General Discussions

[kingfish]

MD unveiled its new Radeon RX 5700 line of graphics cards with 7nm chips at E3 last month, and with just days to go before they launch on July 7th, the company has announced new pricing. In the "spirit" of competition that it says is "heating up" in the graphics market -- specifically NVIDIA's "Super" new RTX cards -- all three versions of the graphics card will be cheaper than we thought.

The standard Radeon RX 5700 with 36 compute units and speeds of up to 1.7GHz was originally announced at $379, but will instead hit shelves at $349 -- the same price as NVIDIA's RTX 2060. The 5700 XT card that brings 40 compute units and up to 1.9GHz speed will be $50 cheaper than expected, launching at $399. The same goes for the 50th Anniversary with a slightly higher boost speed and stylish gold trim that will cost $449 instead of $499.

That's enough to keep them both cheaper than the $499 RTX 2070 Super -- we'll have to wait for the performance reviews to find out if it's enough to make sure they're still relevant.

AMD fires back at 'Super' NVIDIA with Radeon RX 5700 price cuts 

[hardcoregames_]

black_zion wrote:

There's also a bug with 19.12.3 where if you use Windows Snip (Win + Shift + S) to take screenshots or snippets, it causes the screen to turn black for a second or two after you start.

Win+Prt/Scn can make screenshot that does not cause a TDR fault

I think the snipping is more of a problem with Windows than the driver

[Anonymous]

Comment edited to preserve sanity.

Never seen the AMD driver in such a mess in all my years, and this guy Andrej Zdravkovic gets a payrise?

[hardcoregames_]

john007 wrote:

Never seen the AMD driver in such a mess in all my years, this guy Andrej Zdravkovic, what a ****877ng tool.

Told you they all a bunch of scam artists.

At least installing them from the INF works

I do not understand what is going on it the installer that is causing problems

The simple, copy INF and driver components to /windows/system32 and prompt to reboot

[Anonymous]

We have no issues installing the drivers, the main problem is stability, the 20.x.x driver is trash.

[ajlueke]

Agreed.  I installed 19.12.2 on my Radeon VII based system with a clean install of windows.  The driver causes hard hangs when just idling on the desktop.  Previous drivers would crash when overclocking the Radeon VII,  but now they are completely unstable.

The last stable driver for the Radeon VII including overclocking was the 19.4 release for me.  They seem to be getting worse instead of better though.

[ajlueke]

And also,  I was looking in the drivers on my Athlon 200GE based system and noticed this.

Really?  A Radeon VII and Ryzen 3950X are "recommended" to play Rollercoaster tycoon classic?  Is there even an algorithm behind this feature?  Or does it just recommend the highest end hardware supported by the socket you are using?

[black_zion]

Also as a reminder, Windows Update, at least until 1H2020 update comes down in a few months (if then), Windows 10 will download drivers. The proper place to disable them is in the group policy editor (gpedit.msc at Run prompt), Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, Windows Components, Windows Update, and "Do not include drivers with Windows Updates".

[hardcoregames_]

drivers on windows update are usually working fine

its new beta drivers that are more of a headache

[black_zion]

Another day, another batch of rumors about nVidia's upcoming cards, which aren't that hard to believe, except the possibility of a 20GB RTX 3080, mainly because of the cost of GDDR6 thanks to new consoles. One thing that's been relatively constant is that nVidia is expected to do an official reveal in March and start selling them around July, while AMD is not expected to reveal "Big Navi" until Computex in June.

One thing's for sure though, we are all going to lose with yet another generation of sky high prices...

https://www.wccftech.com/nvidia-ampere-gpu-geforce-rtx-3080-3070-specs-rumor/

[hardcoregames_]

GA100 has not been noticed on the NVIDIA developer forums yet so it probably not taped out.

[Anonymous]

So if you purchase a 5600 are you forced onto the 20.x.x driver? If that's the case then I feel sorry for anyone who purchased.

[colesdav]

And a BIOS Flash.

[pokester]

Based on what they have done in the past I would say that yes that is correct you would be locked into whatever driver is current or is released at launch whichever has the compatibility. 

[colesdav]

If you watch the entire Gamers Nexus video it explains the details about the BIOS flashing and the reasons, according to them.
I will not be buying an RX5600XT anyhow, but some people might want to so I thought it was important that they see that video.

[colesdav]

I don't know what Norton Antivirus Market Share is. 

Lets see what it thinks about numbers of AMD Adrenalin Driver Downloads for Windows 10:

Adrenalin 2020 20.1.4 = Less than 5 users.

Adrenalin 2020 20.1.3 = Less than 5 users.

Adrenalin 2020 20.1.2 = Thousands

Adrenalin 2020 20.1.1 = Thousands.

Adrenalin 2020 19.12.3 = Tens of thousands.

Adrenalin 2020 19.12.2 = Thousands.

And for Incremental installs I tried - Adrenalin 2020 19.12.2 = Tens of thousands.

Adrenalin 2020 19.12.3 = Tens of thousands.


Those numbers seem very low to me.

[hardcoregames_]

After a few too many BSOD i installed 19.12.2 manually as the installer wanted to install a know bad driver.

It is not clear what is causing the BSOD problems as every error in the book has been seen.

[black_zion]

Here's some interesting news out of the Linux camp. Valve has managed to boost performance in Linux of the first generation AMD GCN video cards (HD 7000 series) in the upcoming Mesa 20 by 9%. That's not an insignificant performance improvement for 8 year old cards.

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=radv-aco-gcn10&num=1

[colesdav]

I worked on testing Steam Play for Linux.
Doom was running pretty well back then.
This is good news.
It is a pity that no one could fix the OpenCL drivers on those HD7900 and R9 280X Tahiti GPUs so they could still be used  as Blender Compute cards.
Steam :: Steam for Linux :: Help us test ACO, a new Mesa shader compiler for AMD graphics!  

[colesdav]

Here is the post I put out on the forum. There are videos of the testing available:
https://community.amd.com/message/2919350 

[colesdav]

Here are the test video results:
https://community.amd.com/message/2875622 

[pokester]

That is really great. I love how well they are optimizing. All game engines should do this. I still look at how well Doom did in Vulkan on my 7950 staying at around 60fps and 1080p. Just amazing for a card so old. I wish the whole industry would just move to Vulkan only. 

[ajlueke]

It is unfortunate about the state of the the software.  There are some great deals on the 5700 XT THICC III right now.

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/xfx-thicc-iii-ultra-amd-radeon-rx-5700-xt-8gb-gddr6-pci-express-4-0-gra... 

$390 for one of the quietest, coolest 5700 XT around is a great deal.  I have noticed it is available at my local shop for $350, and was considering it for my living room system.  But between the software issues and the HDMI audio issue, I may have to reconsider.

[black_zion]

Not really a great deal when you consider it costs twice as much as its predecessor, barely competes against a two year old competitor card, lacks features of said competitor card, and features quite likely the most stupid name ever given to a hardware product...

[black_zion]

Another day, another bit of information about nVidia's next generation of cards, this time from Brad Wheeler, the vice president of information technology and chief information officer at Indiana University, when talking about their new supercomputer Big Red 200. It appears that nVidia's next generation professional cards, which will be based on the same architecture as consumer variants, should have 70-75% more performance of Volta, and 50% or more performance improvements compared to the Volta revision known as Turing. This same computer which uses 1344 AMD's EPYC 7742 processors.

Big Navi isn't looking so big these days...

https://www.wccftech.com/nvidia-next-gen-ampere-gpu-75-percent-faster-existing-gpus/

[pokester]

Looks good. AMD will continue to play catchup unless they really surprise us with some unannounced product. Even then who cares if the drivers are as they are now. 

[ajlueke]

Looks like it sits between the RTX 2060 Super, and 2070 Super on average, being much closer to the latter than the former.  The latter also retails for about $100 more, so yes, seems like a solid deal.  If I'm not mistaken, those competitor cards are both less than a year old.  Considering the original RTX series isn't even a year and a half old, I'm not sure exactly which competitor cards you are referencing.

What wouldn't be a great deal is constant black screens and stuttering audio.  

[pokester]

One tip I have for scoring a good deal on a GPU is to watch a local Micro Center daily for open box deals. I have bought my last few cards this way. All of the cards have been fine an I saved a hundred bucks of my 2070 super and 60 off my 2060 and that was a week after launch. Those deals pop up a lot if you keep an eye out. Not sure if other similar stores like them post the in store inventories like they do though. Just pointing this out because if you save 50 bucks off the card then that cards overclocks way better and the drivers are good then it's a win, win, win. 

[black_zion]

Also, more bad news. It appears that on February 4th there will be a new Raise The Game bundle...In what reality is AMD living in? nVidia is posing record profits while AMD missed analyst predictions, and their answer is "free" games...

https://www.fudzilla.com/news/gaming/50227-amd-preparing-new-raise-the-game-bundle-with-up-to-three-games

[pokester]

I wish they would all stop this nonsense and just lower the card price instead. It would be far more competitive. Plus most the time you don't even want one or any of the games. Even worse it is another opportunity for AMD to give itself a black eye once again with redemption issues. I was never able to get most of my free games over the years. Granted I didn't jump through all the hoops to make them do it (I did the first time but gave up after) as it just isn't worth my time. Can't understand how 3 free games on the cheaper card makes sense?

[ajlueke]

Yeah, I would have to agree.  I don't really care much for the bundles, as my time these days between work and kids is pretty limited.  Most of the free games I get, I wind up barely playing, because I didn't program my Gladiator MkII HOTAS into Mechwarrior 5 for nothing.  I personally haven't had any problems redeeming games, I just find they don't add much value.

Right now, with other bonuses and discounts, the THIC III comes to $313.  I guess if the audio doesn't work with my receiver, the system can be used as a space heater.

[black_zion]

Because the 1660 Super and 5500XT 8GB are the same price while the 1660 Super is quite a bit faster and more efficient, so right now there's absolutely no reason to get the 5500XT. "$200" worth of "free games"  is the only reason that'd make it worth buying.

[black_zion]

And also remember that the RX 580, which basically has the same performance as the 5500XT, is as little as $155, so it's still a very tough sell for the 5500XT.

[Anonymous]

No-one but themselves to blame, its a garbage GPU range, added with useless drivers.

[pokester]

Plus the drivers work better on the RX 580 too!

[pokester]

I don't get them releasing this card though. The pricing makes no sense as it is not really faster than current offerings. A few FPS isn't a difference it is a margin of error. It doesn't even bring any new ability to the table it supports the same standards, so what is the point other than maybe it is cheaper for them to make? However if that is true then why so much more expensive?  These decisions make no sense. I would get it if they brought out a complete RDNA2 lineup at all price points and said they were not making the earlier cards anymore but this launch seems pointless. 

[black_zion]

Navi is much more power efficient than Polaris, but they had to replace Polaris, it's 4 years old this year, in computer years that's ancient. The fact they doubled the price of Navi replacements for Polaris...They can blame it on increased costs of 7nm or of GDDR6, but it's just a price match to nVidia, trying to extract every last penny they can from an inferior product.

[pokester]

I get the why just not the logic. The same performance is the same performance. So basically you would have to be one challenged individual to buy that product vs another that does the same thing at half the price. Sorry in my book it is unjustifiable stupidity. I could see a similar performance on a newer architecture with the idea that performance will improve over time or that the card because it is newer will be supported longer. However that might explain a 10 to 20% increase to me but not double. Companies can do whatever they want for the most part. AMD just better hope their customers are not smarter than they think they are. 

[ajlueke]

That is exactly the point.  The 5500 XT is 158 mm^2 while the RX 480/580/590 is 232 mm^2, and almost 32% reduction in die size.  That means better yields per silicon wafer, and lower production costs.  Every 5500XT sold makes AMD more money than a Polaris GPU would have.  The 1660 Super on the other hand is 284mm^2 and because of that, likely not as easy to produce.  

So if AMD can come within 12% or so of NVidia using a die that is 44% smaller, why don't they just drop prices to a level where it wouldn't be profitable for NVidia to even try and compete?  As I said before, it doesn't really seem like they are competing.  There is a single price/performance curve and all the GPUs from both vendors occupy it. 

[ajlueke]

Little bit disingenuous with the data here.  The Sapphire 5500 XT you listed is the most expensive 5500 XT.  It would have been more meaningful to compare the Gigabyte 5500 XT ($209.99) to the Gigabyte 1660 Super ($239.99).  That is a 14% price increase for the GTX 1660 Super.  Interestingly enough, if you take the average price of the initial twelve listings of the 5500XT on Newegg, you get an average price of $218.38 while the average is $242.49 for the 1660 Super.  That is a difference in price of 11.04%.  

While not staggering, it certainly isn't "The same" as you indicated, although that is somewhat subjective.  However, you did classify the performance delta between the 5500 XT and the 1660 Super as " quite a bit faster".  Looking at the average frame rates in the data you posted, the 1660 Super is 12.9% faster on average.  Exceedingly similar to the average price difference between them.  How one can be characterized as "the same" and the other as "quite a bit faster" is puzzling.  Based on the data, I'd have to infer an arbitrary cutoff of 12% to define things that are "the same" or "quite a bit different"

But, all that aside, the data is the same as everything else we have seen from AMD starting with the Radeon VII launch.  AMD is content to let NVidia dictate the price/performance curve, and then just slot their GPUs into that curve.  As I mentioned before, it doesn't seem like true competition, but more of price fixing of a sort.

[ajlueke]

This is also why I'm not expecting anything "disruptive from RDNA2".  Let's say NVidia outs the RTX 3080 and the 3080 Ti.  If the RTX 3080 performs similarly or a bit faster than the 2080 Ti, they could price it at an identical $1,200.  The 3080 Ti then could be priced at $1,500.  If "Big Navi" falls somewhere between the two, it will probably cost $1,350.  That is essentially how the two companies have operated over the past year and a half.  And considering that it has done for both of their stock prices, I don't see that changing.