AMD vs. Nvidia vs. Intel: which PC giant wins CES 2023?
AMD, Nvidia, and Intel are the three rivals that power up countless desktops and laptops, and the components they produce make CES exciting every year. This year, each manufacturer had some major announcements to share, including new processors and graphics cards, both for desktops and laptops.
Contents
- AMD: mobile galore and 3D V-Cache
- Nvidia: full laptop lineup and a comeback
- Intel: it’s raining processors
- Who impressed us the most during CES 2023?
Here’s a recap of everything AMD, Nvidia, and Intel showed off during the last few days. Fair warning: there’s a lot to sink your teeth into. Now, the question is, who did it best at this year’s CES?
AMD: mobile galore and 3D V-Cache
AMD certainly had a lot to talk about during its CES 2023 keynote. Team Red’s main focus this year seemed to be on laptops and the different solutions it can bring to that part of the market. Desktop users also got a long-anticipated confirmation of the upcoming 3D V-Cache Ryzen 7000 CPUs.
The company is making a strong entry into the laptop market for this generation of processors and graphics cards. When it comes to CPUs, the list seems to be never-ending, and it’s not even just Zen 4 parts. AMD is also resurrecting the Zen 3+ and the Zen 3 by bringing new chips to budget and efficiency-oriented laptops.
While the Ryzen 7030 and Ryzen 7035, which are Zen 3 and Zen 3+ parts respectively, received some coverage, AMD’s main focus was on the Ryzen 7040 and Ryzen 7045. Both the lineups are based on Zen 4 architecture, with Ryzen 7040 being aimed at ultra-thin notebooks and maxing out at eight cores. It’s the Ryzen 7045 series where the exciting stuff can be found, though. With a maximum of 16 cores, these CPUs will end up in some of the best gaming laptops of the year.
It’s not just Ryzen processors that are coming to laptops, but RDNA 3 graphics cards too.
AMD is readying the RX 7600M XT and non-XT, said to rival the desktop version of Nvidia’s RTX 3060, as well as the RX 7700S.
Laptop fans have plenty to be hyped for, but desktop PC gamers should be on the lookout for not just one, but three Ryzen 7000 3D V-Cache chips. Initially debuted in the last-gen Ryzen 7 5800X3D, the technology had proved to be a win for AMD, and this time around, it’s coming to three CPUs instead of just one. We’re getting the Ryzen 9 7950X3D, with 16 cores and a massive 144MB of stacked cache, as well as the Ryzen 9 7900X3D and the Ryzen 7 7800X3D.
Nvidia: full laptop lineup and a comeback
Nvidia
Nvidia managed to surprise many during this year’s CES. While the rumor mill had been buzzing with news about the RTX 40-series graphics cards coming to laptops for quite a while, most of us didn’t expect to see the full lineup so soon, and with the flagship RTX 4090 sitting atop the mountain of mobile GPUs.
In the last generation of GPUs (Ampere), Nvidia didn’t launch everything all at once, and the RTX 3090 never made it to laptops.
This time, Nvidia is well-positioned to equip every kind of laptop with its hardware, ranging from budget notebooks to high-end gaming beasts.
Nvidia promises that the RTX 4090 and RTX 4080 in laptops will deliver seamless gaming at 4K while maintaining 60 frames per second (fps). As far as specs go, the RTX 4090 comes with 9,728 CUDA cores and 16GB of GDDR6 memory, while the RTX 4080 sports 7,424 CUDA cores and 12GB VRAM.
The mainstream part of the lineup covers the RTX 4070, RTX 4060, and even the budget RTX 4050. There’s a wide gap between the flagships and the mainstream sector, but those cards will be found in laptops priced at $1,000 and above — although we don’t expect the RTX 4070M to be that easy on the wallet. The card will arrive with 4,608 CUDA cores and 8 GB of GDDR6 memory, followed by the RTX 4060 with 3,072 cores and the RTX 4050 with 2,560 cores and just 6GB of GDDR6 VRAM.
Aside from the gaming laptop bonanza, Nvidia resurrected the “unlaunched” RTX 4080 12GB desktop graphics card and released it as the RTX 4070 Ti.
The card retained the same specifications, but it received a $100 price cut, which means it now costs $800 and above. Check out our review of it to see how it compares to some of the other top graphics cards.
Lastly, Nvidia served up an update to GeForce Now, boosting the highest membership tier to an RTX 4080, now called the “Ultimate” tier. This even includes the addition of Nvidia Reflex to reduce overall latency, with Nvidia now claiming it’s on par with a desktop PC.
Intel: it’s raining processors
Team Blue also had a lot to say during CES 2023, although the vast majority of it is centered around CPUs. That should come as no surprise, but given the fact that Intel Arc Alchemist launched in 2022, it’s a shame that Intel didn’t have anything new to share about its successors. Instead, the news about Intel Arc Battlemage and Celestial was leaked on YouTube. At least Intel announced that XeSS upscaling is coming to its integrated graphics solutions.
The lack of GPU news may have been a letdown, but no one can accuse Intel of staying idle as far as its processors are concerned.
The manufacturer is bringing out a boatload of new CPUs, and this includes desktop and mobile chips for all kinds of use cases.
First of all, Intel Raptor Lake is coming to laptops, and some of the chips are set to rival the best desktop processors on the current market. The mobile lineup includes the flagship Core i9-13980HX, equipped with a massive 24 cores, and the Core i9-13900HX, which we’ve already seen in a leaked benchmark prior to launch. Spoiler alert: it bested the Core i9-12900KS.
Nine HX-branded chips are coming out in 2023, and Intel expects over 60 laptop designs to feature a CPU from this lineup. There are also plenty more processors coming out, including H-, P-, and U-series chips that will be found in more power-efficient notebooks.
Desktop users have plenty to be happy about, too. Intel added a bunch of new CPUs to the Raptor Lake family, with a stronger focus on power efficiency. There are still some top-notch chips in there, such as the Core i9-13900, with slightly worse specs than the Core i9-13900K but also much lower power consumption.
There are also six T-series processors which are ultra-efficient.
Who impressed us the most during CES 2023?
CES 2023 was truly eventful, and it’s not an overstatement to say that AMD, Nvidia, and Intel all had something interesting to bring to the table. Laptop users got a lot of love this time around, but those who prefer desktops still have some new hardware to look forward to. However, there have also been some small letdowns.
For AMD, the lack of new discrete desktop graphics is definitely a disappointment. With only the RX 7900 XT and RX 7900 XTX out right now, AMD doesn’t have a lot to offer in the way of GPUs. With Nvidia’s growing lineup, it’d be good to see some rebuttal from AMD, and that includes budget models as well as something stronger than the RX 7900 XTX. The lack of budget Ryzen 7000 CPUs also didn’t go unnoticed — we still don’t have a Ryzen 3 processor based on the Zen 4 architecture. On top of that, AMD’s presence on the laptop front seemed diminished from previous years, which isn’t a good sign for the company’s adoption there.
Nvidia surprised us with its massive bag of laptop chips, but much like AMD, it would have been nice to see more of an expansion of the desktop lineup. The launch of the RTX 4070 Ti was only a matter of time, but many PC builders are looking forward to the RTX 4070 (non-Ti) and the RTX 4060. Nvidia hasn’t said anything about either of those cards.
Intel couldn’t possibly have launched more processors in one go than it has this year during CES. There’s something in there for everyone, including laptop and desktop chips en masse. After all the hype Intel attempted to generate around its discrete graphics, though, the lack of any Intel Arc news was certainly a disappointment. In fact, Intel’s physical presence at CES was extremely small.
With all that said, who wins CES 2023? It’s tough to say. In terms of raw product, laptops powered by Nvidia and Intel were everywhere you looked this year, and Nvidia’s announcements around GeForce Now are exciting.
But in the end, it’s hard not to root for AMD.
The 3D V-Cache parts are exciting, and the claims around the performance of the new mobile parts certainly seem impressive. Hopefully, we see more designs that support those AMD chips though, because right now, the laptop market has never seemed so dominated by Intel and Nvidia.
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AMD Is Losing Ground to Intel in This Key Chip Market
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD -2.08%) and Nvidia (NVDA -1.60%) hold a near-duopoly in discrete GPUs. Nvidia controls the majority of the market with its higher-end chips, while AMD remains the persistent underdog in the lower-end market.
However, that duopoly could soon be threatened by Intel (INTC -1.83%), which recently returned to the discrete GPU market after an absence of more than two decades. According to JPR, Intel captured 4% of the discrete GPU market in the third quarter of 2022, compared to roughly 0% a year earlier. AMD’s share dropped from 17% to 8%, while Nvidia’s share rose from 83% to 88%.
It wasn’t surprising to see AMD cede some of its market to Nvidia, but its losses to Intel are troubling because the latter has been targeting many of the same lower-end PC gamers as AMD. Let’s see why Intel is expanding into discrete GPUs again, and how that expansion could throttle AMD’s long-term growth.
Image source: Getty Images.
Why is Intel selling discrete GPUs?
Intel is still the largest maker of GPUs in the world, thanks to the integrated GPUs that are directly baked into its CPUs, but those chips can’t handle graphically advanced games and applications. That’s where powerful discrete GPUs, which are installed separately as add-in boards, come in.
Two decades ago, the discrete GPU market was dominated by Nvidia and ATI, which would be acquired by AMD in 2006. Intel attempted to break into the market with the i740 GPU in 1998, but it flopped and was discontinued after just a few months. It tried to return to the market with a new discrete GPU in 2009, but that project was ultimately scrapped.
The lack of a powerful GPU has been a sore spot for Intel, since AMD now bundles together its CPUs and discrete GPUs in APUs (advanced processing units) for PCs, Sony‘s PS5, and Microsoft‘s Xbox Series S and X consoles. Intel even licensed Nvidia’s GPU technology for its own integrated graphics chips until that deal expired in early 2017.
That’s why Intel finally launched a new generation of Xe discrete GPUs in late 2020 and early 2021. That first batch included its Iris Xe MAX chips for mid-range laptops, as well as other Xe GPUs for desktops and servers. Those chips paved the way for the arrival of its more powerful Arc GPUs, which challenge AMD’s Radeon and Nvidia’s GeForce in the high-end PC gaming market, in early 2022.
Like AMD and Nvidia, Intel outsources the production of those 7 nm GPUs to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing.
Several recent industry benchmarks reveal that Intel’s Arc A380 delivers much better performance than AMD’s Radeon RX 6400 across a wide range of games. That’s a bright red flag for AMD in the low-end market, since the RX 6400 costs about $10 more than the A380, which retails for around $140. Nvidia’s comparable GTX 1630 costs about $200.
How could Intel hurt AMD in the GPU market?
Intel’s market share gains wouldn’t be too troubling if the entire GPU market were still expanding. But discrete GPU shipments actually plunged 42% year over year to 14 million units in the third quarter of 2022, according to JPR, as the PC market shrank. Therefore, Intel, AMD, and Nvidia are all fighting for a shrinking market.
Intel’s return to discrete GPUs also coincides with a cyclical slowdown for AMD. AMD’s revenue rose 45% in 2020 and increased another 68% in 2021 as people bought new PCs to work remotely, attended online classes, and played more PC games.
Analysts expect its revenue to rise another 43% this year, partly driven by its acquisition of Xilinx in February, but to slow to just 6% growth in 2023 as it laps that purchase and faces a slowdown now that pandemic fears have eased.
Starting in the second quarter of 2022, AMD began reporting its gaming revenue separately from its CPUs and other embedded chips. Its gaming revenue increased 32% year over year in the second quarter, but only grew 14% year over year (and stayed nearly flat sequentially) to $1.6 billion in the third quarter. During both quarters, AMD said its robust sales of its semi-custom APUs for gaming consoles offset its declining sales of gaming GPUs for PCs.
AMD expects that slowdown, which is also weighing down its CPU business, to continue for the foreseeable future. Therefore, Intel’s Xe and Arc GPUs could cause even more headaches for AMD’s gaming business as the broader PC market sputters out.
But AMD’s pain isn’t Intel’s gain
Intel has seemingly landed a surprising blow against AMD in the GPU market, but that victory doesn’t address its core problems of sluggish CPU sales and its inability to manufacture smaller and more power-efficient CPUs than AMD, which also outsources the production of its CPUs to TSMC.
Instead, it merely highlights Intel’s hidden dependence on TSMC, its top competitor in the foundry market, and reveals that it can’t manufacture superior discrete GPUs through its own foundries yet. AMD might face some fresh headwinds from Intel’s discrete GPUs, but investors shouldn’t assume those headwinds will generate significant tailwinds for Intel either.
Leo Sun has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Advanced Micro Devices, Intel, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2023 $57.50 calls on Intel, long January 2025 $45 calls on Intel, and short January 2025 $45 puts on Intel. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Can I use an AMD graphics card with an Intel
processor
Can I use an AMD graphics processor with an Intel processor? Is there a reason why you shouldn’t do this, or when is it useful?
Let’s delve into these issues together, and by the end of the article, you should have a clear idea of whether the AMD + Intel combination is reliable.
Are AMD GPUs compatible with Intel CPUs
First of all, let’s set the basics: you can easily use an AMD GPU with an Intel processor.
Two companies may compete in both CPUs and GPUs, but that doesn’t mean they won’t work together inside your PC build.
However, with you may still have problems with the overall compatibility of .
For example, are there any benefits you might be missing out on if you don’t pair AMD graphics cards with AMD processors?
Benefits of using AMD graphics cards with an AMD processor
AMD Smart Access Memory (SAM) and Resizable BAR
One notable feature of AMD graphics cards in combination with AMD processors is a feature called AMD Smart Access Memory.
In essence, the AMD Smart Access Memory gives the CPU more access to video memory, providing a small performance boost (~4% or less in most cases, 10% or more in rare cases) in games, which is nice, but hardly a must for a good experience.
What people may not know is that this is based on a feature called Resizable BAR (base address register) which is not AMD specific.
In fact, many Intel processors support the use of Resizable BAR with AMD video cards.
Therefore, most AMD/AMD features work fine with an AMD/Intel setup. Are there any other CPU/GPU combination exclusive features to worry about?
Not exactly .
The closest thing to this used to be something called AMD Dual Graphics , which allowed AMD APUs (processors with integrated graphics chips) to run in dual GPU mode with some discrete AMD graphics cards.
However, in this feature was deprecated fairly quickly and is no longer used for current AMD processors and graphics cards.
Why AMD graphics cards with Intel processors can be a perfect match
AMD video cards with Intel processors can be an attractive combination for one type of user, in particular: gamers .
Modern Intel processors are capable of maintaining a consistent, if sometimes slight, performance advantage over AMD processors. Especially for high refresh rate games, Intel processors may seem like the best choice for many users, even if they use AMD graphics cards.
Similarly, AMD graphics cards tend to have much better performance per dollar in games compared to competing graphics cards.
The extra money isn’t necessarily wasted on Nvidia, especially if you or the games you play can make good use of Nvidia’s extra hardware features, but if all you want is stable frames per second, AMD graphics cards may be the best companion .
When to choose an Nvidia graphics card for an Intel 9 processor0009
There’s an elephant in the room to look out for, especially if you want to use GPU acceleration for professional and performance-oriented workloads.
When it comes to non-gaming use, Nvidia GPUs are well ahead of AMD graphics cards in many of the ‘s high-end professional workloads.
And in gaming, and workloads, current generation AMD GPUs simply can’t compete with Nvidia GPUs when it comes to ray tracing workloads.
If your gaming or professional 3D rendering requires a lot of ray tracing, the AMD GPU might not be the right choice for your build.
Especially if your 3D GPU Render Engine uses CUDA/OptiX for rendering, which is supported only on Nvidia GPUs!
So unless gaming is your primary use case, it might not be the best idea to pair an AMD GPU with an Intel CPU.
Everything will work, but Nvidia graphics cards are generally better suited for most performance-oriented heavy workloads.
Will there be any benefit from pairing an Intel GPU with an Intel
CPU
Probably not .
While I’m sure this particular combination will offer some interesting features once it hits the market, these hypothetical improvements aren’t worth postponing a viable personal, gaming, or work PC build today.
For example, remember the AMD Dual Graphics feature mentioned earlier that allowed AMD iGPU and AMD dGPU to run at the same time? Looks like Intel is also doing this , but until Intel graphics cards hit the market, I wouldn’t consider them as an opportunity to upgrade the system.
Also, most multi-GPU technologies… don’t work well outside of workloads where the GPU load can be easily shared across multiple GPUs, so for games it probably won’t make much difference .
Frequently Asked Questions
Are Intel Processors Better Than AMD Processors?
As mentioned above, Intel processors consistently lead the gaming performance.
However, this performance crown tends to swap heads every generation, and AMD processors often boast an incredible lead in pure multi-core processor power.
When used properly, this processor power can be put to good use for things like live streaming and video rendering/editing.
Ultimately, the answer to this question will really depend on who offers the best product for your money in a given price range and whose features you need more.
This is a very general question, but if gaming performance is your primary or only concern, Intel has a slight advantage.
Are Nvidia GPUs better than AMD GPUs?
As mentioned above, AMD’s and Nvidia’s GPUs excel at different things , but both are pretty solid product lines in their own right.
If you’re not worried about Nvidia’s hardware-specific features, it’s generally wise to just buy from the big manufacturer that gives you the best deal for your money in that price range.
Often, especially for gamers, it’s AMD, but other times Nvidia can actually give a decent lead .
However, before making a final purchase decision, you should always cross-check the benchmarks between competing graphics cards.
What are the best GPU brands?
Another question that comes to mind when buying graphics cards is which brands or AIB partners to buy from.
While AMD and Nvidia make core GPU chips, their partners tend to have unique cooler designs that can then be stacked on top and have varying levels of customer service and warranties to keep in mind .
how Intel returns to the discrete graphics market
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Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger Wall Street Journal
In 1998, Intel released its first graphics card, the i740, which was criticized for using up computer memory and poor performance. The following year, the company announced the release of new versions of the i752 and i754 GPU, but sent only the first limited edition to production. The reason for abandoning the project was a slight increase in performance compared to the failed i740.
For the next 20 years, Intel only worked with integrated graphics. In April 2018, Fobres magazine reported that the manufacturer is preparing to release a new discrete graphics card and is assembling a team to develop GPUs that can compete with Nvidia and AMD.
In August of the same year, the company promised to introduce the first card in 2020.
The first discrete graphics card Intel i740 Tom’s Hardware
In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemicand lockdowns have caused a disruption in the global supply chain, leaving electronics manufacturers with semiconductor shortages and consumers with rising prices and graphics card shortages. In 2021, amid the ongoing crisis, Intel introduced its first discrete GPUs in 20 years.
Status of Intel
Intel Expected to Officially Announce 12th Generation Alder Lake Processors and Z69 Chipset on October 27th0. With their help, CEO Pat Gelsinger promises to end AMD’s market dominance. According to InvestorPlace contributor Chris Lau, Intel has lagged behind in terms of innovation, but with the arrival of Gelsinger, it is aggressively catching up: the company has begun investing in its own chip production.
In 2021, Intel plans to open two semiconductor factories at a cost of $20 billion.
Earlier this year, Samsung and TSMC, which also make Intel chips in their factories, also announced increased investment in chip manufacturing.
Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger at the construction site of two new factories in Chandler, Arizona Ars Technica
Another Intel problem is the policy of Apple, Google and Amazon, which are moving from standardized manufacturer chips to work on their own processors. Willie Shea, a professor of management at Harvard Business School, puts the company at risk of being “left behind.”
Intel’s Q3 2021 sales fell short of estimates, pushing the manufacturer’s share price down. Refinitiv estimated that Intel should have received $18.24 billion in revenue, but the total in the report was only $18.1 billion. Pat Gelsinger said that the reason for this result is the lack of auxiliary chips needed to manufacture computers.
The company’s management has promised to invest in the modernization of its semiconductor manufacturing plants.
Gelsinger also noted that he does not expect the end of the crisis and a return to the balance between supply and demand in the chip market until 2023.
Prospects for new video cards
At the beginning of 2021, the Intel DG1 discrete graphics card entered the market, which the company promised to supply to OEMs and system integrators for the assembly of finished computers.
The manufacturer’s first discrete graphics card in 20 years was described by journalists from the online publication Tom’s Hardware as «crossing the line between discrete and integrated graphics» and compared with the Nvidia GT 1030 and the integrated AMD Vega 8 video core.
Asus GECID.com
first Intel DG1 discrete graphics card in 20 years
Reviewers noted that the Intel DG1 is hardly interesting due to low performance and unstable work with errors at the software level. On August 16, the company promised to release «gaming» graphics cards of the Intel Arc line, capable of competing with Nvidia and AMD, in the first quarter of 2022.
Asus, Gigabyte and MSI will become partners in the release of new graphics processors for the manufacturer.
At the end of September, former lead AMD GPU architect Vinit Goel joined the Intel team. As vice president and general manager of Xe Architecture and IP Engineering Group, he led a team of specialists to develop, design, and verify the Intel Xe architecture roadmap.
In October, Intel inadvertently disclosed pricing for new GPUs in a raffle promo campaign that included the estimated market price of GPU bundles, Intel branded apparel, and an Xbox Game Pass subscription. According to journalists, the price for Intel Arc, depending on the model, will be from $650 to $850.
An amateur render of an Intel Arc Alchemist based on Moore’s Law is Dead
leaks
In May, Nvidia introduced software restrictions on mining on the RTX 3060, 3070 and 3080 series graphics cards and released a separate series of CMP cards for cryptocurrency production.
In October, Intel announced that it would not interfere with any way to work with its video cards, which put the company on a par with AMD, which also decided not to impose restrictions on miners.
According to Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, the new graphics cards will have a more powerful and energy efficient version of the core than AMD. According to him, with the Arc line, the company plans to “really put pressure” on Nvidia for the first time. About how many graphics cards Intel plans to bring to market, and what characteristics will be in different models, the manufacturer did not report.
Competitors Nvidia and AMD
According to Ars Technica, in the face of scarcity and high prices for graphics cards, users may be more likely to turn their attention to the yet untested line of Intel Arc. Speaking about the prospects of the new series, the journalists compared the company’s developments with the Nvidia RTX 3060 and AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT — graphics processors that are popular on the market due to the lack of other solutions.