AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX/XT review: High-end graphics card with non-ray chasing and slightly better cost performance than RTX4080

AMD’s first RDNA 3 architecture GPU with Multi-Chip-Module, multi-chip module (MCM) technology: Radeon RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT are officially released and Taiwan channel retails at NT$35,550 / 29,990. see it The performance can reach the high-end market occupied by the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 series!

AMD Radeon RX 7900 Series GPU Specifications

public design

Both the Radeon RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT use a 2.5-thick, three-slot fan radiator. The central cooling element is a large-area vapor chamber with dense fins, while the periphery is covered with a thick sandblasted and blackened aluminum frame. it seems unobtrusive and stable. The 3 lugs near the power contacts are specially decorated in red which is a nice finishing touch.

In terms of power, the 12VHPWR power connector is not imported, and only 2 sets of 8-pin PCIe power terminals are used. The main difference is that the RX 7900 XTX has a total card consumption of 355W, so the radiator height is slightly higher than that of the RX 7900 XT.

It is worth mentioning that RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT are the first GPUs in the market to introduce DisplayPort 2.1. Compared with the current DisplayPort 1.4, which can only output 4K 240Hz video and 8K 60Hz in DSC mode, DisplayPort 2.1 can provide videos up to 4K 240Hz and 8K 165Hz.

Testing environment

For the next test, we used the former flagship Radeon RX 6950 XT priced at US$1099 and the rival NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Founder’s Edition priced at US$1199 as a comparison to see the performance of Radeon RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT Drop point.

3DMark

Let’s first look at the indicative execution points of 3DMark.

In Time Spy and Time Spy Extreme tests simulating DirectX 12 games, Radeon RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT GPU scores increased by nearly 30% and nearly 13% compared to RX 6950 XT. When compared to the GeForce RTX 4080, the RX 7900 XTX is either almost tied or winning by 1%, while the RX 7900 XT is about 12% behind.

The Speed ​​​​Way test simulating DirectX 12 Ultimate gaming incorporates ray tracing, so the RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT is up 46% and 25% compared to the RX 6950 XT, but will fall behind by 20% compared to the RTX 4080% and 30%.

The Port Royal test is also a game of simulated ray tracing: the RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT is up 43% and 23% over the RX 6950 XT, and is 11% and 24% behind the RTX 4080.

Finally, seeing the DXR test of purely ray tracing performance calculation, RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT has grown by 63% and 40% compared to RX 6950 XT, but still lags behind RTX 4080 by 44% and by 52%.

legacy rasterized games

In the non-ray tracing gaming environment, the performance of RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT is quite impressive, with a total average growth of 33% and 11% compared to RX 6950 XT.

It is very interesting to match the RTX 4080. Taking 4K resolution with the highest GPU load as an example, RX 7900 XTX can drive up to 20% in “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II” (Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II) , “F1 22” and “Border Also Forbidden 3” ( Borderlands 3) leads by about 16%.

Other games are mutually beneficial: In the total of 21 games tested, the RX 7900 XTX is only about 2% better than the RTX 4080, while the RX 7900 XT averages about 15% less.

Competitive first person shooter

From the measured data, it seems that the RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT has not yet completed the optimization of these two games, and some scores are even lagging behind the RX 6950 XT, and it may need to wait for future game adjustments. driver update.

ray tracing games

The ray tracing capability of RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT has actually grown a lot Compared to RX 6950 XT, the overall gaming performance has increased by 40% and 17%, respectively, but it is still significantly lower than RTX 4080, lagging behind 16% and 30% respectively.

FSR games

Compared with NVIDIA’s leading AI technology DLSS super-resolution function, the AMD camp will introduce Temporal Upscaling FSR time scaling technology, and games with this function can also be opened to NVIDIA GPUs, allowing low-end GPUs to achieve this goal feature High resolution game environment.

In the heavy-duty 4K ray tracing game, RX 7900 XTX / RX 7900 XT can double the frame rate per second by activating FSR to the maximum, resulting in a 50% + FPS increase. In God of War without ray tracing, FPS with FSR 2.0 also increased from 23% to 30%.

In addition, compared with DLSS, except “Cyberpunk 2077”, “F1 22”, “Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales” (Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales) which were imported into DLSS 3 because the generation FPS frame rate is much higher, and the FPS performance of other FSRs and DLSS 2s is quite similar.

Energy consumption vs. temperature

By connecting the power contacts and PCIe slot to detect the actual power, the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT compared to the RX 6950 XT, the power consumption still decreases after the performance growth, which shows that the energy efficiency has improved a lot. But they are still slightly superior to RTX 4080.

Also, when the radiator size is smaller than the original RTX 4080 version, the GPU chip temperature during RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT burn-in is effectively well controlled, but the memory temperature reaches 88°C. and 86°C is slightly higher.

However, the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT’s three fans run at full load speeds of over 1700 rpm during burn-in, and the noise is actually slightly more noticeable than that of the RTX 4080 Founding Edition, which has two fans. with a speed of only 1300 rpm, but it is generally used The environment is usually covered by the system case fans, so don’t worry too much.

Recap

Faced with NVIDIA’s offensive, AMD chose to avoid the more powerful GeForce RTX 4090, Rdeon RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT priced at US$999/899, and besieged the GeForce RTX 4080 priced at US$ 1199, which is pretty smart.

When the RX 7900 XTX doesn’t turn on ray tracing, the total average is only about 2% better than the RTX 4080. While it feels good, it’s $200 cheaper than the RTX 4080. And in specific games, the RX 7900 XTX can even outperform the RTX 4080 by 15% to 20%. If the games you play often are among them, the RX 7900 XTX actually has a good price/performance ratio.

In addition, if the power connector is not replaced with 12VHPWR, using RX 7900 series, there is no need to consider a dedicated power cord or buy a new ATX 3.0 power supply. The upgrade threshold is much lower than that of RTX 4080 / RTX 4090 .

But looking back on the RX 7900 XT is a bit of a shame: after all, you only need to spend 11% more than your initial budget to buy the RX 7900 XTX and you can get 20% more performance. more on the RX 7900 XT if allowed.

Ray tracing is still AMD’s sweet spot, and if you’re a fan of crazy light-chasing games, then the RX 7900 series isn’t for you.

AMD can be expected to introduce two new technologies in the first half of 2023.

The first is FSR 3, which will introduce Fluid Motion Frames similar to NVIDIA DLSS 3 frame generation and boost the overall FPS by interpolating frames, and the performance can reach double that of FSR 2. Then there is HYPR-RX, which is similar to NVIDIA Reflex technology, which adjusts the game rendering queue through the driver to achieve the effect of reducing latency.

The combination of the two technologies above should bring significant performance improvements to the Radeon RX 7900 series GPUs, so let’s wait and see!