AMD Radeon R9 M360 vs Intel Arc A380 Comparison

The Intel Arc A380 and AMD Radeon R9 M360 represent two very different eras of GPU design. The Arc A380 is a modern 6nm discrete graphics card built on Intel’s Xe-HPG architecture, while the R9 M360 is a legacy 28nm mobile-class chip based on AMD’s older GCN 1.0 architecture. Benchmark data shows a decisive performance gap, with the Arc A380 winning every available head-to-head test by a wide margin.

FAQ

Q: How does the Intel Arc A380 compare to the AMD Radeon R9 M360 in OpenCL performance?

A: The Arc A380 scores 38,224 in Geekbench OpenCL, while the R9 M360 scores 8,211. This gives Intel a 365.5% advantage, making the Arc A380 roughly 4.65 times faster in this compute workload.

Q: What is the difference in Vulkan benchmark scores?

A: In Geekbench Vulkan, the Arc A380 achieves 36,736 points versus 8,047 for the R9 M360. The delta is 356.5% in favor of Intel, indicating a similar magnitude of superiority as seen in OpenCL.

Q: Which GPU has a higher overall benchmark percentile ranking?

A: The Arc A380 sits at the 44th percentile among all GPUs, while the R9 M360 ranks at the 42nd percentile. Despite the massive performance gap in specific tests, their overall percentile rankings are close.

Q: What are the closest rivals to each card based on average benchmark scores?

A: For the Arc A380, the nearest rival is the AMD FirePro W5170M with an average score of 8,595, which is 0.4% behind. For the R9 M360, the closest competitor is the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950M with an average score of 8,135, which is 0.1% behind.

Q: What is the average benchmark score for each GPU?

A: The Arc A380 has an average benchmark score of 8,558, while the R9 M360 averages 8,129. The Arc A380 is 5.3% higher on average across all recorded benchmarks.

Q: Which card supports newer graphics APIs?

A: The Arc A380 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, whereas the R9 M360 only supports DirectX 12 (11_1) and Vulkan 1.2.170. The Intel card is also rated for 12 Ultimate features, while AMD’s is not.

The Verdict

The data is unambiguous: the Intel Arc A380 outperforms the AMD Radeon R9 M360 in every recorded benchmark. In Geekbench OpenCL, Intel leads by 365.5%, and in Vulkan, the lead is 356.5%. Neither of these tests goes to AMD. For users seeking modern compute performance, the Arc A380 is the only choice between the two.

However, the R9 M360’s slightly lower percentile ranking (42nd vs 44th) suggests that its legacy architecture still holds its own relative to the full GPU landscape. The Arc A380’s nearest rivals include the AMD FirePro W5170M and NVIDIA GeForce MX330, while the R9 M360 competes closely with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950M. The Arc A380 is end-of-life and has a successor in Battlemage, but it remains a far more capable part than the older R9 M360.

Pick the Intel Arc A380 if you need current feature support, higher memory bandwidth, or significantly better compute results. Pick the AMD Radeon R9 M360 only if you are constrained to a system that requires its specific GCN 1.0 driver stack or PCIe 3.0 interface. The benchmark results do not support any scenario where the R9 M360 is the faster option.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head comparison includes two tests, and the Intel Arc A380 wins both. The largest victory comes in Geekbench OpenCL, where the Arc A380 scores 38,224 against 8,211 for the R9 M360. That is a delta of 365.5%, meaning Intel delivers more than four times the compute throughput in this workload. The gap is nearly as large in Geekbench Vulkan: the Arc A380 scores 36,736, while the R9 M360 trails at 8,047, a 356.5% difference.

These results align with the raw specifications. The Arc A380 has 1,024 shading units, 64 TMUs, and 32 ROPs, while the R9 M360 has 512 shading units, 32 TMUs, and 16 ROPs. In terms of raw throughput, the Arc A380 produces 4.198 TFLOPS of FP32 compute versus 947.2 GFLOPS for the AMD part. Texture and pixel rates follow suit: the Intel card hits 131.2 GTexel/s and 65.60 GPixel/s, while the R9 M360 manages only 29.60 GTexel/s and 14.80 GPixel/s.

The average benchmark scores tell a similar story, though with a narrower margin. The Arc A380 averages 8,558 points across all recorded tests, while the R9 M360 averages 8,129 points. That is a 5.3% overall advantage for Intel. Notably, the Arc A380’s nearest rival (AMD FirePro W5170M) is only 0.4% behind, whereas the R9 M360’s nearest rival (NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950M) is 0.1% behind. This indicates both cards sit in a crowded performance tier, but the Arc A380 leads within that tier.

Specification Differences

The two GPUs differ substantially in memory configuration. The Arc A380 uses 6 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 96-bit bus, yielding 186.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The R9 M360 uses 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus, which provides only 72.00 GB/s. Even though AMD has a wider bus, the much slower memory clock (4.5 Gbps effective vs 15.5 Gbps effective) results in less than half the bandwidth.

Clock speeds also favor Intel significantly. The Arc A380 runs at a base clock of 2000 MHz and boosts to 2050 MHz, while the R9 M360 runs at 900 MHz base and 925 MHz boost. That is more than a 2x difference in raw clock speed. The compute unit counts follow: 1024 shading units on Intel versus 512 on AMD. The Arc A380 also has 8 RT cores, while the R9 M360 has none.

The bus interface differs as well. The Arc A380 connects via PCIe 4.0 x8, whereas the R9 M360 uses PCIe 3.0 x16. While the older card has more lanes, the newer PCIe 4.0 standard on Intel’s side offers higher per-lane bandwidth. The Arc A380 has a TDP of 75 W and requires a 250 W suggested PSU, while the R9 M360 has no listed TDP or power connector data.

The process technology is a major differentiator. Intel uses a 6 nm TSMC process with 7,200 million transistors on a 157 mm² die, giving a transistor density of 45.9M per mm². AMD uses a 28 nm TSMC process with 1,500 million transistors on a 123 mm² die, resulting in 12.2M per mm². The Arc A380 is also a dual-slot card with a 222 mm length, while dimensions for the R9 M360 are not listed.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gap between these two GPUs is generational. Intel’s Arc A380 is based on the Xe-HPG architecture, specifically the DG2-128 chip, and belongs to the Alchemist generation (Arc 3). AMD’s R9 M360 is based on the GCN 1.0 architecture with the Tropo chip, part of the Gem System (R9 M300) generation. Intel’s architecture is newer by roughly seven years, as the release dates show: June 2022 for Intel versus May 2015 for AMD.

The Arc A380 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. The R9 M360 supports DirectX 12 (11_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.2.170. The Intel card also includes 8 dedicated RT cores for hardware ray tracing, which the AMD card lacks entirely. Neither card has tensor cores listed.

Memory technology reflects the architectural divide. Intel uses GDDR6 with a 15.5 Gbps effective data rate, while AMD uses GDDR5 with a 4.5 Gbps effective rate. The Intel card’s memory clock is 1937 MHz compared to 1125 MHz on AMD. The FP16 compute capability also differs: the Arc A380 delivers 8.397 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio), while the R9 M360 has no FP16 data listed.

In terms of production status, both are end-of-life. However, the Arc A380’s predecessor is Xe Graphics and its successor is Battlemage, while the R9 M360’s predecessor is Solar System and its successor is Polaris Mobile. The Arc A380 also has a launch MSRP of 149 USD, which is not available for the R9 M360. The display outputs differ as well: the Arc A380 offers 1x HDMI 2.1 and 3x DisplayPort 2.0, while the R9 M360 has no listed display output specifications.