PC Graphics

[colesdav]

RDNA2, RDNA Refresh, and "Big Navi" Launch and Reviews.

It looks like it will not be long before real information will start to get released about RDNA2 and "Big Navi". 

I am opening this thread to capture information about RDNA2, RDNA Refresh, and Big Navi Launch and Reviews.

I will only include information such as:

Benchmarks or Reviews of XBOX Series X and PS5 which include "RDNA2" GPU.

Information released by AMD on RDNA2 and Big Navi.

Information about any "RDNA Refresh" of the RX5000 series GPUs.

Benchmark data from AMD and YouTube Benchmarks and Reviews.

I will be watching out for the information and reading reviews anyhow so I will post data here if I see it.

If anyone has useful data such as described above then can you please add information here?

Please avoid wild speculations from "Tech YouTubers" who seem to make outrageous performance improvement claims based on "rumours" from "reliable leakers".

They often seem to yoyo their conclusions on a weekly basis just to get better viewing numbers or deny their predictions were complete rubbish when they get it wrong, and huff about it.

[colesdav]

AMD have a long way to go to be competitive to Nvidia in GPU.
There is also Blender and Compute and Linux and Driver stability and Ray Tracing feature support and GeForce Experience features...

However I was surprised a little by the RX6900XT.

I thought they would produce a card to be around or slightly lower than RTX3080 performance if they were just using GDDR6.

I thought they would need HBM2e to solidly beat an RTX3080.
It looks like they have a combination of "Infinity Cache" + GDDR6 instead of HBM2e.

The Smartt Access Memory feature that works only with RX6000 series GPU could be seen as against AMD usual "Open Standards" message if they do not open up that interface to Nvidia and Intel though.

[pokester]

Or earlier Ryzen board too that should have no logical reason for not being compatible. 

[colesdav]

I need to see more technical details about the Smart Access Memory feature but sure if no reason why not work on earlier Ryzen board then it should.
Might need PCIe 4.0 speeds though.

[pokester]

There is no reason 4xx boards can't support pcie 4 other than AMD doesn't want them to. Again B550 pcie 4 support comes from the Ryzen CPU not the chipset, unlike x570. So unless the reason is anything other then it is a feature none of us know about on any of the boards and I do doubt that exists. 

[colesdav]

The 6900XT makes no sense to me.
It will likely only be ~ 3% faster than RX6800XT when also in "Rage Mode" and "Smart Access Memory" on.

[pokester]

6800 xt  pricing makes good sense but not the non xt ,more sense if 6800 were priced like the 3070. 

I can't really argue the 6900 price wise as by comparison it is a deal compared to the 3090. However if you ask me even 999 is way to much for a GPU. I am sure plenty will buy. However I do think there are more cheap skates like me out there that think these are all priced too high. 

Looks very probable Nvidia is going to rework their line up. With release still a little off. There is still time for pricing to change. I just don't get why AMD would not price that 6800 the same as the 3070. In raw performance it isn't that much faster than the 3070. In fact not much different than the 5700xt is than a 2070 super. Yet the 2070 super was the all around bang for the buck card last round. AMD is missing the boat on the 6800 being that this time around. 

[colesdav]

Gamers Nexus:

AMD RX 6900 XT, 6800 XT, & 6800 Specs, Ray Tracing, Price, & Release Date - YouTube 

[colesdav]

Another reason for better than espected performance.
These AMD reference designs are > 2 slot ...

RX6900XT = 2.5 slot.
RX6800XT = 2.5 slot.
RX6800     = 2.0 slot.

[colesdav]

Buildzoid on RX6000 series GPU:
Rambling about the AMD Radeon RX 6000 series announcement - YouTube 

[pokester]

Okay this made me laugh. Hitler reacts to AMD Ryzen 5000 Series Zen 3 CPUs - Intel - YouTube 

[black_zion]

AMD released more first party benchmarks showing how much AMD Smart Access Memory can increase performance.

These were of course done on an X570 motherboard and a Ryzen 9 5900X, so if you're willing to spend $550 on a 5900X and half that again on an X570 motherboard for a whopping 11% performance improvement...Or you could just spend less on a 3090?

https://wccftech.com/amd-radeon-rx-6900-xt-rx-6800-xt-rx-6800-gaming-4k-wqhd-benchmarks/

[pokester]

True dat! Then you have better performance regardless if it is optimized for it or not. 

[colesdav]

Jayz2Cents Video.
I think he is wrong about "Rage Mode" BS.which is just increasing the GPU Power Limit and Fan speed increase according to Gamers Nexus. 
It looks like Rage Mode is a preset like you had on RX Vega 64 - i.e Power saving -25% Power Limit, Balanced 0% Power Limit, Turbo +25% Power Limit.
Yawn.

NVIDIA Never saw this coming... AMD on top?? - YouTube 

[pokester]

I absolutely agree. And more than likely any user that would use this would likely do this manually and get a better combination anyway. So meaningless feature for 99%. 

[colesdav]

What is your confidence level in AMD Drivers on these GPU after 8 months of horse manure on RX5700XT Navi 10?

[pokester]

I know you asked BZ but my take is that yes it is likely some things which Navi had issues with such as audio drop out that I believe to be hardware issues will be fixed, but more by the improved silicon. I find it very likely though that you will have the normal teething pains of an architectural change. Plus I see nothing improving with the interface nor any improvement in the features that still don't work right. The hardware isn't going to fix it. 

[black_zion]

Considering Andrej Zdravkovic still has a job and he hasn't made a massive effort to reorganize his division and hire new developers? Absolute zero.

[colesdav]

I feel the same way and past performance is a reliable metric to predict future results.

[black_zion]

Predictions on when we will see the first "I spent over $1200 in AMD gear and I can't play <game>!!!!!" thread?

[pokester]

Cool where can I buy my square! LOL

[black_zion]

This is a very, very interesting article. Apparently, using DXR and in SoTR, the RX 6800 is nearly as fast as the 3070 with DLSS on...Thing is though, why would AMD have withheld ray tracing performance benchmarks if they were all this good?

https://wccftech.com/amd-radeon-rx-6800-rdna-2-graphics-card-ray-tracing-dxr-benchmarks-leak-out/

[black_zion]

Something which concerns me is AMD's lack of anything lower than the 6800. We know the RTX 3060Ti, which will have performance of the 2080 Super supposedly, will debut on the 16th for sub $400, but I haven't even seen anything confirmed that there will be a 6700 or lower anytime soon...Unless AMD just takes Navi, overclocks and rebrands them as the 6700 and lower...

[pokester]

My only guess there is that do to lack of availability in the market right now of anything other that rtx 2060 and down on the green team that AMD is trying to move the ton of Navi cards still on store shelves. Everywhere I look the only thing you can get is a Navi card. I imagine AMD doesn't want to get stuck with them like they did all those polaris cards. 

[colesdav]

I do not think iut possible or sensible to attempt to overclock Navi10 RX5700XT any more than they are already set to unless AMD move them to newer 7nm process. I do not think that would happen. I think they will just drop the prices to where they should have been in the first place and the AIB will strip fancy features like detachable RGB fans, backplates etc, You know - like the Bait and Switch Gigabyte pulled with theit RX590 REV1.0 versus REV2.0 - except in that case the cards were avertised with the higher spec and the price stayed the same...

[pokester]

I think RDNA will be gone as soon as inventory dries up. Maybe some of the newer skus will hang around for about a year that are the newer ones bellow the 5700. From what some tech sites say they believe the silicon or hardware issues in some of those have been fixed. Which makes sense because you only hear about the HDMI audio issues on existing 5700 cards. I would expect we will see a RDNA2 replacement for the 5700 on shelves by the end of quarter one 2021. 

[black_zion]

I still keep thinking back to when AMD said "Navi Refresh". To quote Lisa Su directly, from the WCCFTech article in January:

[pokester]

Could be but IMHO a dumb move then. RDNA overall I think has had a bad reputation for a lot of people. They would also be better to have a head to toe lineup that supports ray tracing at this point. Plus with one architecture to count on a better chance of improving the driver on hopefully less flawed silicon. 

Guess time will tell. 

[black_zion]

But with a single architecture from top to bottom, it'd be all the excuse AMD needs to move every single GPU prior to the RX 6000 series to legacy support officially, and I'm sure there's more than a few people who stopped using AMD after they did that with the HD 6000 series after one year.

[pokester]

Can't disagree with that and it is what I predicted would happen with RDNA. However that ended up not replacing the whole lineup. 

[black_zion]

Same, I predicted everything pre-Polaris would be officially moved to "Legacy" status, although we know "unofficially" they all long since have as they have not received any new features or improvements in ages. Given the minuscule market share of all pre-Polaris cards, however, now would be the time to actually do that officially so they could "officially" focus on RDNA, which I am believing more and more will be refreshed to fill out the $100-$300 price range, RDNA2, which will need massive attention, and Vega, which will be featured on Cezanne and not RDNA/2.

[pokester]

Even though Vega is still in some current and even upcoming APUs. It certainly isn't beyond AMD to end support abruptly. They have done it now several times with mobile chips and their graphics. As much as I would hate to have those still using Polaris to end support it really would be the smartest thing AMD could do IMHO to make drivers that really are good for RDNA2. Maybe what they should do is truly split the drivers. Keep supporting GCN for a while but not in the same driver that is used for RDNA2. Thus really ending new features for GCN but getting some game updates and updates needed by new Windows changes. 

[colesdav]

If they pull a stunt like that it will be GPU user base suicide.
Nvidia are still releasing new drivers for Kepler GTX780Ti.

[black_zion]

AMD may still be technically releasing new drivers all the way back to the HD 7000 series, but when was the last time anything pre Polaris received any actual update? Performance improvements stopped long ago, and all new feature improvements require either Polaris or Navi, mostly Navi, so all the HD 7000-R5/7/9 series gets is a horrid new UI.

[colesdav]

Whist Game optimisation for older GPUs seems dropped like a brick, some things have been done for older GPUs. 

Radeon Image Sharpening was enabled for Vega after some complaints.
Radeon Boost has been enabled on RX Vega GPUs.
Bug fixes were implemented to fix Black Screen bug on RX Vega 64 during attempt to fix the issue in Navi 10.

Many issues still remain to be fixed for older GPUs.

Fan control on R9 390X is non existent and I expect they will never fix it.
MultiGPU support in Adrenalin 2020 GUI/UI is a disgrace and they should at least put the Crossfire Profile and GPU Pairing options back for people still running DX11 Crossfire on older GPUs and games that still support it.
FRTC control should be put back in the driver GUI.

There is still a point to have the older GPU supported - if just for bug fixes.

[pokester]

Very good point. Plus so many GCN users can't even get the 2020 drivers to load. So in some ways you can already say support ended. 

[black_zion]

That was a huge black mark against AMD when I was choosing between the 5700XT and the 2070 Super, how I was treated as a Fury series owner, seeing years of Polaris updates and none for Fury, which again led to the RX 580, a slower card computationally, outperforming the Fury X.

And yes, even if performance improvements are stopped, bugs still need to be fixed, and it becomes even more important in this era of the "new normal" of discrete GPUs costing in excess of $300, with more "mainstream" 1920x1080 60FPS full details with ray tracing GPUs, which should be the 2080 Super/3060 Ti level cards pushing $400 or more, people are going to expect that two years down the road they're going to be able to play their games and use their programs bug free. And don't even mention the people who will be dropping $1000 on a GPU...

[pokester]

Honestly the people I think who will end up getting hosed the most are those who bought navi. So many of them have issues it's ridiculous. I am amazed at the people that bought these to connect to tv's and apparently for whatever reason the sound drops out a lot when connecting to TVs and Receivers. I however am not sure if some of the Navi chips did get fixed silicon at some point. I think though that Navi is still a pretty good bit different than RDNA2 and that it will be another step child that just doesn't get good support moving forward. Although not sure you can call the last year good support for it either. 

[black_zion]

Most decidedly yes they're getting the shaft, especially if AMD does indeed launch a Navi Refresh so the 5700XT becomes the 6700XT for $300, or just continues to cut RDNA2 down even more to get lower models, especially the people who are buying into Navi right now for >$400 during "Black Friday Month"...

[colesdav]

This lot are usually a good indicator of what's happening in Europe at least.
Once that "Sorry this product is not available anymore" sign goes up - there is an AMD refresh or a new AMD GPU to replace it on the way.
They are completely out of RX5700XT.

[colesdav]

"Announcement:New Community Platform is Coming!

• Hide Details

by sam.tehrani (03 November 2020)

Heads-up Everyone!

AMD will be launching our new Community Platform soon.  Don’t worry, we’ll be migrating existing active conversations and you won’t have to re-register (you may need to reset your password) – but you’ll also get new capabilities such as an updated user interface with intuitive navigation, improved search, and many more features. 

We’ll keep the community informed, and we look forward to connecting on the new platform!"

Looks like we lwill lose tons of threads and useful old information.
Great.