Quote:During a Q&A session at AMD's Q2 2019 earnings call, AMD President and CEO Dr. Lisa Su confirmed that high-end 7nm Navi-powered gaming graphics cards are en route.
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As a matter of fact, AMD partner Sapphire has already put in a request to the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) to register the RX 5800 and RX 5900 monikers, among others.

The EEC listing, which was discovered by reputable leaker KOMACHI_ENSAKA, shows a ton of alleged Navi models. At this point in time, it's very likely that most of the model names are placeholders, and not all of them will make it to the market. Nevertheless, it opens the door for a bit of speculation.

Quote:AMD's add-in board (AIB) partners are preparing to launch custom-design Radeon RX 5700-series graphics cards leading up to mid-August, 2019. Although it wouldn't take dates, PowerColor revealed that its custom-design Radeon RX 5700 XT cards would start at USD $399. This is the same price at which all AIB partners sell AMD's reference-design RX 5700 XT.

Quote:Gigabyte's forthcoming custom Radeon RX 5700 XT Gaming OC 8G gaming graphics card has gone up on Amazon for $419.99. The card is currently listed as "temporarily out of stock," but you can still pre-order the component.

As spotted by PCWorld's Brad Chacos, Amazon listed the Radeon RX 5700 XT Gaming OC 8G for $419.99, which may or may not be just a placeholder. If the price tag is accurate, the Gigabyte graphics card is priced pretty well, since it only commands a $20 difference over the reference Radeon RX 5700 XT.

Quote:For the past few days, rumors have circulated that AMD is pulling its reference design 5700-series GPUs from its website and that they will no longer be manufactured. However, AMD and Radeon Technologies Group's Scott Herkelman has denied the reports publically and clarified what exactly would be happening with reference GPUs going forward.
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Additionally, Herkelman stated on Twitter: "We will continue to offer the Radeon 5700 series reference design on AMD.com and select OEM, retail and etailers. However, we are fully transitioning our AIB partners over to their own custom designs." Essentially, there is a stock of reference coolers that exists right now, and once that is gone, AMD is the only company that is guaranteed to sell them, although other vendors can sell them if they want to. So, reference designs haven't been canceled, but they are being made less important by the existence of custom-designed 5700 series GPUs.

Quote:AMD explained:

"Instead of setting a conservative, ‘worst case’ throttling temperature for the entire die, the Radeon RX 5700 series GPUs will continue to opportunistically and aggressively ramp clocks until any one of the many available sensors hits the ‘hotspot’ or ‘Junction’ temperature of 110 degrees Celsius. Operating at up to 110C Junction Temperature during typical gaming usage is expected and within spec. This enables the Radeon RX 5700 series GPUs to offer much higher performance and clocks out of the box, while maintaining acoustic and reliability targets."

That won't stop the company's add-in board partners from introducing cooling systems powerful enough to keep junction temperatures below triple digits. Sapphire did just that with the Pulse Radeon RX 5700 XT we reviewed yesterday, actually, and we sincerely doubt it will be the only one. But at least the company made an effort to explain why temperatures high enough to boil water are considered "in spec" for its latest GPUs.

Quote:Add-in board partners like Sapphire obviously can’t ameliorate all of AMD’s shortcomings. However, the Pulse Radeon RX 5700 XT does fix some of what we found problematic on the reference design. Dual 95mm axial fans, for example, spin more slowly and make less noise than the single centrifugal fan on AMD’s own Radeon RX 5700 XT. They also cool more effectively, pulling the Navi GPU’s operating temperature down 10°C compared to the reference card. And the Pulse does this in its Performance mode, enabling higher clock rates than we saw from AMD. A second BIOS gives you the freedom to use more conservative frequencies for lower power consumption; fortunately, the difference between them is relatively minor.
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We weren’t particularly enthused about the reference Radeon RX 5700 XT’s $400 price tag compared to a GeForce RTX 2060 Super for the same amount of money. AMD’s card was almost 10% faster than Nvidia’s, yes. But its higher power consumption, hotter GPU, and deficit in ray-traced games tipped the scales the other way for us. The Pulse Radeon RX 5700 XT’s $410 MSRP is even higher. Sapphire does use a Dual-X cooler to rectify the reference design’s runaway temperatures. It’s oh-so-quiet, too. But you’re still being asked to pay more money for even higher power use. And ray tracing is still absent. You need to be OK with these things before any Radeon RX 5700 XT becomes the right choice.

If that’s the camp you find yourself in, then the Pulse Radeon RX 5700 XT deserves an extra half of a point on our scoring scale compared to AMD’s own implementation. It addresses the solvable critiques we had of the reference design with only a minor bump up in price.

Quote:AMD hasn't officially announced its Navi 14 GPU, but after showing up in a Linux driver in June and the CompuBench database in July, the rumored Polaris successor will probably arrive sooner than later. Linux users should be ready when it does--Phoronix reported that Navi 14 support is set to be back-ported to the Mesa 3D Graphics Library with the Mesa 19.2 release that's expected to make its official debut within a few weeks.

Navi 14 is believed to be a smaller version of the Navi 10 GPU found in the Radeon RX 5700 that debuted in July. We don't yet know what products based on the Navi 14 will be called, but the RX 5500 or RX 5600 are likely candidates, based on the CompuBench database results from July. These will likely be lower-end graphics cards that offer a performance bump over the RX 500 series but don't match the performance of the RX 5700 lineup.

Quote:If you have $400 to spend on a graphics card, it's clear that the Radeon RX 5700 XT is the best option. Based on this data we estimate it’s around 10% faster than the RTX 2060 Super, so that makes it 10% better in terms of cost per frame. If you weigh your buying decisions more on value then the 5700 XT is also a better buy than the RTX 2070 Super, as we just saw it’s around 14% cheaper per frame.

However, this will depend on the games you play as the GeForce will get favorable results in games such as Vermintide 2, War Thunder and Fortnite, where you just get next tier performance for the extra money you pay.

Overall the 5700 XT is very punchy at 1440p and we think it’s fair to say that the 5700 XT eliminates the RTX 2060 Super and it almost does the same to the 2070 Super, but the fact that the 2070 Super was faster by a noteworthy margin in about a dozen of the games tested, means it’s a worthwhile option for those seeking some extra performance. If you exclusively play titles such as Battlefield V, CS:GO, Deus Ex Mankind Divided, Far Cry New Dawn, For Honor, Just Cause 4, World War Z, DiRT Rally 2, F1 2019, Warframe and about half a dozen other titles that we tested, then the 2070 Super makes way less sense.

We already spelled this out in our recent update to The Best Graphics Cards. For the best high-end 1440p GPU we're going with the Radeon 5700 XT as the best option in the $400 - $600 range. Unless you’re spending considerably more -- there's a brief window for buying the RTX 2080 at $660 which is a better deal than buying the Super version -- there are no other options.

Quote:Several media are reporting that AMD might launch Navi 12 and Navi 14 graphics cards in October since the chipmaker has ushered in Navi 12 and Navi 14 support into Mesa 19.2.

AMD's last-minute effort to add Navi 12 and Navi 14 support into Mesa 19.2 doesn't necessarily mean the corresponding graphics cards will launch soon. We can't discard the possibility that AMD just wanted to ready support in Mesa in preparation for the Navi 12 and Navi 14 launch, which could be next month, the month after that, or even next year. There's no concrete evidence that the graphics cards are actually ready, and therefore, it's anyone's guess at this point when they will land.

Quote:HP has revealed the Pavilion Desktop TP01-0006ng and Desktop M01-F0017ng -- both of which seemingly use AMD's upcoming B550 chipset. The listings also include the first mention we've seen of a new AMD gaming graphics card, the AMD Radeon RX 5300 XT.
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The only information that HP provided about the Radeon RX 5300 XT is that it will supposedly feature 4GB of GDDR5 memory. There were talks that AMD was working on smaller Navi silicon, Navi 12 and Navi 14. However, we've never seen any mentions of a Radeon RX 5300 series until today. It's also impossible to tell if the Radeon RX 5300 series will be based on the Navi microarchitecture. Given the choice of GDDR5 memory, the Radeon RX 5300 series seems closer to another Polaris rebrand. However, this wouldn't match earlier Radeon RX 5000-series lines. We're more inclined to think that the Radeon RX 5300 series is indeed low-end Navi, but only time will tell.

Quote:AMD is preparing lower-end variants of its NAVI GPUs based on new RDNA graphics card architecture, which will replace all the existing cards based on aging GCN architecture. Today, AMD's upcoming Radeon RX 5500, as it is called, got benchmarked in GFXBench - a cross-platform benchmark which features various kinds of test for Windows, MacOS, iOS and Android.

The benchmark was run on Windows OS using OpenGL API. It only ran the "Manhattan" high-level test, which yielded a result of 5430 frames in total or about 87.6 frames per second. When compared to something like RX 5700 XT, which scored 8905 frames in total and 143.6 FPS, RX 5500 clearly seems positioned at the lower end of NAVI GPU stack. Despite the lack of details, we can expect this card to compete against NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 1660/1660 Ti GPUs where AMD has no competing offer so far.

Quote:"Navi 14" is expected to be the smallest of the three, with an estimated 170 mm² die-area, about 24 RDNA compute units (1,536 stream processors), and expected to feature a 128-bit wide GDDR6 memory interface. It will be interesting to see how AMD carves out an SKU that can compete with the GTX 1660 Ti, which has 6 GB of 192-bit GDDR6 memory. The company would have to wait for 16 Gbit (2 GB) GDDR6 memory chips, or piggy-back eight 8 Gbit chips to achieve 8 GB, or risk falling short of recommended system requirements of several games at 1080p, if it packs just 4 GB of memory.

The 350-400 mm² "Navi 12" is a whole different beast, with an estimated 64 compute units (4,096 stream processors). The big news in the 3DCenter.org report concerns its memory interface. AMD will stick to 256-bit GDDR6 memory with the "Navi 12," and probably dial up memory clocks compared to the 14 Gbps speed the "Navi 10" uses. This design choice is influenced by NVIDIA's decision to stick to 256-bit bus width with its "TU104" silicon. AMD appears to have had enough of expensive memory solutions such as HBM2, at least in this market segment.

Quote:It turns out that the Radeon RX 5500 is arriving a lot sooner than expected, with VideoCardz reporting an October 7th product launch for the card. It's also being reported that the SKU will launch as the Radeon RX 5500 XT, with board partner GIGABYTE being ready with half a dozen custom-design cards, all of which with 8 GB of memory. In a separate report, VideoCardz also confirmed that the RX 5500 series will be based on the latest "Navi" family of GPUs that use the company's latest RDNA architecture, and will be built on the 7 nm silicon fabrication process. What's more, the RX 5500 will reportedly use 8 GB of modern GDDR6 memory across a 128-bit wide memory bus. A WCCFTech report predicts the RX 5500 (XT) will feature 22 RDNA compute units, which works out to 1,408 stream processors.

Quote:Last week, Videocardz.com reported AMD was set to release a new Navi-based GPU, the Radeon RX 5500 series, sometime in the fourth quarter. And despite the fact that we’re only a couple of days in to Q4, the company is making its new Navi part official. Announced today, the Radeon RX 5500 is intended for 1080p gameplay at a price that’s much easier on the wallet than the higher-end Radeon 5700 and 5700XT, the former of which currently starts at about $330. AMD says the RX 5500 series aims for 60 fps (frames per second) in AAA games and 90-plus fps in eSports titles at 1080p, which is still a dominant resolution for most PC gamers.
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The new Navi 14-based GPU uses a PCIe 4.0 x8 bus and will sport up to 8GB of GDDR6 across a 128-bit bus. 8GB of memory is achieved over the 128-bit bus by using higher-density 16Gb chips. A 4GB version is also expected. Other specifications include 22 compute units (CUs), 1,408 stream processors (SPs) and 32 render output units (ROPs) under the hood.

Performance-wise, AMD puts this card up against a GTX 1650 in order to compare it to “similarly positioned products.” In AMD’s internal testing, the RX 5500 beats the GTX 1650 (both mobile and desktop cards) by a fair amount, but does so with notably higher power consumption -- which we’ll touch on shortly. According to AMD’s press materials, we can expect 90 fps in Gears 5, 82 fps in Borderlands 3, and 60 fps in Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, while eSports titles such as Fortnite, Apex Legends, PUBG, WoW, Overwatch, and Rainbow Six: Seige are all 90 fps or above.

When asked about power use, an AMD rep stated the desktop version will have a total board power of 150W. If we compare this to the 75W rated TDP of the GTX 1650 or the 120W GTX 1660 things don’t exactly look great for AMD in terms of efficiency. Of course, we’ll have to see what actual measured power consumption and performance is when we get our hands on an RX 5500. But it seems likely the GTX 1660 will deliver similar performance while consuming roughly 20% less power.
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Pricing and availability still hasn’t been announced for the desktop cards. That said, given AMD’s comparison to the 1650, we expect the RX 5500 to land below $200. Additionally, AMD is offering either Borderlands 3 or Ghost Recon Breakpoint with a purchase of 5500 or 5700 series cards as part of its ongoing Raise the Game bundle.

While we’re always skeptical about day-one availability of a new graphics card, an AMD rep told us the company doesn’t expect that to be a problem here. We’ll update this post when we hear more about pricing and launch date for AMD’s new mainstream Navi parts.And of course, stay tuned for a full review.

Quote:Later this month, MSI is expected to launch the MSI Alpha 15 laptop, powered by Radeon RX 5500M GPUs. In addition, Radeon RX 5500 graphics cards are expected to be available in leading desktop gaming systems beginning in November 2019, including HP'S OMEN Obelisk and Pavilion Gaming desktops, as well as Lenovo Legion T530 and IdeaCentre T540 Gaming PCs. The Radeon RX 5500 graphics cards are expected to be available in Acer Nitro 50 PCs beginning in December 2019. AMD board partners are expected to launch standalone graphics cards this quarter (Q4 2019).

Quote:It appears that AMD has had ray tracing code in its drivers since the Adrenalin Edition 19.7.2 driver that debuted in July. But while the code has been there, it hasn’t been activated.
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Given that Nvidia has had its RTX products on the market for over a year, it’d make sense for AMD to incorporate it into their upcoming GPUs in order to be competitive. We doubt it will be introduced with the RX 5800 graphics cards, but it’s also been rumored next-generation AMD GPUs with the new RDNA 2.0 architecture will arrive in 2020. Given that the AMD Radeon RX 5700 and RX 5700 XT only hit the market in July, we don’t expect to see RDNA 2.0-based cards until the end of 2020. Therefore, it may take a while before we see AMD’s hardware-level ray tracing implementation.

We can, however, hope that AMD will enable DirectX ray tracing on its existing GPUs. But that’s doubtful too, since we’ve found that ray tracing on graphics cards without hardware-level support comes with drawbacks, like less smooth framerates.

Quote:There's something to be had for everyone who successfully flashes their Radeon RX 5700 with the BIOS of the RX 5700 XT. For those who just want to flash their card and leave it, there is a free 7 percent performance boost to be had that's permanent and doesn't require playing with any tweaking dials. If you're feeling just a little bit adventurous, you can max out the power limit, which results in an additional 2%, giving you 8-9 percent performance over the stock RX 5700. The beauty of this approach is that your card will be 100% stable at all times, and you don't have to deal with AMD's finicky overclocking controls, which results in system hang after system hang until you've found the right settings. This config is what we recommend for the majority of gamers who don't feel like they're overclocking experts.

Quote:@KOMACHI_ENSAKA, a respected hardware leaker, has unearthed 12 additional AMD graphics cards that reportedly utilize AMD's Navi 14 silicon.

A new driver holds up to 14 different device IDs for Navi 14 graphics cards. Starting with the obvious, AMD has announced the Radeon RX 5500 and RX5500M, which are identified with the 7340:C7 and 7340:C1 device IDs, respectively. That leaves us with 12 unused device IDs. There's no guarantee that they will all come out of the woodwork though.
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Back in August, AMD partner Sapphire filed a bunch of Navi models with the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC). In its submission, there were mentions of other Radeon RX 5000-series models, including the RX 5550 XT, RX 5550 and RX 5500 XT. The unclaimed device IDs could be for those models. Additionally, AMD produces custom graphics cards for its customers like Apple. Then there's also the possibility that some of the device IDs are for prototypes that will probably never make it to the market.

Quote:A Redditor, (who previously found alleged benchmarks for AMD's upcoming Renoir APU), has posted what they claim are five Navi 14 entries with their corresponding game clock speeds in a Linux driver. This latest discovery lends credence to the rumor that more Navi 14 graphics cards are en route.

As with all rumors, we're taking this with a grain of salt. But here's why we think this listing may be legit. The Linux driver lists three Navi 10 devices with the XL, XT and XTX suffixes, which represent different variants of the silicon. We already know that the Radeon RX 5700, RX 5700 XT and RX 5700 XT 50th Anniversary Edition employ the Navi 10 XL, Navi 10 XT and Navi 10 XTX dies, respectively. Additionally, the listing also mentions the 1,625, 1,755 and 1,830 values, which effectively match the game clock speeds for the trio of Navi 10-powered graphics cards.

Quote:References to Navi 22 and Navi 23 silicon have been spotted inside a Linux driver by a 3DCenter forum veteran known as Berniyh (you can find them here and here). Could these be the high-end Navi parts Lisa Su was referring to in August?

Nvidia has been sitting peacefully alone in the premium graphics card market. Although AMD has already launched its Navi-based graphics cards (AMD Radeon RX 5700 and 5700 XT) the chipmaker still doesn't have an answer for Nvidia's high-end offerings, such as the GeForce RTX 2080 Super or RTX 2080 Ti. Berniyh's discovery doesn't mean big Navi is landing tomorrow, but it is coming.

Quote:GIGABYTE has filed regulatory filings with the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) for several Radeon RX 5500-series graphics cards, including as many as six models based on the range-topping RX 5500 XT. The filing confirms that the RX 5500 XT is real, and that all six models from GIGABYTE feature 8 GB of GDDR6 memory. The RX 5500 XT, or Navi 10 XTX is rumored to feature 24 RDNA compute units, making up 1,536 stream processors, and a 128-bit wide GDDR6 memory interface, holding 8 GB of memory. AMD possibly hopes to capture sub-$250 price points with this SKU, given that NVIDIA preempted it with the $230 GeForce GTX 1660 Super.

Quote:NVIDIA's add-in card partners are ordering fresh stocks of GeForce RTX 2070 graphics chips even as the performance-segment of the GPU market has changed with AMD's introduction of its Radeon RX 5700 series "Navi," according to a Gamers Nexus report citing sources among NVIDIA partners. NVIDIA partners are expecting a slump in AMD's RX 5700 series graphics card inventories, particularly that of the RX 5700 XT, to create a price-point at which to sell the RTX 2070. NVIDIA partners expect RX 5700 XT inventories to run slim as supply of the 7 nm "Navi 10" chips from foundry-partner TSMC may not satiate the SKU's reportedly high demand.

Quote:The second slide is where things get very interesting. AMD tabled its product stack, and the RX 570, RX 580, and RX 590 are missing, even as the RX 560 isn't. This is probably a sign of AMD phasing out the Polaris-based 1080p cards in the very near future, and replacing them with the RX 5500, and possibly a better endowed "RX 5500 XT," if rumors of the "Navi 14" featuring more CUs are to be believed. What is surprising about this whole presentation though is that only the "RX 5500" is listed, with the "XT" nowhere in sight. Let's hope the XT version gets released further down the road. In the product stack, the RX 5500 is interestingly still being compared to the GeForce GTX 1650, with no mention of the GTX 1660. This document was probably made when the GTX 1660 Super hadn't launched. A different slide provides some guidance on what kind of experiences to expect from the various cards, rated N/A, good, better, or excellent. According to it, the RX 5500 should provide "excellent" AAA gaming at 1080p, fairly smooth gaming at high settings (graded "better"), "excellent" e-Sports gaming, and "better" 1440p gaming. The card is also "excellent" at all non-gaming graphics, such as watching 4K video, photo/video creator work, game streaming at any resolution, and general desktop use.

Quote:A desktop variant of the AMD Radeon RX 5300 XT graphics card surfaced in a specs sheet of an upcoming HP Pavilion desktop model (TP01-0004ng). The listing describes the RX 5300 XT as featuring 4 GB of GDDR5 memory. This is the first instance of an RX 5300 XT in the wild. An older report citing driver files pointed to there being only two RX 5300-series products, the RX 5300 (desktop), and the mobile RX 5300M. The "XT" brand extension could denote a higher CU count than the RX 5300, although the series is still differentiated from the RX 5500-series with cheaper GDDR5 memory.

The RX 5300 series and RX 5500 series are based on a common silicon, the 7 nm "Navi 14," featuring up to 24 RDNA compute units (up to 1,536 stream processors), and a 128-bit wide memory interface that supports up to 8 GB of GDDR6 or GDDR5 memory. AMD hopes to phase out its 14 nm and 12 nm "Polaris 10" and "Polaris 30" chips with "Navi 14." It's possible that the RX 5300 XT is OEM-only, just like the other key component in this HP desktop, the Ryzen 5 3500 6-core/6-thread processor.

Quote:According to the findings of a Chiphell user called "wjm47196", AMD is supposedly going to host an event at CES 2020 to showcase its next generation of Radeon graphics cards. Having seen huge success with its first-generation "RDNA" GPUs, AMD is expected to showcase improved lineup utilizing new and improved RDNA 2 graphics card architecture.

Judging by the previous information, second generation of RDNA graphics cards will get much-needed features like ray tracing, to remain competitive with existing offers from NVIDIA and soon Intel. Supposed to be built using the 7 nm+ manufacturing process, the new GPU architecture will get around 10-15% performance improvement due to the new manufacturing process alone, with possibly higher numbers if there are changes to the GPU core.

Quote:AMD hasn't communicated any pricing for their Radeon RX 5500 as they probably haven't even decided themselves and are waiting for the GeForce GTX 1650 Super results. We have those results in this review, and I also plotted price/performance at some price levels I picked arbitrarily, but seem realistic given the positioning. At $180, the card is simply way too expensive. It would only match the RX 580 and end up a significantly worse investment than the competition from NVIDIA, too. $160 is the level where things start getting interesting. Here, the RX 5500, GTX 1660 Super, GTX 1650 Super, and RX 570 are all within a few percentage points from each other, giving customers choices based on their personal preferences. If AMD can pull off $140, on the other hand, the card would immediately take the markets in a heartbeat because it would offer the best price/performance ever seen. AMD does have one ace up its sleeve, and that's the tiny die size of the Navi 14 GPU, which measures only 158 mm², compared to the 284 mm² of the NVIDIA TU116 (GTX 1650 Super, 1660, and 1660 Super). If AMD is willing to pass along that significant cost advantage, they could bring down pricing so much it would hurt NVIDIA. What does concern me is the reference design PCB and cooler. It's extremely well engineered, but that also makes it expensive, probably too expensive to sell at those price points. The RX 5500's VRM configuration is not cheap, and neither is the cooler—compare it to the coolers in today's GTX 1650 Super reviews.

Overall, the RX 5500 is a solid entry in this market segment. Just its announcement was disruptive enough to force NVIDIA to change its plans and release new updated products. The Radeon RX 5500 reference design can definitely impress, so let's hope AMD figures out retail channel availability soon, and board partners can release their custom designs. Assuming pricing will end up at $150 or below, I'm giving this card "Recommended" and "Great Value".

Quote:VideoCardz has obtained new information on the Radeon RX 5500 XT and Radeon RX 5600 XT's release dates. As it looks, both Navi-based graphics cards are closer than we think.

Starting with the Radeon RX 5500 XT, the publication got word that it will launch sometime next week. The specifications and pricing for the Radeon RX 5500 XT are unknown at the moment, but the graphics card should come in 4GB and 8GB flavors.
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VideoCardz has also confirmed with its industry sources that two anonymous board partners are currently preparing their custom models for the Radeon RX 5600 XT. There isn't much information on the graphics card right now except that it might sport GDDR6 memory, and if so, it'll probably have a 192-bit memory interface.

The Radeon RX 5600 XT is expected to arrive as early as January of next year. If the date is accurate, the launch event could take place at CES 2020, which runs from January 7 to 10.

Quote:A well-known hardware leaker called @KOMACHI_ENSAKA on Twitter has tweeted a screenshot of what appears to be the specifications for the upcoming AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT graphics card. However, the specs suggest that the card will merely be an overclocked version of the AMD Radeon RX 5500 graphics card that AMD has already detailed but not released.
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Chinese retailer JD.com has already listed plenty of custom RX 5500 XT graphics cards from big names, including ASRock, PowerColor, Sapphire and XFX. This lends credence to the early speculation that the RX 5500 is strictly for OEMs, while the RX 5500 XT is open to any of AMD's partners.
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Another piece of useful information from JD.com's posting is the release date. The RX 5500 XT reportedly goes on sale on December 12, which coincides with the timeframe from an earlier report.

Quote:Store pages of AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT surfaced on Chinese retailer JD.com, confirming that AMD will launch the "XT" variant of the SKU very soon (by 12th December, according to these listings). While the product pages don't list out specifications, they confirm a wide launch through AMD add-in-board (AIB) partners covering non-reference designs, and include 8 GB variants. The 8 GB variant starts at roughly RMB ¥1,499 including taxes, which converts to roughly USD $212. You reserve your card by paying ¥100 ($14) upfront. Among the listings are two cards from Sapphire, one from Yeston, and one from XFX. The product pages confirm three dates: pre-orders starting today (5th December) in which you pay the ¥100 deposit and drop your hat in, order confirmation and shipping on 12th December upon payment of the balance, and earliest delivery by 15th December, depending on where you live in China.

Quote:After a much-delayed and anticipated release, AMD’s RX 5500 XT is a compelling product and gives users more than one good choice in the sub-$200 category for 1080p gaming. The RX 5500 XT is a good replacement card for the aged Polaris architecture and RX 4xx/5xx series of cards. Navi’s 7nm process and other architectural improvements bring it in line with its Nvidia-based competition. As we saw in the performance graphs, there’s still a large gap between the RX 5500 XT and the RX 5700. With plenty of space in both performance and price to slide in another SKU, we could see an RX 5600 to compete with the GTX 1660 Super and GTX 1660 Ti.

When we look at pricing, Nvidia’s GTX 1650 Super can be found for as low as $160 dollars on Newegg while the faster GTX 1660 is $199-plus. If gaming at 1080p running medium settings, the 4GB 5500 XT is a competitor at the lower price point. The true view of value here is going to come down to card partner pricing and how third-party RX 5500 XT designs. However, if running Ultra settings is your goal, the GTX 1660 is the same price as the 8GB variant and is stiff competition. A sale could sway the decision either way, all other things equal.

Quote:Recently, we published an article speculating on the imminent launch of the Radeon RX 5500 XT as well as the RX 5600 XT arriving in January. With respect to the RX 5600 XT, new information has come to light through filings from the EEC (Eurasian Economic Commission) listing 6GB and 8GB versions of the new GPU from ASRock and Asus.

In this filing, ASRock lists six models: Three RX 5600's and three RX 5600 XTs that hail from the Challenger and Phantom Gaming lines. Curiously, all ASRock cards listed sport 6GB of VRAM, even the XT models. Meanwhile, the Asus entries listed are from the Dual Evo and ROG Strix lines, and they are 8GB models across both 5600 series SKUs. Asus likely has other SKUs on the horizon for the 6GB versions (perhaps ASRock has 8GB versions planned?), or it could have been an error.

Quote:German website pcgameshardware.de recently tested both RX 5500 XT versions using PCIe 3.0 and PCIe 4.0. The results were a bit surprising. They found that when the 4GB card's VRAM buffer was full, running on a PCIe 4.0 slot improved performance by reducing the impact of using VRAM. The 8GB also displayed minor improvements from PCIe 3.0 to 4.0, but the 8GB capacity is what makes that card shine, since the extra memory means the card didn't have to dump data off of the faster VRAM as often.

So why does this happen? Once the VRAM is filled up, the extra data is sent to the system RAM across the PCIe bus. The faster the bus, the faster the swapped data will get where it needs to go and not delay the next frame. The 5500 XT is wired as a PCIe 4.0 x8 card (physical tab is x16), which yields the same theoretical bandwidth as PCIe 3.0 x16. According to the article, AMD said that is sufficient for a GPU of this performance class. For all intents and purposes, this is correct. However, for games that eclipse the installed VRAM we see it can fall short.
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In the end, it's a curious choice for AMD to wire these cards in an x8 configuration, particularly with the 4GB card, which has a greater chance of running into VRAM limits. While many titles will not run into these issues, those that do can take a severe performance hit.

With all of this information, I’m left wondering why AMD chose to configure the card in this manner? Cost perhaps? Increasing the performance of both cards can only help the optics, especially on the 4GB card, which is the most affected. This could have been spun as a reason to buy into the AMD Ryzen 3000 X570 ecosystem as a bright spot for PCIe 4.0. But instead, we are left wondering, why?

Quote:AMD's upcoming Radeon RX 5600 XT graphics card features the same exact stream processor count as the $350 RX 5700, according to a leaked specs sheet of an ASRock RX 5600 XT Challenger D graphics card. With a stream processor count of 2,304, it's safe to assume that the RX 5600 XT is based on the same 7 nm "Navi 10" silicon as the RX 5700 series. What set the RX 5600 XT apart from the RX 5700, besides lower clock-speeds, is the memory subsystem, which is severely stripped down. The Radeon RX 5600 XT will be equipped with 6 GB of GDDR6 memory across a 192-bit wide memory interface. What's more, the memory ticks at 12 Gbps, compared to 14 Gbps on the RX 5700 series.

With these specs, the RX 5600 XT has 288 GB/s of memory bandwidth at its disposal, same as NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 1660 Ti. In contrast, with 8 GB of 256-bit GDDR6 running at 14 Gbps, the RX 5700 enjoys 448 GB/s. The specs sheet suggests that AMD has also dialed down the engine clock-speeds (GPU clocks) a bit, with up to 1620 MHz boost, up to 1460 MHz gaming, and 1235 MHz base. With these specs, it's highly likely that the RX 5600 XT outperforms the GTX 1660 Ti and gets close to the RTX 2060. It all boils down to pricing. The RX 5500 XT is a decent GTX 1650-series alternative with a lukewarm price thanks to NVIDIA's aggressive product-stack management by getting its partners to lower prices of the GTX 1660 and GTX 1660 Super. It would be interesting to see if AMD can outfox NVIDIA in the sub-$300 market.

Quote:At a Q&A session with the tech press in Las Vegas, AMD CEO Dr Lisa Su raised hopes of a high-end graphics card based on its "Navi" family of GPUs. Responding to a specific question by Gordon Ung from PC World on whether there will be a high-end competitor in the discrete graphics space, Dr Su stated that one should expect a "high-end Navi." Dr Su states: "I know those on Reddit want a high end Navi! You should expect that we will have a high-end Navi, and that it is important to have it. The discrete graphics market, especially at the high end, is very important to us. So you should expect that we will have a high-end Navi, although I don't usually comment on unannounced products."

For months now, it's been speculated that AMD has been working on a larger GPU die than "Navi 10." In 2020, AMD is expected to release the "Navi 20" familly of GPUs built on 7 nm+ (EUV) node, based on the RDNA2 graphics architecture. The key design goals of RDNA2 are expected to be support for at least tier-1 variable-rate shading (VRS), and possibly hardware-accelerated ray-tracing. It's possible that "high-end Navi" belongs to this family of GPUs.

Quote:At CES, we went hands-on with the EVGA GeForce RTX 2060 KO graphics card, and its price came as the biggest surprise: USD $299. This could very well be NVIDIA's first response to AMD's Radeon RX 5600 XT: a new line of RTX 2060 graphics cards under $300, with RTX support being the clincher. The EVGA card looks like it's severely built to a cost. A 20-ish centimeter length, a simple twin-fan cooling solution, and just three connectors, including a legacy DVI-D. It still has a full-length back-plate. The KO ticks at NVIDIA-reference clock-speeds for the RTX 2060. EVGA is planning a premium KO Ultra SKU with factory-overclocked speeds comparable to the RTX 2060 iCX, priced at a small premium. EVGA says that the RTX 2060 KO will launch next week (January 13 or later).

Quote:Confirmation of four new Radeon RX 5000-series SKUs came to light as AIB partner AFOX pushed them to regulators at the Eurasian Economic Commission. EEC filings have been a reliable early-sign of upcoming PC hardware. All thee new SKUs are positioned above the Radeon RX 5700 XT launched last year. These include the Radeon RX 5800 XT, the RX 5900 XT, the RX 5950, and the RX 5950 XT. Going by AMD's convention of two SKUs per resolution serving up to differentiated experiences, the RX 5800 XT could be a step up from the RX 5700 XT in offering 1440p high frame-rate AAA performance. This could possibly put it in direct competition with the GeForce RTX 2070 Super. AMD took a similar 2-pronged approach to 1080p, with the RX 5500 XT serving up 1080p at up to 60 fps, while the RX 5600 XT topping it up with a 40-50 percent performance uplift.

The Radeon RX 5950-series is completely new. This could very well be a new large "Navi" silicon, since dual-GPU is dead. Just as AMD carved out the RX 5700 XT, the RX 5700, and the RX 5600 XT, it could carve out the three new SKUs from this silicon. AMD CEO Dr Lisa Su already confirmed that her company is working to upscale the RX 5000-series "Navi" family. The RX 5900-series could be competition for the likes of the RTX 2080 or even RTX 2080 Super. The RX 5950-series could target premium 4K gaming (RTX 2080 Ti). It remains to be seen if the three new SKUs are based on the existing RDNA architecture or the new RDNA2 architecture designed for 7 nm EUV, featuring variable-rate shading.

Quote:Back at CES a couple of weeks ago there was a Q&A session with AMD, where Gordon Ung from PC World asked: "Do you think that AMD has to have a high-end competitor in the discrete graphics market?" At the time, this was interpreted by many as a confirmation of a Big Navi GPU, but we felt that the phrasing of Lisa Su's answer was still too ambiguous. Now, AMD has published a 'The Bring Up' episode where Lisa Su was interviewed, which sorted out any doubt there may have been.

"I've heard a little bit through Twitter and Reddit that people are wondering about Big Navi. I can say you're going to see Big Navi in 2020" Said Dr. Lisa Su, AMD's CEO in the interview.

Quote:In the latest episode of the MSI Insider podcast, hosts Eric Van Beurden, MSI marketing director, and Pieter Arts, MSI product marketing manager, had a discussion saying that not every single Radeon RX 5600 XT graphics card can run its memory at 14 Gbps.

Unlike motherboards, graphics cards usually don't get many vBIOS updates, especially not a few days before launch. However, AMD did just that with the RX 5600 XT and boosted performance, likely in response to Nvidia's GeForce RTX 2060 price drop.
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It also looks like not every RX 5600 XT will receive the vBIOS update either. Depending on the graphics card's design and the quality of the silicon that's inside, it seems some of the entry-level models might not be capable of accommodating higher clock speeds.
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The MSI execs confirmed that the first batch of the RX 5600 XT was probably already en route if not already in retailers' hands upon the vBIOS release. Those might require the vBIOS update, but future products should already come with the latest vBIOS.

This whole situation ultimately unlocks the doors for vendors to release new models that already carry the latest vBIOS and 14 Gbps memory.

Quote:AMD’s 5600 XT, specifically the Sapphire Pulse OC used for testing, has really shown some mettle in our performance tests, being able to match and perform a bit better than Nvidia’s more costly (even after price drops) reference RTX 2060. It did so while using less power, too. EVGA’s pre-emptive strike lowering prices during CES 2020 week and other partners now seemingly joining the movement, now seems like a necessary response.
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Compared to the 5500 XT launch, which was marred with a less-than-stellar driver along with a price-to-performance ratio that wasn’t positive versus its competition, the 5600 XT is a complete 180. Here the card will compete with or beat the reference RTX 2060, costs a bit less, and uses a bit less power. AMD really hit the sweet spot here on all fronts, especially with the highly clocked models. If you’re looking for a graphics card that can easily handle 1080p and even most games in 1440p, the RX 5600 XT is a great choice in the sub $300 range.

Quote:Due to reports of both Navi refresh cards and a new lineup of cards based on next-gen RDNA, we followed up with AMD's communications team.

AMD responded that it would introduce new GPUs with the next-gen RDNA architecture this year, which makes sense given recent statements that the company will compete in the high end of the graphics market.

As to Su's reference to a Navi refresh, we're told she was speaking in terms of new additions to the product stack, and not stating that refreshed Navi cards would come with the next-gen RDNA architecture.
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In the context of Su's statement, it doesn't appear that she was referencing a "refreshed" lineup of Navi cards analogous to the tech community's typical understanding of the term. Instead, we will see new products based on the next-gen RDNA architecture come to market, ostensibly to address the high end of the GPU market (Big Navi).

Aside from the small statement during the call, Su didn't share any details about the new graphics cards but said the company would announce more details at its Investor Day on March 5, 2020. Su also said we could expect new data center GPUs in the second half of 2020, too.

Quote:Asus has identified the problem that's making the company's ROG Strix Radeon RX 5700-series graphics cards suffer from very high operating temperatures. Apparently, AMD is the culprit for the malfunction.

According to Asus, AMD's guidelines state that the cooler should be mounted with a pressure between 30 to 40 PSI. However, after thorough testing, Asus has found out that the optimal pressure should actually be between 50 and 70 PSI. In short, the screws that hold the beefy Strix cooler in place aren't tight enough.
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Asus highlighted that only initial batches of ROG Strix 5700-series graphics cards are affected by the condition, and cards shipped after January 2020 already come with the new screws with the correct mounting pressure within the 50 to 60 PSI range.

Asus has published the model numbers for the graphics cards that are eligible for the free screw upgrade. If you own one from the faulty batch, you can contact your nearest Asus service center starting March 2020. However, it should be noted that the Coronavirus is still wreaking havoc so it might affect the time frame in which the components find their way to the different local Asus service centers.

Quote:The Korean RRA has listed AMD graphics cards for certification this month which may well point towards an actual announcement coming from AMD during the next month. The company has already confirmed they will be discussing RDNA2 graphics cards come their next Financial Analyst Day, set for March 5th. The new entries, D32310 and D30201, have been listed on February 03 and February 19, respectively. This is relevant for a March announcement - even if just a paper one - of the new RDNA2 GPUs because historically, it seems that AMD has registered impending releases with the Korean RRA roughly one month prior to actual product releases.

As you can see in the listing, AMD registered two graphics cards in June 2019 (D16302 and D18206 - and one month later, in July, the company released Navi-based RX 5700 XT and RX 5700. AMD also registered the RX 5600 XT model number, D32501, on December 3, 2019 with a release one month later on January 21, 2020. AMD similarly registered model number D18902 on November 27, 2019 - and AMD released the 5500 XT on December 12, less than a month later. There seems to be a pattern here. if you're wondering why the model number for these new February registrations is lower than that of the RX 5600 XT (D32501 against the newer, yet lower D32310 and D30201), it could have something to do with the fact that AMD decided to carve out the RX 5600 XT SKU later than they knew they'd be releasing Big Navi - as an attempt to curtail NVIDIA in the GTX 1660 Ti and GTX 1660 Super battlefield.

Quote:Update (2/26/2020): SK Hynix has released a statement specifically denying that this GPU configuration has anything to do with them or their hardware. The company writes: “Recently, there have been media reports about SK hynix’s memory HBM2E and AMD’s next-generation GPU, based on the allegations by a Twitter user CyberPunkCat, which are factually incorrect. SK hynix hereby announces that the company has not created or distributed such specifications as well as the document asserted to be leaked by an internal source.”

Original story below:

AMD fans have been curious about Big Navi since the company teased its arrival last year, but AMD hasn’t officially said much about the GPU since, beyond confirming that it’ll launch this year and that the same technology is used in the PS5 and Xbox Series X. Now, a Twitter user is claiming to have documents from SK Hynix that give some of the official stats on the upcoming graphics card.

Quote:AMD has been gaining ground in the GPU market over the past year, with 7nm Navi 1x parts launching at the high-end, mainstream, and budget markets. During its Financial Analysts Day 2020, AMD is finally starting to spill the beans for what comes next. It's not called "Big Navi"—at least not officially—but while it will use a new RDNA 2 architecture for the Navi 2x GPUs, the foundation appears to be largely the same as existing Navi 1x / RDNA parts. These new RDNA 2 GPUs will power both next generation consoles from Sony and Microsoft, and more importantly, we're getting new GPUs for the PC as well.
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What does that mean, exactly? That's where things get very murky. If AMD includes ray tracing performance in any fashion, it should be trivial to achieve a 50% improvement in performance per Watt. Assuming it's more than that, however, and either AMD is looking to provide 50% more performance than current RDNA 1 parts at the same power levels, or else cut power requirements by 33% while keeping performance the same, or most likely RDNA 2 will land somewhere in between those two.

Still, 50% percent performance per watt does give us the potential for a significant jump in AMD graphics performance relative to the RX 5700 XT. Let's also discuss what that might mean. By our own benchmarks, the RTX 2080 Ti is currently the fastest consumer graphics card, beating the RX 5700 XT by about 31% on average. That's not the whole story, however. The RTX 2080 Ti is only 15% faster than the 5700 XT at 1080p medium, 25% faster at 1080p ultra, 40% faster at 1440p ultra, and 50% faster at 4K ultra. The problem is that the RTX 2080 Ti will be two years old this fall, and Nvidia is expected to launch its next-generation Ampere GPUs this year as well.
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Besides RDNA 2 and Navi 2x, AMD also mentioned RDNA 3 and Navi 3x. Not surprisingly, things are incredibly thin here. AMD showed a slide with a tentative launch date of some time before the end of 2022, and other than the RDNA 3 and Navi 3x there's nothing to say. Given RDNA launched in mid-2019 and RDNA 2 is coming at the end of 2020, AMD is running on a 1.5 year cadence of new architectures. That means RDNA 4 and Navi 4x are coming by 2024—you heard it first here, folks!

Quote:Back in January, AMD released its Radeon RX 5600 XT graphics card with a last-minute specifications update that made it competitive with NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 2060 graphics card. It did so by increasing GPU clock speeds, and more importantly, increasing memory clock speeds to 14 Gbps up from 12 Gbps in the original spec. Various AMD add-in board (AIB) partners released one-click BIOS updates on January 22nd (find them for ASRock, Sapphire, MSI, PowerColor, and Gigabyte). An easy updater from ASUS was missing in action at the time. The company finally got around to releasing easy, Windows-based programs that update the video BIOS of its ROG Strix Radeon RX 5600 XT O6G and TUF Gaming RX 5600 XT EVO OC graphics cards. The BIOS updates run the video memory at 14 Gbps since the cards physically do feature 14 Gbps-rated memory chips. The specifications update has had a profound impact on the price-performance positioning of the RX 5600 XT, from being able to outperform the GTX 1660 Ti to trading blows with the RTX 2060. Grab the BIOS update from the links below.

Quote:AMD finally got around to officially talking about its sneaky last-minute specs update of the Radeon RX 5600 XT graphics card, which saw its memory frequency increased to 14 Gbps from its original 12 Gbps, in a bid to make it competitive against the price-cut GeForce RTX 2060. In a blog post subheaded "Unlock the full potential of your Radeon RX 5600 XT today," AMD tabulated all the graphics cards eligible for a video BIOS update that increases memory- and GPU clock speeds; along with links to support pages on their manufacturer website. We already made such a list. The AMD table also lists out certain custom-design cards that come with 14 Gbps memory out of the box, for which a BIOS update isn't needed. Find the table in the AMD blog post here.

Quote:AMD's next-generation RDNA2 architecture based Radeon RX series client-segment graphics cards will launch in September 2020, according to a DigiTimes report citing industry sources. This would make September a mighty busy month for hardware launches, as the company is also expected to debut its 4th generation Ryzen "Vermeer" (and possibly "Renoir) desktop processors in the AM4 package. NVIDIA is expected to debut its GeForce "Ampere" client-segment graphics cards around the same time. Although not in the same computing segment, Intel could also debut its 11th generation Core "Tiger Lake" mobile processors.

RDNA2 is an important launch for AMD as it's the company's first graphics architecture that meets the DirectX 12 Ultimate logo requirements, which include real-time ray-tracing capability leveraging DXR, variable rate shading, mesh shaders, and sampler feedback. AMD and NVIDIA will be debuting their graphics cards close to the release of CD Projekt's "Cyberpunk 2077," which is emerging as the year's most hotly anticipated game.

Quote:AMD released over 200 Linux patches today for an unannounced graphics card, as reported by Linux news outlet Phoronix. The Radeon graphics card, codename Sienna Cichlid, is presumably the Big Navi that the hardware world has been eagerly anticipating.

Phoronix said that AMD developers have considered using a substitute codename to hide a product's real marketing name before. This makes sense, considering that developers have to release patches in advance, and using a fake name could help hide the product from prying eyes.

The Linux patch, which was signed off by Alex Deucher from AMD, explicitly states that "Sienna Cichlid is a GPU from AMD."
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According to Phoronix, Sienna Cichlid won't be inserted until the Linux 5.9 merge window, which is expected for August. The stable version would consequently land in October.

That time frame suggests Sienna Cichild could be an RDNA 2 graphics card coming later this year. A DigiTimes report last month claimed that AMD Big Navi's release date will be September. The rumored dates line up perfectly.

Quote:AMD is planning a big gamer-specific event in late-Q3/early-Q4, likely September, where it plans to announce its 4th generation Ryzen desktop processors based on the "Zen 3" microarchitecture, and Radeon RX graphics cards based on RDNA2, including the "Big Navi." Speaking at the Bank of America Securities Global Technology Conference, AMD CFO Devinder Kumar confirmed that "Big Navi" will be a halo product and not merely a lofty performance increase over the RX 5700 XT to make AMD competitive against GeForce "Ampere." He states "there's a lot of excitement for Navi 2, or what our fans have dubbed as the Big Navi," adding "Big Navi is a halo product." He goes on to state that "enthusiasts love to buy the best, and we are certainly working on giving them the best." AMD's product stack so far is application-specific, rather than competition-specific. The RX 5700 XT was designed for 1440p gaming, and ended up competitive to the RTX 2070. "Big Navi" could hence have a lofty design goal: 4K gaming with ray-tracing.

Quote:AMD is still doubling down on the idea that RDNA2 will be a 1.5x uplift over RDNA. AMD’s promises of GPU performance improvements haven’t always materialized as well as their CPU improvements have, but RDNA delivered the improvement it promised relative to the RX500 family, and a 1.5x improvement in performance-per-watt would help Navi 2 compete with expected GPUs from Nvidia’s Ampere family. A 2.25x improvement in performance per watt over GCN (1.5x * 1.5x) would be a substantial overall gain for a single node transition, even if it took several years to deliver the improvement.

Quote:There’s a new set of slides being passed around that supposedly showcase AMD’s upcoming Radeon 6900 XT. They’re completely fake. Here’s how you can tell:

In the first slide, the branding has been updated at the upper right, but the branding on the actual GPU hasn’t been. Also, that’s a Radeon 5700 cooler with a Vega water-cooler next to it, and there’s a clear flaw in the image where the radiator attaches to the card.

The specs themselves are pretty reasonable. I’m not saying how accurate I think they are, but the specs are the only part of the slide that isn’t instantly fake. At the very least, I’d have to get out a calculator and run some numbers first.

The fact that there’s a price on the card is another way you know this slide is fake. Price is always the last thing a company decides on.