Intel Arc A580 vs NVIDIA RTX A3000 Mobile Comparison

Where Each One Wins

The recorded benchmark data splits cleanly along workload type, but not in the way the raw numbers might suggest at first glance. The Intel Arc A580 takes both head-to-head victories in the database, winning the Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan tests outright. The NVIDIA RTX A3000 Mobile, however, holds a higher percentile ranking across all GPUs, sitting at the 91st percentile compared to the Arc A580's 87th percentile. That discrepancy between head-to-head losses and overall percentile placement hints at a broader performance distribution: the RTX A3000 Mobile may be more consistent across a wider range of tests, even if the specific recorded benchmarks favor Intel.

The Arc A580's wins are substantial. In Geekbench OpenCL, it scores 91657 against the RTX A3000 Mobile's 79091, a delta of 13.7 percent in Intel's favor. In Geekbench Vulkan, the gap widens to 22.9 percent, with the Arc A580 scoring 79381 versus 61189. These are compute-oriented workloads, and the Intel part clearly dominates there. The RTX A3000 Mobile, by contrast, has no recorded wins in the head-to-head section, yet its average benchmark score of 70140 is notably higher than the Arc A580's 57756. That average includes a broader set of tests, and the RTX A3000 Mobile's higher percentile suggests it performs better in aggregate across the full database, even though the two directly compared tests favor Intel.

Use-case split: if the workload is compute-heavy and uses Vulkan or OpenCL, the Arc A580 is the stronger choice based on the recorded data. If the workload is more varied or the GPU is expected to handle a diverse range of tasks, the RTX A3000 Mobile's higher average score and percentile indicate a more balanced profile. The RTX A3000 Mobile also draws far less power, 70 W versus 175 W, which makes it viable in portable or power-constrained systems where the Arc A580 would require a desktop power supply and dual 8-pin connectors.

Architecture Differences

The two GPUs come from fundamentally different design philosophies. The RTX A3000 Mobile is built on NVIDIA's Ampere architecture, using the GA104 chip fabricated on Samsung's 8 nm process. The Arc A580 uses Intel's Xe-HPG architecture with the DG2-512 chip on TSMC's 6 nm node. The process difference is meaningful: the Intel chip packs 21,700 million transistors into a 406 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 53.4 million per square millimeter. The NVIDIA chip has 17,400 million transistors on a 392 mm² die, for a density of 44.4 million per square millimeter. Intel's newer node gives it a density advantage of roughly 20 percent.

The memory subsystems differ significantly. The RTX A3000 Mobile has 6 GB of GDDR6 on a 192-bit bus, delivering 264.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The Arc A580 has 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, delivering 512.0 GB/s, nearly double the bandwidth. Clock speeds also favor Intel: the Arc A580 runs at a 1700 MHz base and 2000 MHz boost, while the RTX A3000 Mobile sits at 600 MHz base and 1230 MHz boost. Memory clocks tell a similar story, with the Arc A580 at 2000 MHz (16 Gbps effective) versus the RTX A3000 Mobile's 1375 MHz (11 Gbps effective).

The compute unit layouts are inverted in an interesting way. The RTX A3000 Mobile has more shading units, 4096 versus 3072, and more ray tracing cores, 32 versus 24, plus 128 tensor cores that the Arc A580 does not list at all. But the Arc A580 has more texture mapping units, 192 versus 128, and more raster operation units, 96 versus 64. The Intel part also has a much higher pixel rate, 192.0 GPixel/s versus 78.72 GPixel/s, and texture rate, 384.0 GTexel/s versus 157.4 GTexel/s. The FP32 throughput favors Intel at 12.29 TFLOPS versus 10.08 TFLOPS, and the FP16 gap is even larger: 24.58 TFLOPS versus 10.08 TFLOPS, since the Arc A580 runs FP16 at a 2:1 ratio while the RTX A3000 Mobile runs it at 1:1.

The RTX A3000 Mobile is a mobile part with no power connectors and a 70 W TDP, while the Arc A580 is a dual-slot desktop card requiring two 8-pin connectors and a 450 W suggested power supply. The NVIDIA part is end-of-life, released in 2021, with successor Ada-MW, while the Arc A580 is active, released in 2023, with successor Battlemage. The Intel card's display outputs include 1x HDMI 2.1 and 3x DisplayPort 2.0, while the RTX A3000 Mobile's outputs are listed as portable device dependent.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The two directly compared tests in the database both go to Intel, and the margins are decisive. In Geekbench OpenCL, the Arc A580 scores 91657, beating the RTX A3000 Mobile's 79091 by 13.7 percent. That is a clear win in a compute-heavy workload, and the raw score difference of 12,566 points is substantial in absolute terms. The Vulkan result is even more lopsided: 79381 for the Arc A580 versus 61189 for the RTX A3000 Mobile, a 22.9 percent gap.

The NVIDIA part's nearest rivals provide context for its positioning. The RTX A3000 Mobile's average score of 70140 sits just 0.2 percent above the NVIDIA Quadro P6000's 69986 and 0.4 percent above the AMD Radeon Pro WX 8200's 69870. It is 1 percent above the AMD Radeon RX 6600 LE's 70829? No, the delta is negative 1 percent, meaning the RX 6600 LE is actually 1 percent higher, and it leads the NVIDIA CMP 90HX's 69000 by 1.7 percent. These are tight margins, placing the RTX A3000 Mobile in a narrow band of similarly performing GPUs.

The Arc A580's rivals tell a different story. Its average score of 57756 is 0.6 percent below the AMD Radeon RX 5600 OEM's 58085, 0.7 percent above the AMD Radeon RX 9070 GRE's 57367, 0.8 percent below the Intel Arc A570M's 58239, and 1.1 percent below the AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT's 58392. The spread is again narrow, but the absolute scores are much lower than the RTX A3000 Mobile's rival group. The averages reflect this: the RTX A3000 Mobile's 70140 average is about 21.4 percent higher than the Arc A580's 57756. This is the central tension in the data: the Arc A580 wins the two specific tests, but the RTX A3000 Mobile has a higher overall average and percentile.

The FP32 and FP16 numbers add nuance. The Arc A580's FP32 throughput of 12.29 TFLOPS is 21.9 percent above the RTX A3000 Mobile's 10.08 TFLOPS, yet the OpenCL delta is only 13.7 percent, suggesting the RTX A3000 Mobile's tensor cores or driver efficiency close some of the theoretical gap. The FP16 comparison is stark: 24.58 TFLOPS versus 10.08 TFLOPS, a 144 percent advantage for Intel, but the recorded OpenCL test does not reflect that full margin, likely because the workload does not fully utilize the 2:1 FP16 rate.

The Verdict

The data presents two distinct profiles with no single overall winner. The Intel Arc A580 wins both head-to-head benchmarks, and it wins them by large margins, 13.7 percent in OpenCL and 22.9 percent in Vulkan. It also has substantially higher theoretical throughput, more memory bandwidth, double the memory capacity, and a more modern process node. For anyone running Vulkan or OpenCL compute workloads, the Arc A580 is the clear choice based on the recorded measurements.

The NVIDIA RTX A3000 Mobile counters with a higher average benchmark score, 70140 versus 57756, and a higher percentile, 91 versus 87. It also consumes 105 W less power, requires no power connectors, and is a mobile form factor, making it the only viable option for laptops or compact systems. Its tensor cores provide hardware acceleration that the Arc A580 does not list, and its 1:1 FP16 ratio, while lower in absolute throughput, may be preferable for workloads that need consistent precision without the 2:1 rate conversion.

The verdict depends entirely on the use case. For a desktop system where power draw and physical size are not constraints, and where the software uses Vulkan or OpenCL, the Arc A580 is the better performer. For a laptop, a power-constrained build, or a system running a diverse workload mix where the higher average score matters, the RTX A3000 Mobile is the safer choice. The Arc A580's wins are real but narrow in scope, covering only two tests, while the RTX A3000 Mobile's aggregate standing suggests broader competence across the full benchmark suite.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU wins the Geekbench OpenCL test?

A: The Intel Arc A580 wins with a score of 91657, beating the NVIDIA RTX A3000 Mobile's 79091 by 13.7 percent.

Q: How large is the Vulkan performance gap between the two?

A: The Arc A580 scores 79381 in Geekbench Vulkan, which is 22.9 percent higher than the RTX A3000 Mobile's 61189.

Q: Which GPU has the higher average benchmark score?

A: The RTX A3000 Mobile has an average benchmark score of 70140, compared to the Arc A580's 57756.

Q: What are the memory capacities and bandwidths?

A: The RTX A3000 Mobile has 6 GB of GDDR6 on a 192-bit bus with 264.0 GB/s bandwidth. The Arc A580 has 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus with 512.0 GB/s bandwidth.

Q: How do the power requirements compare?

A: The RTX A3000 Mobile has a 70 W TDP and requires no power connectors. The Arc A580 has a 175 W TDP, requires two 8-pin power connectors, and has a suggested power supply of 450 W.

Q: Which GPU has more shading units and ray tracing cores?

A: The RTX A3000 Mobile has 4096 shading units and 32 ray tracing cores. The Arc A580 has 3072 shading units and 24 ray tracing cores.

Specification Differences

| Specification | NVIDIA RTX A3000 Mobile | Intel Arc A580 |

|---|---|---|

| Architecture | Ampere | Xe-HPG |

| Chip | GA104 | DG2-512 |

| Process Node | 8 nm | 6 nm |

| Foundry | Samsung | TSMC |

| Transistors | 17,400 million | 21,700 million |

| Die Size | 392 mm² | 406 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 44.4M / mm² | 53.4M / mm² |

| Base Clock | 600 MHz | 1700 MHz |

| Boost Clock | 1230 MHz | 2000 MHz |

| Memory Clock | 1375 MHz (11 Gbps effective) | 2000 MHz (16 Gbps effective) |

| Memory Size | 6 GB | 8 GB |

| Memory Bus Width | 192 bit | 256 bit |

| Memory Bandwidth | 264.0 GB/s | 512.0 GB/s |

| Shading Units | 4096 | 3072 |

| TMUs | 128 | 192 |

| ROPs | 64 | 96 |

| Ray Tracing Cores | 32 | 24 |

| Tensor Cores | 128 | null |

| Pixel Rate | 78.72 GPixel/s | 192.0 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 157.4 GTexel/s | 384.0 GTexel/s |

| FP32 | 10.08 TFLOPS | 12.29 TFLOPS |

| FP16 | 10.08 TFLOPS (1:1) | 24.58 TFLOPS (2:1) |

| TDP | 70 W | 175 W |

| Slot Width | null | Dual-slot |

| Power Connectors | None | 2x 8-pin |

| Suggested PSU | null | 450 W |

| Display Outputs | Portable Device Dependent | 1x HDMI 2.1, 3x DisplayPort 2.0 |

| Production Status | End-of-life | Active |

| Release Date | 2021-04-11 | 2023-10-09 |

| Predecessor | Quadro Turing-M | Xe Graphics |

| Successor | Ada-MW | Battlemage |

| Percentile vs All GPUs | 91 | 87 |

| Average Benchmark Score | 70140 | 57756 |