Friday, October 30th 2020
Sapphire Unveils Reference-design Radeon RX 6800 XT and RX 6800
Unlike NVIDIA, AMD still relies on its add-in board (AIB) partners to sell reference design (made by AMD) graphics cards, and Sapphire just announced its lineup. The company unveiled its reference-design Radeon RX 6800 XT and RX 6800 cards. The RX 6800 XT is characterized by its triple-slot cooling solution, while the RX 6800 makes do with a slimmer dual-slot one. Both cards are based on the 7 nm "Navi 21" silicon and feature 16 GB of 16 Gbps GDDR6 memory over a 256-bit wide memory interface, cushioned by 128 MB of on-die Infinity Cache.
The RX 6800 XT is configured with 72 out of 80 RDNA2 compute units on the "Navi 21" silicon, working out to 4,608 stream processors, 72 ray accelerators, 288 TMUs, and 128 ROPs. The engine clock of the RX 6800 XT boosts up to 2.25 GHz. The RX 6800, on the other hand, features 60 out of 80 RDNA2 compute units, which make up 3,840 stream processors, 60 ray accelerators, 240 TMUs, the same 128 ROPs, and the same memory subsystem as the RX 6800 XT. Given that these are reference cards, Sapphire could price them at AMD's baseline, with the RX 6800 XT going for $649, and the RX 6800 at $579.
The RX 6800 XT is configured with 72 out of 80 RDNA2 compute units on the "Navi 21" silicon, working out to 4,608 stream processors, 72 ray accelerators, 288 TMUs, and 128 ROPs. The engine clock of the RX 6800 XT boosts up to 2.25 GHz. The RX 6800, on the other hand, features 60 out of 80 RDNA2 compute units, which make up 3,840 stream processors, 60 ray accelerators, 240 TMUs, the same 128 ROPs, and the same memory subsystem as the RX 6800 XT. Given that these are reference cards, Sapphire could price them at AMD's baseline, with the RX 6800 XT going for $649, and the RX 6800 at $579.
38 Comments on Sapphire Unveils Reference-design Radeon RX 6800 XT and RX 6800
I would say that these being reference cards, anything other than baseline price would be just wrong and deceiving.Well no, not triple slot but 2.5 slot for 6800XT but as motherboards don't do half slots it will take up 3 slots.
6800 though is a 2 slot card.
Hopefully the reviews of 6800XT reference card will not disappointment me. :p
I have already full water loop setup with Ryzen 3700X and Radeon VII and intend to replace Radeon VII with this.
EK already announced that they are preparing the blocks. :rockout:
Hopefully EK will include the single slot bracket as in the past.
just noticed the 6800 xt is triple slot
welp, just waiting for reviews now, if the cooler is good to not get an AIB, I'm going to go for a reference 6800 xt
For those wondering: the XTs have "2.5" slot coolers, 50mm (49.75mm) thick. The 6800 non-XT has a 40mm, 2-slot cooler.Look at the cooler fin orientation - the fins are perpendicular to the motherboard, so no noticeable amount of air would be passing out there even if there was no I/O plate at all. Leaving it closed off is no problem at all. It would of course be entirely different if the fins were oriented parallel to the board.Probably coming - both Asus and Gigabyte have blowers for the 3080 (and GB even for the 3090!), so they'll make it if there's a market.
In the last few generations Radeon reference coolers were disappoint. :(
Hopefully this time it has better efficiency. :rolleyes:
The concern I have with this sideways air blowing design is that on PCIe connector side the most of air will hit mainboard PCB making it hot in the area. :oops:
This is close to NVMe SSD slot on many x570 boards and will make the SSD hotter like on my ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi).
But, can not help but wonder. Is Sapphire getting preferential treatment from AMD? there is as well, XFX, PowerColor exclusive radeon producers too.
I just hope AMDs cooling solution is quiet enough for my taste. Is there any new information when the NDA on reviews will be lifted?
So ya if you can wait that long I would just keep rocking what you got.