Intel Highlights Their Progress On Arc Graphics Drivers Since Launch

[rogerx]

The deal breaker is that you cannot even get a box (pc, server, workstation) to even post with an ARC if any virtualization is enabled in the bios:

What?? Bull crap?!?

My 2012 Ivy bridge platform is doing just fine with CPU virtualization features enabled!

Shrugs... I do not see how virtualization feature would hinder a graphics card.

The article pointed to by support specifies "Graphics Virtualization" function. Ditto with another poster here, likely graphics PCI pass-through, and is still very experimental after many years later, from what I hear.

If you have any HDMI connections connected to the Intel Arc card, I would remove all HDMI connections and try using only DisplayPort connectors. Temporarily remove any DisplayPort HDMI adapters as well. Blatantly put, I found some trivial problems when using HDMI connectors, and migrated to using only DisplayPorts on the Arc card. I'm also now using a DisplayPort to HDMI adapter as well for secondary displays. Once using only DisplayPorts (and no HDMI ports) on the Arc card, everything seems to be working smoothly!

Could also be a vendor bios problem as others have posted.

My only gripe, when using X/Xorg zaphoid, with zahoid would export different $DISPLAY variables for each connected display for easily starting applications via one display terminal.

[Radtraveller]

What?? Bull crap?!?

My 2012 Ivy bridge platform is doing just fine with virtualization enabled

Shrugs... I do not see how virtualization feature would hinder a graphics card.

The article pointed to by support specifies "Graphics Virtualization" function. Ditto with another poster here, likely graphics PCI pass-through, and is very experimental still after years from what I hear.

If you have any HDMI connections to the Intel Arc card, I would remove all HDMI connections and try using only DisplayPort connections. Temporarily remove any DisplayPort HDMI adapters as well. I found some trivial problems with using HDMI connectors, and migrated to using only DisplayPorts on the Arc card. I'm also now using a DisplayPort to HDMI adapter as well. Once only DisplayPorts and no HDMI ports on the Arc card, everything seems to be working smoothly!

My only gripe, when using X/Xorg zaphoid, with zahoid would export different $DISPLAY variables for each connected display for easily starting applications via one display terminal.

Argue with the intel rep then. (or dell). Been building PCs since the 8086 days. Probably longer than you have been alive.
When a PC refuses to even post in a machine that is configured AS YOU NEED IT TO BE, it just means that card is not for that machine.
xorg, windows, whatever, doesn’t make a difference when the machine won’t even post with the card in (and yes, I tried all the outputs)
and no, I did not remove the other cards in the system. Moved them around, but not remove.. those others are more important to the FUNCTIONING of the workstation and I can just get a different video card and it just works.

Maybe the vendors will fix their crap.
Maybe not.
It doesn’t matter.
I went with an nvidia that works just fine for this machine, as is, with all the other devices, and configurations, I need in place.

"…….""
Hello radtraveller

Thank you for the information provided. Please let's try the following:

1.-Could you please confirm if you were able to test disabling virtualization in Bios? I understand you are not planning to use video virtualization, however, this is important to discard possible causes of the issue.
Best Regards,

Hugo O.

Intel Customer Support Technician.

Hugo,
Thanks, but if I cannot use the card with virtualization enabled in this machine, testing with it disabled is just a waste of my time.
radtraveller..

[Nille_kungen]

Oh look, we became 43% faster in D3D9 (by utilizing the open source project DXVK). Bugger off, Intel.

I think it was the upgrade to a newer DXVK release that was behind most of the DX9 performance boost for windows.
DXVK 2 did bring improvements that also reduced stutter.

[thebear]

on fedora 37 the intel arc a380 runs in software rendering at 1024x800 pixel and fedora 38 is still 3-4 months away.

fedora 37 uses 6.0 kernel? In that case you need to forceprobe the i915 driver. see e.g. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/intel_graphics

(I run 4K 60Hz on debian bookworm using A380, though I have trouble getting HuC to load according to dmesg)

[yump]

I didn’t turn off the virtualization to “test” because there is absolutely no point in me doing so for this machine.
This is my workstation with many vms.

So you don't actually know if virtualization is incompatible or not.

When you say "you can't get a box to post if any virtualization is enabled in the BIOS," that's a guess by a phone Karen based on suggested troubleshooting steps that you didn't even attempt and might have been merely diagnostic, or a recycled support script from 10 years ago, or based on problems with prototype hardware fixed in later steppings.

I realize you are mad at Intel and want to damage Arc's reputation, but when you conceal important information until 3 posts in the only reputation you damage is your own.

[Radtraveller]

So you don't actually know if virtualization is incompatible or not.

When you say "you can't get a box to post if any virtualization is enabled in the BIOS," that's a guess by a phone Karen based on suggested troubleshooting steps that you didn't even attempt and might have been merely diagnostic, or a recycled support script from 10 years ago, or based on problems with prototype hardware fixed in later steppings.

I realize you are mad at Intel and want to damage Arc's reputation, but when you conceal important information until 3 posts in the only reputation you damage is your own.

So you take a partial sentence and “quote” out of context?
what I said is with THIS CARD installed, the box wouldn’t post with bios virtual extensions enabled.
I did NOT say the box wouldn’t post “if any virtualization is enabled in the bios”

Those two are VERY different statements.

I am neither “mad” at intel nor dell really.
Wanting them to fix it? Sure…
I am just reporting a use case where this card does not work in a specific environment.

[yump]

So you take a partial sentence and “quote” out of context?
what I said is with THIS CARD installed, the box wouldn’t post with bios virtual extensions enabled.
I did NOT say the box wouldn’t post “if any virtualization is enabled in the bios”

Those two are VERY different statements.

I didn't say you said that. I said you said you didn't even try the card with virtualization disabled.

The only reason you suspect that the box not posting with the card in might have anything to do with virtualization is that support suggested that you try turning it off, but since you bailed out of the troubleshooting process you don't know if it's even relevant.

It's like... Imagine you had a Ryzen box that wouldn't post, and support told you to try booting with only one stick of RAM installed. Imagine you got mad and refused to try it, assumed that meant Ryzen CPUs in general are incompatible with dual-channel memory, and then went on the internet and told people Ryzen sucks because it only has a 64-bit memory interface.

[rogerx]

Argue with the intel rep then. (or dell). Been building PCs since the 8086 days. Probably longer than you have been alive.
When a PC refuses to even post in a machine that is configured AS YOU NEED IT TO BE, it just means that card is not for that machine.
xorg, windows, whatever, doesn’t make a difference when the machine won’t even post with the card in (and yes, I tried all the outputs)
and no, I did not remove the other cards in the system. Moved them around, but not remove.. those others are more important to the FUNCTIONING of the workstation and I can just get a different video card and it just works.

Maybe the vendors will fix their crap.
Maybe not.
It doesn’t matter.
I went with an nvidia that works just fine for this machine, as is, with all the other devices, and configurations, I need in place.

Two more things to remember, video cards are built for either Legacy BIOS or EFI, or both.

Most nVidia cards are built for both, Legacy BIOS and EFI BIOS support. Not sure about the most recent nVidia cards such as the RTX models. Find this is the best method for selling/supporting most platforms.

Most AMD cards are EFI BIOS only supported, and will boot only using EFI. While booting on a Legacy BIOS platform will result with your exact displayed hardware symptoms, a completely blank screen with likely only back lighting/cursor visible. I ran into this with a legacy bios Dell desktop computer as well!! God how I dislike AMD for not advertising this, as they costed me money, similar to false advertising.

I'm not sure about the recent Intel ARC video cards, but am pretty sure the ARC video cards are only EFI BIOS supported, having no legacy BIOS support. Intel also boasts their ARC cards are only for recent platforms, although it has been frequently stated the cards will work fine on older (non-EFI?) platforms.

Additionally, there are sometimes either, similar to USB devices, faulty PCI ports or faulty PCI cards. Consider this a knack of the trade, whenever having USB device problems, check everything. PCI ports can be really finicky, with what devices are plugged into them, as the PCI ports auto negotiate link/speed rates and sometimes disable themselves when certain PCI ports are utilized. Easiest method for troubleshooting if you need a certain card, yank/disconnect all PCI cards (or devices) not needed, only using the needed PCI card. This verifies whether or not the PCI card will ever work, regardless of configuration.

Regardless, the nVidia RTX 3060 was my second choice, however I am so glad and thankful I did not have to waste another $300-400 on such a card I would never use much wtihin MS Windows. Having native open source drivers (or at most closed sourced firmware) is far better and easier. If you did purchase an nVidia card, I'm sorry for hearing about your future not expected (potentially not readily fixed) kernel panics and system crashes/freezes. If you purchase an AMD, good luck finding the right firmwares/drivers, as my eyes tended to go cross-eyed after reading the AMD Linux driver documentation.

I think those rarely using Linux or other operating systems, without a budget, will likely just buy into nVidia.

Those using operating systems other than MS Windows most of the time, will more likely use Intel cards.

AMD is another option for those using other operating systems.

[yump]

Most AMD cards are EFI BIOS only supported, and will boot only using EFI. While booting on a Legacy BIOS platform will result with your exact displayed hardware symptoms, a completely blank screen with likely only back lighting/cursor visible. I ran into this with a legacy bios Dell desktop computer as well!! God how I dislike AMD for not advertising this, as they costed me money, similar to false advertising.

Weirdest thing -- my RX 580 has vBIOS switch, and aside from the power/frequency/fan differences, one of the vBIOSes supports legacy BIOS, while the other does not. I bought it from a cryptocurrency miner on eBay who may have re-flashed it, possibly more than once, so I don't know if it was like this from the factory.

[Dopefish]

So I recently built an Intel budget gaming PC around Raptor Lake using the B760 chipset and installed Intel Arc A770 graphics on it.

I was able to enable VT-x virtualization on it and it posted just fine. Methinks the particular system that was giving Radtraveller issues was a one off based on their specific configuration.