Friday, May 26th 2023
AMD Confirms: RX 7600 Reference Cards in Retail will Not Have Power Connector Flaw
In the course of our testing of the reference-design AMD Radeon RX 7600 graphics card, we noticed a flaw in the physical design that could impede certain kinds of 6+2 pin PCIe power cables, causing improper power connector contact, posing a potential fire hazard, theoretically. The flaw centers on the design of the card's backplate. The cutout near the power connector is designed such that certain kinds of 6+2 pin PCIe power connectors don't properly insert. Most if not all power supply units (PSUs) have their 150 W, 8-pin PCIe power connectors designed to be 6+2 pin, where you can split two of their pins away, turning them into 6-pin PCIe. While some PSU brands use a passive hook-type tail-end bridge that ensures the 2-pin portion inserts along with the 6-pin portion, some brands use more elaborate stubs that hold the two portions together. The AMD RX 7600 reference backplate design impedes these kinds of connectors.
We reached out to AMD with our findings before the May 24 review NDA, and the company got back to us with a statement:
AMD states that there are plenty of Radeon RX 7600 graphics cards that you can buy right now. These are custom-design (non-reference design) graphics cards from AMD's board partners, such as Sapphire, PowerColor, XFX, ASRock, ASUS, Gigabyte, and MSI. These cards are currently available for purchase, and none of them have the flaw. As for the reference-design (made by AMD) graphics card, AMD says that these cards are not available in retail, but should be over the coming weeks, and will have a revised design without the flaw. AMD didn't spell out a definite timeline, and so "the coming weeks" could even mean months (the company isn't sure). The way we interpret the statement is that the current batch with the bad backplate design will not make it to market, not now, not in the coming weeks or after that.
If you'll notice, none of AMD's AIB partners have published product pages of reference-design RX 7600 cards on their websites, which confirms that AMD has placed a block on the sales and marketing of the reference-design RX 7600, giving them time to work on the revision—which really just needs to be a new backplate, the rest of the card isn't affected. Unlike NVIDIA, which has a de facto reference-design in the form of the Founders Edition graphics card that it directly markets without partner branding; AMD retains a classical marketing approach to its reference graphics card designs—these are sold by its add-in board partners with minimal re-branding (brand-specific retail packaging, stickers, inclusions, extended warranty incentives, etc).
In conclusion, AMD has ensured that none of the cards with the power connector design flaw make it to customers, while it works on a revision that comes out "over the coming weeks." Good job!
Be sure to catch our detailed review of the reference-design AMD Radeon RX 7600, in which we discussed a few workarounds under the assumption that cards with the flaw would make it to retail—which we now know they won't.
We reached out to AMD with our findings before the May 24 review NDA, and the company got back to us with a statement:
We are very pleased with the volume of Radeon RX 7600 cards available globally from our AIB partners. We expect RX 7600 reference design cards to be available over the coming weeks with a design that accommodates all power supply cables.Here's our analysis of the AMD statement.
AMD states that there are plenty of Radeon RX 7600 graphics cards that you can buy right now. These are custom-design (non-reference design) graphics cards from AMD's board partners, such as Sapphire, PowerColor, XFX, ASRock, ASUS, Gigabyte, and MSI. These cards are currently available for purchase, and none of them have the flaw. As for the reference-design (made by AMD) graphics card, AMD says that these cards are not available in retail, but should be over the coming weeks, and will have a revised design without the flaw. AMD didn't spell out a definite timeline, and so "the coming weeks" could even mean months (the company isn't sure). The way we interpret the statement is that the current batch with the bad backplate design will not make it to market, not now, not in the coming weeks or after that.
If you'll notice, none of AMD's AIB partners have published product pages of reference-design RX 7600 cards on their websites, which confirms that AMD has placed a block on the sales and marketing of the reference-design RX 7600, giving them time to work on the revision—which really just needs to be a new backplate, the rest of the card isn't affected. Unlike NVIDIA, which has a de facto reference-design in the form of the Founders Edition graphics card that it directly markets without partner branding; AMD retains a classical marketing approach to its reference graphics card designs—these are sold by its add-in board partners with minimal re-branding (brand-specific retail packaging, stickers, inclusions, extended warranty incentives, etc).
In conclusion, AMD has ensured that none of the cards with the power connector design flaw make it to customers, while it works on a revision that comes out "over the coming weeks." Good job!
Be sure to catch our detailed review of the reference-design AMD Radeon RX 7600, in which we discussed a few workarounds under the assumption that cards with the flaw would make it to retail—which we now know they won't.
98 Comments on AMD Confirms: RX 7600 Reference Cards in Retail will Not Have Power Connector Flaw
Worst part is whatever the redesign involves will be passed to the consumers as always is.
"We change the price at $273 because we feel consumers should pay for that design error.".
Trust me when a company f's up, you pay for it.
Especially with this tech giants, that clearly don't want to lose a inch of ground from the pandemic and crypto gains.
Look im one of those people, I still run an RX480 today, mostly because gaming just barely grabs my attention anymore, I have been gaming for over 20 years now and I see games basically dont progress in meaningful ways for me, I recently started playing Prince of Persia Sands of Time (already completed the first...literally 20 years ago (2003 game) but never the sequels, I own it all on PC so I thought id do a complete playthrough) and obviously that runs at hundreds of FPS just fine, and playing that I once again am confronted about how little games have progressed so yeah, gaming barely grabs me anymore, just more of the same year in year out.
Cyberpunk was going to move the needle....and we all saw how that turned out, it moved the needle alright...just backwards.
Anywho, long story short, they could bring out a GPU today whos performance is equivalent to a GTX980 and it would be better then my RX480....the point is that that would be laughable to release today...there should not be a standard that low.....
and the same for this RX7600...it should not exist as this low end a product imo....
As for the reason why it is released today. Well, the fact that there where bigger, stronger, faster cars than a modern Smart 50 years ago, doesn't mean that anything under a Ferrari doesn't make sense today. It does. As you can do your job with the RX 480, the same someone can do their job with an RX 6500XT, a GTX 1650, even an A380. At a lower price 7600 will be a very good option for people who don't care setting everything at ultra, or are satisfied with lower settings, indy games, or older games at high/ultra settings.
oh wait I do….money, budget, needs vs wants…
:)
He's gone off his rocker...
Also most reviews run ultra max settings, which I suppose is a good way to see what the card can handle at max, but I find is they don't do medium or optimized settings to show that the card is still completely capable of playing most games.
I had an RX480 when BL3 came out and on auto settings at 1440p it would drop well below 60fps and the fans were very loud.............I watched an optimization video, and adjusted my settings with virtually no/minimal visual loss and held 60fps consistantly and fans never ramped up.
As for the RX7600 it's probably over double the performance of an RX480 if not more, and the RX480 was $239 in 2016 ...........is equivalent in purchasing power to about $302.09 today, while the RX7600 is $269, plus it has more features (whether or not you use them is another thing) supports newer standards and features, etc. etc.
I suppose another thing is back in 2016, 1080p was probably still king.............with 1440p and 4k there is more market areas now as well? So anywho, I'm kind of glad there is a 7600 beacuse I don't want to pay $250 for an RX6400 :)
It's more or less relative to what you compare.
In my opinion, a $300 CPU is the equivalent to a $700 graphics card. So the comparison should be done with those cards. And even then I believe that the hardware on a graphics card is much less expensive compared to the hardware on a current gen motherboard, with a current gen CPU and plenty of DDR4/5 memory on it. Using specific settings makes it easier to compare all cards, from the faster to the slowest. Getting 60 fps with an RTX 4090 at ultra settings and 60 fps with an RTX 4060 Ti at medium settings, will only create confusion, because most people will look at those 60fps, but they will have a problem spotting that "medium" in place of "ultra" in the charts. People without technical knowledge would not even know that they have to search for that little detail. There is stagnation. Going back to 2016 to find a favorable scenario, it is bad already. But we see companies doing it in their slides lately all the time, going back 2-3 generations with the excuse of "we want to show to users of old hardware that now it is the time to upgrade". Why? Because there is no real performance improvements compared to previous gens. 50-100% performance improvements where normal many many years ago. Of course now we have hit some ceiling and we can't expect 50-100% performance improvements to come easily. But still, what do we get under $500? The RTX 4060 Ti offers performance close to the RTX 3070 at a price close to that of an RTX 3070. RX 7600 offers the same performance at the same price as the RX 6650 XT having about the same specs. AMD cut the XT from the name to have the excuse to compare the card with the plain 6600, but 6600 costs $200, not 270.
Stagnation. The company that CAN offer higher performance at under $500, increases prices, the company that CAN'T offer higher performance at under $500, keeps offering the same performance at the same price.
2. relative to opinion and where you live in the
3. perhaps - but feel free to start up a company and make an RX6800 16GB equivalent for $250 and I will buy one :)
4. again last gen and now it does...............it didnt when it was released.............I can get a 10 year old car cheaper than a new one as well :)
End of the day it's a decision, don't have to buy anything, vote with your wallet I belive the saying is.
2. It's relative. Making assumptions about pricing it's relative. That's what I am saying. I wasn't going to use that $300 example, but you did, so I played with your rules. And you can't compare a $300 CPU to a $260 card. The $260 card is considered entry today. The $300 CPU not. It's mid range close to hi end. So you have to compare with a $700 card at least.
3. This is not an argument. What you post is not an argument. Explain to me why it is an argument. We have stagnation and what you post is not an argument. I really don't know what it is.
4. Well, that old car is in fact brand new meaning with full support and warranty. It has almost the same specs, the same performance as the new one. You are again missing my point here. Maybe you didn't understood what I wrote, maybe you choose to miss my point. Don't know.
Closing with a general comment with which the majority agrees, doesn't make the rest of the post correct.
I mean, it's good that AMD are making the change, but it's not their fault that PSU manufacturers are taking liberties with the connector standard in the first place...
2. everything is relative
3. I know
4. again depreciation / early adopter tax
simple facts
RX480 2016 MSRP $239 (2023 $ 302)
RX 6600 2021 MSRP $330 (2023 $369)
RX 7600 2023 MSRP $270 - 2023
My only argument is that when comparing realease to release the RX7600 relatively speaking is decent card for the money for 1080p gaming. It's not awesome, but not bad.
Now of course last gen is better bang for the buck, I'm not arguing that, that's why I built in Nov. 2022, used all older/last gen stuff that was on good sales.
Would I get a 7600 now? Not if I can get a 6600/xt/50xt at a better price. Would I upgrade from a 6600 - nope. But if I had an RX480 it would be a good upgrade, but so would a 6600/xt/50xt
But real growth seems to go in spurts
HD 3850 320 cores
HD4850 800 cores
HD5850 1440 cores
HD 6850 960 cores
HD7850 1024 cores
R9 270 1280 cores
......
RX 480 2304 cores
RX 6600 1792 cores
RX 7600 2048 cores
It increased good from 3850 to 5850 then dropped and increased slowly then got a good spurt going to RX480 and then dropped again, even though there was a die shrink..........maybe due to the cost difference from GF 14/12nm to TSMC 7nm, maybe everyone was milking covid, there was crypto as well which didn't help either.
But yes, it would be great if the RX7600 would have been 2560 cores on a 256-bit bus and 16x slot for $270....................however I think now with 1080p and 1440p and 4k, everyone jumped on board with Intel's marketing segregation and says its a top 1080p car and its a top 1440p card and its a top 4k card, which I think is just marketing shenanigans to try to set higher prices. I think the real stagnation is gimping the memory bus and pcie wiring.
Well lets hope maybe there will be a 7600XT with 2560 cores, or hopefully on increasing core counts for the same $ but I won't hold my breath.
They purposefully and arbitrarily cut performance, cores, memory bandwidth, etc... to serve the price stack they figure maximizes profit, and don't fool yourselves, this is not random, this was thought out, was calculated.