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AMD announced its first RDNA 2 (Radeon RX 6000 series) gaming GPUs during a live stream (24m42s) on October 28.
AMD originally planned for RDNA 2 to have 50% more performance per Watt than GPUs using the RDNA 1 microarchitecture. Now, AMD is claiming 54% more performance per Watt for the RX 6800 XT and RX 6800, and 65% more performance per Watt for the RX 6900 XT. Part of the efficiency gain is due to the use of "Infinity Cache", similar to the L3 cache found in Ryzen CPUs. This allowed AMD to use a 256-bit memory bus with 2.17x the effective memory bandwidth of a 384-bit bus, while using slightly less power.
The RX 6900 XT ($1000) has performance comparable to Nvidia's RTX 3090, with a total board power (TBP) of 300 Watts. The RX 6800 XT ($650) is comparable to Nvidia's RTX 3080, also with a 300 Watt TBP. The RX 6800 ($580) is around 18% faster than Nvidia's RTX 2080 Ti, with a 250 Watt TBP. All three of the GPUs have 16 GB of GDDR6 VRAM and 128 MB of "Infinity Cache".
The 6800 XT and 6800 will be available starting on November 18, while the 6900 XT will be available on December 8.
Also at Tom's Hardware, Phoronix, Ars Technica, and Guru3D.
Previously: Nvidia Announces RTX 30-Series "Ampere" GPUs
AMD Announces Zen 3 CPUs
(Score: 2) by EJ on Thursday October 29 2020, @04:16AM (1 child)
Wrong. If people stop buying this stuff, then they will stop making it.
The only reason we're seeing such advancements that we're seeing is because people are willing to pay for it. These cards are also helping to advance the power of consoles because the research that goes into making PC cards carries over to console technology.
If you don't want to pay for the top of the line, then don't. Buy the $300 tier cards.
You just want to have a car that goes 331 MPH without paying the $1.9M it costs to have a Tuatara.
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Thursday October 29 2020, @04:42AM
They might stop making $1000 cards, but it's not like they are going to throw their hands in the air and close up shop. They'd make more realistically priced consumer cards.
I understand where you're coming from, really I do. I think the car analogy is interesting because owning a car that can go 330MPH with 75MPH speed limits is not quite the same as a video card that can run flight sim on max settings at 4K at 144FPS. At least you could push the card to the limit all the time with no legal or bodily worries... but still... $1000 for a video card, in my mind, is almost as an obscenely overpriced object.
While we're at it, why don't they mass produce Lamborghini's and sell them for the same profit margins as other cars? It's the Apple/Name/Status symbol. It's not really because people are driving 300MPH.
If they sold gullwing cars that looked like a Lamborghini with the engine of a Honda Civic would they sell like hotcakes,or it really the horsepower people care about?
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