frametime graphs shown, it shows it both in FPS and milliseconds.
What you will notice is that on the Intel Arc A770 Limited Edition, there are more “spikes” between the different scenes. There are more highs, and more lows and the in-between framerate is less consistent. The GeForce RTX 3060 has a more consistent frametime experience, and just a little less overall frame render time as well, even though the framerate, is faster on Arc 770. This means the experience is better on GeForce RTX 3060, smoother, with fewer stutters, and is consistent.
Let’s be clear, frametimes on Intel Arc have improved a great deal since early launch drivers. Intel has made huge strides in improving the consistency and lowering frametimes in games. There are multiple reviews out there that prove that the frametimes are much better today than they were at launch. That said, the frametimes are still not on par with modern NVIDIA or AMD GPUs. There is still room for improvement, as we saw in our example in Dying Light 2.
To put it simply, the consistency and experience of gameplay are still currently the best on NVIDIA or AMD, and frametimes are still not on par with Intel Arc. Intel has proven they can improve the frametimes, because that has happened, from now compared to launch. Therefore, the potential is there that Intel may eventually match parity with the consistency of frametime with modern NVIDIA and AMD GPUs.
Final Points
The Intel Arc A770, and Arc series in general, is the definition of the ‘fine wine’ argument/meme. When the Intel Arc GPUs were released, performance was chaotic and underperforming. Since the launch, drivers have improved, and Intel has shown multiple iterations of drivers that have improved many aspects of performance, including framerate, and frametime. In fact, in this latest driver, Intel has made its Arc Control software a separate application, rather than an overlay, greatly improving that aspect and building upon user feedback.
Intel is also improving in another way, it is starting to support new games with Day 1 drivers, optimizing its GPUs for said games. This was proven by releasing a driver on 1/24/2023 to support Forspoken, which came out exactly on 1/24/2023. AMD doesn’t even have an optimized driver for Forspoken (at the time of writing) yet on its Radeon RX 6000 series GPUs, and the game has now been out 3-weeks (at the time of writing). Intel also released a driver on 2/7/2023 to support Hogwarts Legacy before the game was even released! These kinds of moves by Intel are important and show that it is serious.
It is clear that Intel Arc A770 has a good architecture, the architecture is solid, and it has the potential to perform well. We are impressed by the Ray Tracing performance at this price range, it is much better than the Radeon RX 6000 series in Ray Tracing, and rivals GeForce RTX Ray Tracing performance at this price range. Intel Arc A770 also has Intel XeSS upscaling technology, and as far as we can tell also rivals DLSS, providing similar image quality, and performance uplift.
Truly the only thing holding back Arc A770 was drivers, and that is continuing to improve over time. There are weaknesses still, inconsistent game performance between games, subpar DX9 performance, and not the best frametimes and consistency, but Intel has shown it can improve, and it has shown that there is great potential in the Intel Arc architecture and GPUs. When it comes to modern games or AAA titles, Intel Arc A770 is a modern GPU that can support the latest features well in this price range. In fact, it is the only new GPU in this price range, and right now rules the $349.99 price point offering the best value.