Intel offering Core i7-12700K/i5-12600K alternative CPU prizes to Arc Scavenger Hunt winners

Intel suggests how much Arc GPUs might cost

Intel Xe-HPG Scavenger Hunt began on March 2021 and lasted for many months afterwards. Groups of enthusiasts, discord fans or even press reviewers (yes, really) spent countless hours to win the Hunt and get their hands on Intel Arc GPUs before others. It’s August 2022 already and there the prizes were still not delivered to the 300 winners.

Intel is now offering an alternative to the winners. Instead of the Arc A7-series GPUs (grand prize is A770 GPU and first prize is A750), winners can now choose Core i7-12700K or Core i5-12600K CPUs instead. This information is interesting for many reasons, mainly because we can finally pinpoint how much are Arc GPUs going to cost.

The i7-12700K MSRP is 409 USD while i5-12600K is 289 USD. This means that Arc A770 and A750 pricing should correspond to Core CPU pricing more or less. The flagship A770 GPU might cost less than 410 USD, which is a great price for 16GB GPU for sure. Naturally we don’t expect Core CPU pricing to be exactly the same as Arc A7 series, but this should be a very good estimate.

Intel email to Xe-HPG Scavenger Hunt winners, Source: Intel

This email is a follow-up to those who selected an alternative prize instead of the Arc GPU earlier. Furthermore, since the alternative prizes are now known, Intel is offering winners to opt back in for the Arc GPU prize. If winners chose the CPU alternative, these will ship before Arc A7 GPU launch, which is ‘very close’ as per Intel email.

Scavenger Hunt winners must make a choice by August 19th, but it’s unclear how this date correlates with Arc GPU launch because the company is pretty silent about its ‘later this summer’ launch. Rumors suggest these cards should not become available till September at least, which is just a month before NVIDIA ships their next-gen GPUs.

Source: Intel