GPU power consumption numbers under load. Credit: Andrew Cunningham
Power consumption is another area where the Battlemage GPU catches up to Nvidia. With the caveat that power usage numbers measured by software like ours are less accurate than numbers captured with hardware tools, it appears that the B580's power consumption, when fully charged, draws between 120 and 130W on Hitman and borderlands. This is a bit higher than the 4060, but is lower than any of the Radeon RX 7600s.
It's not the best in its class, but looking at the A750's power consumption shows how far Intel has come: the B580 outperforms the A750 every time and consumes about 60W less power.
A strong contender, a late arrival
The Intel Arc B580. Credit: Andrew Cunningham
Intel is explicitly targeting Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4060 with the Arc B580, a role it fills well for a low starting price. But the B580 is perhaps most damaging to AMD, which positions its two 7600 series cards (and the rest of the 6600 series out there) in the same cheaper niche as Nvidia, with caveats.
In fact, I'd probably recommend the B580 to a budget GPU buyer over any of the Radeon RX 7600 cards at the moment. For the same asking price as the RX 7600, Intel offers better performance in most games and a lot Better performance in ray-traced games. The 16GB 7600
All that said, Intel is introducing a great competitor to the RTX 4060 and RX 7600. year and a half after the launch of both cards, and just a few months away from a possible RTX 5060. Intel will sell mid-range GPU performance from mid-2023 to late 2024. There's actually a good case for building a budget gaming PC in this same time, before Trump can Administrative tariffs may affect prices or supply chains, but assuming the tech industry can maintain its normal patterns, it would be wiser to wait and see what Nvidia does next.