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Yesterday we reported that Intel could be preparing to launch Battlemage in early December – ahead of AMD’s RDNA 4 and Nvidia’s Blackwell GPUs. Today, a shipping manifest at NBD – highlighted by user josefk972 at

Based on our testing, while a GPU’s retail case is probably the least likely thing you’d expect in the event of a pre-launch leak, it does highlight that Intel is working hard to ship these cases to the OEM. Battlemage, or Xe2, debuted with Intel’s Lunar Lake chips and held its own against AMD’s Strix Point offerings. The drivers have improved significantly, at least compared to Alchemist, but there are still a few issues that need to be fixed.

It seems that this manifesto has escaped us because it dates back to September 18. Intel has sent out packaging or retail boxes – measuring approximately 192mm x 89mm x 381mm for the Arc B580 – a budget offering from the Battlemage line. The case is relatively small but should be enough to accommodate a compact dual-slot GPU.

We still don’t know the specs, although Battlemage is rumored to feature three GPUs: Arc BMG-31, Arc BMG-20, and Arc BMG-G10. The BMG-31 would offer 32 Xe cores, bringing us 256 Xe vector engines or 4096 ALUs.

Intel will target the budget gaming segment, like AMD, with Xe2 on desktop to better penetrate the mainstream market. Team Blue needs serious value and incentives to gain the trust of the average consumer, such as higher VRAM capacities and competitive pricing. Initial leaks paint a positive picture as a 20-Xe2 core dGPU (dedicated GPU) beat the 28-Xe core based Arc A750 in a reference recently. RDNA 4 will likely be the most mature architecture as it builds on RDNA 3.5 – Battlemage’s competitor and is set to bring substantial changes to the RT department and AI capabilities.

With more leaks surfacing daily, the potential Battlemage announcement next month seems likely, but we still advise users to take this rumor with a pinch of salt. It makes sense for Intel to take advantage of the holiday season and make hay while the sun shines, but for that to happen it needs to be able to offer Battlemage in volume, at least until RDNA 4 and Blackwell are hitting the shelves.