Intel Arc board partner MAXSUN working on custom-design graphics card with M.2 Gen 4 NVMe slots

MAXSUN, a board partner of Intel Arc, recently announced that they are developing an Arc B580 graphics card with two M.2 Gen 4 NVMe slots on the card. This allows users to utilize the unused 8 lanes from the x16 PEG slot to connect a pair of SSDs, as the B580 has a PCIe Gen 4 x8 host interface. Previous renders of the card showed two M.2 slots protruding from the PCB, with an aluminum heatsink cooling the SSDs under airflow from the fans. Now, the first image of the PCB has been revealed.

A report from Tom's Hardware unveiled the first image of the card, leaked on Chinese social media. The image shows an 18 cm-long PCB with two M.2 Gen 4 slots at the end. PCIe interface traces can be seen connecting the x16 PEG interface to the M.2 slots. Key components of the card include the "BMG-G21" ASIC, six GDDR6 memory chips, and a 6-phase VRM. Power is supplied through two 8-pin PCIe power connectors, with the second connector potentially helping manage the card's power budget. The B580 has a power limit of 190 W, and each M.2 Gen 4 SSD has a peak power draw of around 10 W. This isn't the first time M.2 slots have been included on graphics cards, as the ASUS DUAL GeForce RTX 4060 Ti SSD OC also featured this concept, albeit with only one M.2 slot.