Thursday, January 23rd 2020
MSI Says not all Radeon RX 5600 XT GPUs Can Hit 14 Gbps Memory Speed
Just before the launch of AMD's latest Radeon RX 5600 XT graphics cards, AMD released a vBIOS update that boosts the GPU clock speed by a few percent margins and increases the GDDR6 memory speed from 12 Gbps to 14 Gbps, which is almost a 17% performance increase in memory bandwidth. However, despite the release of these new firmware updates, AMD's add-in-board partners like ASUS and MSI have been cautious about applying the new vBIOS to the existing cards. A YouTube show called the MSI Insider, which is hosted by MSI employees, explains the situation. Due to the GDDR6 memory, which was originally meant as a 12 Gbps chip, when applying the new firmware update to the card can lead to RMA issues with customers.
While some cards are capable of hitting 14 Gbps speeds with the GDDR6 chips, others are not as they were not certified to work at that frequency. Silicon lottery (not the company) of the memory chips plays a big role as the quality of the onboard DRAM will have a large impact on the ability to overclock to new frequencies. That's why MSI released an RX 5600 XT GAMING Z variant with 14 Gbps vBIOS already applied out of the box. ASUS also joined the party and launched the ASUS ROG STRIX TOP graphics card, which is the only 14 Gbps enabled cards in ASUS'es whole lineup. By launching GPU SKUs with 14 Gbps speeds out of the box, manufacturers can guarantee these speeds and not depend on silicon lottery which may cause them a few RMA troubles down the road.
Source:
VideoCards
While some cards are capable of hitting 14 Gbps speeds with the GDDR6 chips, others are not as they were not certified to work at that frequency. Silicon lottery (not the company) of the memory chips plays a big role as the quality of the onboard DRAM will have a large impact on the ability to overclock to new frequencies. That's why MSI released an RX 5600 XT GAMING Z variant with 14 Gbps vBIOS already applied out of the box. ASUS also joined the party and launched the ASUS ROG STRIX TOP graphics card, which is the only 14 Gbps enabled cards in ASUS'es whole lineup. By launching GPU SKUs with 14 Gbps speeds out of the box, manufacturers can guarantee these speeds and not depend on silicon lottery which may cause them a few RMA troubles down the road.
86 Comments on MSI Says not all Radeon RX 5600 XT GPUs Can Hit 14 Gbps Memory Speed
This card is a fail for the board partners. AMD would have been better off running Navi 14 with 12 gb/s of 192 bit GDDR6. Most likely they could have sold it as a high volume mid-range product in the $230 or lower range, competing against the 1660 Super.
Nothing gets in a card without AMD's knowledge and approval because it wont work otherwise.
That said I fully feel as if MSI buys lower grade components that are rated for what they are but aren't good enough to do a bit more and they''ll use it on anything, even high end.
I know this going in and my next platform will likely be MSI based
Boy... yeah I really do wonder why. How about 'this company cannot be trusted'. The number of topics on artifacting and breaking AMD GPUs are vastly outnumbering the ones on Nvidia cards, but we could never put the finger on it because things were 'as specced'. I wonder why that happens too when the market share is only a quarter of Nvidia's. Now we know better. Its not just abysmal power management and heat, its the VRAM too.
Staying FAR FAR away from this company for any GPU anytime soon. Good luck with those consoles. After 560D and non existant overclocking dreams, stalling progress, now this?!
Utterly ridiculous and if anyone somehow feels AMD deserves benefit of doubt? Get yourself checked out. This isn't a player anymore, its a leftover of what once was. Let's hope Intel can rise above anything that is IGP level performance soon. Its the last chance.
'jebaited'... pffft'a bit'. The company that engineers your product pushes a BIOS update that shortens the lifespan for its OWN customers, willingly, and only to gain a minimal (PR) advantage versus the direct competitor?
Yeah just a bit of a stuff up :D Its fine though, you can always flash back right? ...at your own risk.
Note that AIBs now apply a binning process to the very same chips that are deemed 'not stable', and put the better bins in '14 Gbps' GPUs. A comforting thought isn't it. I think they'll make it just past warranty. Now that's consumers winning for sure!Actually MSI is always the first telling us an honest story, and being consistent with its GPU releases and tiering. Except maybe if its coming from a random MSI rep. But this is an announcement. The real question is why AIBs are not coming out with one story together. It shows that the rest is trailing the music and unable to draw the same conclusions yet, or just slow. None of that is a good thing that shows dedication in any way, or is it?
Mark my words. These 14 Gbps models are going to be more prone to failure too.Precisely. Reading between the lines here, too huhThat is the only possible way both AMD and AIBs can save face here. Pull the entire launch, recall all sold and ordered GPUs and replace with officially specced 14Gbps modules.
Anything else : 'You got screwed'
Or perhaps they need reasons to sell overpirced 5600XTs (the most expensive AIB card is by MSI)
Powercolor/Sapphire make no such claims.
Besides, having this:
ASUS:
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/asrock-releases-rx-5600-xt-performance-enhancing-vbios-easy-1-click-updater.263174/unread
Gigabyte:
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/gigabyte-outs-rx-5600-xt-gaming-oc-vbios-update-and-easy-updater.263178/unread
Sapphire:
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/sapphire-releases-pulse-rx-5600-xt-convenient-vbios-updates.263175/unread
MSI:
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/msi-pushes-rx-5600-xt-video-bios-updates-through-dragon-center.263176/unread
Powercolor:
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/powercolor-releases-rx-5600-xt-unleashed-bios.263177/
I wonder how any manufacturer would dare to make "nope, no warranty" claim.In which parallel universe has that happened?
Until Ampere, then its back down to 25 or lower...
Also. are you seriously enlarging a screenshot for nearly 50% 'market share' that only applies to a single year? How does that define market share? LOL... Still need your coffee?
And then there is this:
"The JPR data showed that the overall discrete GPU market was weak in the second quarter. AIB shipments down 16.6% sequentially and 39.7% YoY, which reflects the impact of excess GPU inventory after the crypto bubble burst. "
So what's really being said is that while AMD gained share from Nvidia, the net result is still down YoY and even sequentially.
Well, not Sapphire but with the sole model with different memory spec and it being the launch/review card, Sapphire is in a bit of different situation here. Sapphire only has that one Pulse model that has 14Gbps in its specs from the beginning while all the other cards did not, including the ones that have the specs updated to 14Gbps now (which I assume is because they had 14Gbps memory chips to begin with). Still, that is not all 5600XT cards and there is still a good amount of 12Gbps cards.
Powercolor has 3 RX5600XT models (www.powercolor.com/products?id=1492658578&type=1577415667)
Red Devil, Red Dragon and a basic one. If you look at the Unleashed BIOS story, Red Devil and Red Dragon will get the BIOS update while basic one will not. Powercolor's specs page shows why - basic one has 12Gbps memory.
AMD wouldn't change the spec to 14GB/s if they'd told manufacturers to source 12GB/s GDDR6 in the first place.
IMO, AMD made the change knowing there was headroom in the original design and it turns out that the board vendors have been taking that headroom for their own profit by using cheaper VRAM instead.
OK, got it, makes sense.
From what I have seen, flashing the wrong BIOS very rarely fails due to issues with memory configuration. There are a lot more common reasons for it to fail.