AMD Radeon RX Vega Preview

[Crap Daddy]

It's as bad as predicted, Fury looks like a masterpiece compared to Vega. Way too expensive MSRP but I guess they just simply can't afford to go lower due to the costs involved. I think any GTX1080 available on the market today will outperform Vega RX 64 clocked at 1547 Mhz on a comprehensive gaming benchmark suite.

 

[Vya Domus]

More like a $100 discount, because you pay $100 more for the video card. At least that's how I understand it.



Then it's not the smartest choice for a consumer video card, is it? But then again, it depends on what percentage "considerable" translates to.

Well Vega has about 30% higher transistor count. Given it has the same shader count as Fiji I would assume a lot of that extra die has to do with compute.

It is smart enough of a choice if you want to make just one design.

 

[Liviu Cojocaru]

Let's see some reviews. The TDP for these cards is quite high...I don't want to jump to conclusions but if the power consumption is high, that means the temps will be high as well and if the performance is not matching the TDP then this will be a big failure

 

[Prima.Vera]

Click bait. I thought this was the actual card review....

 

[Liviu Cojocaru]

Click bait. I thought this was the actual card review....

It says "Preview" in the title...

 

[AndreiD]

I just want to point out how hilarious it is that they used an Intel 7700K for their Vega 'benchmarks'.

 

[crow1001]

Vega sucks. Nvidia focused on gaming oriented GPUs whilst AMD still screw about with cramming in all the useless pro crap that does nothing for gaming. Sorry but Nvidia are the gamers choice.

 

[john_]

Nah it's performing about the same as Fury X clock for clock.

You get about 30% performance with a 40-60% extra frequency. Not exactly same as Fury X. The screenshot is from AMD's own video.

 

[bug]

Let's see some reviews. The TDP for these cards is quite high...I don't want to jump to conclusions but if the power consumption is high, that means the temps will be high as well and if the performance is not matching the TDP then this will be a big failure

Worse yet, the TDP is high with HBM on board. Since HBM2 draws less than GDDR5, it makes the GPU that much less efficient. Not a problem per se, if someone manages to design a proper heatsink for it, but an advantage either.

 

[Liviu Cojocaru]

if someone manages to design a proper heatsink for it

That will probably result in a higher price

 

[john_]

Vega sucks. Nvidia focused on gaming oriented GPUs whilst AMD still screw about with cramming in all the useless pro crap that does nothing for gaming. Sorry but Nvidia are the gamers choice.

Do you have a few hundred millions to give them to come out with a new design especially for gaming?

All those years that people where shooting everyone who was suggesting an AMD APU or an FX (in those not so many cases where they where good for the job) lead to this. I mean people where coming at forums and saying "I want to make a cheap system so I can do a little of everything, browsing, office, simple gaming". Some people where suggesting an APU or an FX 6300, and then swarms of Intel and Nvidia fans where crucifying those who dared to suggest an AMD as an option.

If Ryzen wasn't a success, to give them a little financial boost, and if AMD didn't cared about gaming market, Vega would have been a pro product ONLY. I really don't know if they will make any money out of this RX series.

As for Nvidia, they have the money today to create many designs. A few years ago that they where NOT swimming in dollars, they where creating only one design, the GTX 480 that you have in your system specs. That was NOT a pure gaming card, it was more like Vega.

 

[Vya Domus]

You get about 30% performance with a 40-60% extra frequency. Not exactly same as Fury X. The screenshot is from AMD's own video.

View attachment 90655

Gamer nexus did a test with FE and it performed exactly the same at 1050 mhz or something like that. The reason the performance doesn't scale with the frequency is because there is a bottleneck somewhere else , most likely something to with the way the drivers operate.

All those years that people where shooting everyone who was suggesting an AMD APU or an FX (in those not so many cases where they where good for the job) lead to this. I mean people where coming at forums and saying "I want to make a cheap system so I can do a little of everything, browsing, office, simple gaming". Some people where suggesting an APU or an FX 6300, and then swarms of Intel and Nvidia fans where crucifying those who dared to suggest an AMD as an option.

I used to love it when people would persuade someone to buy an i7 and crappy GPU for gaming.

 

[Basard]

I predict $50-100 price drop after a couple months. Gotta give all the die-hard fans a chance to empty their wallets. Just like with Ryzen.
I also predict a $250 price hike after a couple months due to limited stock and miners.
Finally, I predict full stock and reasonable pricing early next year by the time nobody wants it anymore.

 

[bug]

I predict $50-100 price drop after a couple months. Gotta give all the die-hard fans a chance to empty their wallets. Just like with Ryzen.
I also predict a $250 price hike after a couple months due to limited stock and miners.
Finally, I predict full stock and reasonable pricing early next year by the time nobody wants it anymore.

You forgot to factor in Nvidia clearing stock ahead of Volta

 

[yotano211]

I predict $50-100 price drop after a couple months. Gotta give all the die-hard fans a chance to empty their wallets. Just like with Ryzen.
I also predict a $250 price hike after a couple months due to limited stock and miners.
Finally, I predict full stock and reasonable pricing early next year by the time nobody wants it anymore.

I have a feeling miners wont be touch this thing

 

[john_]

I predict $50-100 price drop after a couple months. Gotta give all the die-hard fans a chance to empty their wallets. Just like with Ryzen.
I also predict a $250 price hike after a couple months due to limited stock and miners.
Finally, I predict full stock and reasonable pricing early next year by the time nobody wants it anymore.

The first could happen, but more chances go to the $50 drop. If they get better prices for the HBM2.
The second could happen from day one if it ends up being good for mining.
You can forget the third one. This isn't a card for mass availability to the gaming community. This is a card to help AMD to remain relevant in the market. To keep part of it's fan base. To have some red bars closer to the top of the charts, a top which will be full of green bars. A card that will go to professionals and will give AMD's partners the chance to make some extra dollars.

 

[yotano211]

The first could happen, but more chances go to the $50 drop. If they get better prices for the HBM2.
The second could happen from day one if it ends up being good for mining.
You can forget the third one. This isn't a card for mass availability to the gaming community. This is a card to help AMD to remain relevant in the market. To keep part of it's fan base. To have some red bars closer to the top of the charts, a top which will be full of green bars. A card that will go to professionals and will give AMD's partners the chance to make some extra dollars.

I keep saying that miners wont touch this thing. Mad gamers can have Vega all to themselves.

 

[bug]

I keep saying that miners wont touch this thing. Mad gamers can have Vega all to themselves.

We don't know the mining performance of these things. They may be mining beasts, well worth their TDP, it's too early to tell.

 

[yotano211]

We don't know the mining performance of these things. They may be mining beasts, well worth their TDP, it's too early to tell.

Just look at Vega frontier edition, YUCK!!!!!!

 

[VSG]

RX Vega 56 and RX Vega Nano would be the most lucrative mining cards of these, but even so I doubt it given the hoops to jump through to get the limited quantity available.

 

[KainXS]

Looks like its success will depend on how much they throttle and how the XT chips clock.

 

[bug]

Just look at Vega frontier edition, YUCK!!!!!!

Has the compute power been benchmarked? I must have missed it.

 

[Breit]

For that kind of performance, 345W TDP is just absurdly high. Even an overclocked 1070 under water will probably stay under this while performing better. I had hoped for something Ryzen-like performance in the GPU space with Vega.

Does anyone know how many consumer GPUs AMD is selling compared to its professional lineup? I'm under the impression that they seem to develop their GPU architectures mainly around the professional market and not the gaming market anymore and are happy that gaming is at least somewhat possible on these GPUs too.

One should think that given all those years in the business, they should at least know what a GPU architecture tailored to gaming should look like and still they fail to deliver. I'm by no means saying taht they can't do better or are incapable of coming up with anything better. They just seem to don't care that much of the high end gaming market. It must have something to do with the expected revenue (or the lack thereof), which is understandable.
All I'm expecting from them is to be truthful about this and not pretending something they are not with shady marketing. This doesn't help getting back in the gaming market.

 

[ShurikN]

Looks to me that AMD (or should I say RTG) simply had to dish out something to fill the gap between Hawaii and Navi and stay relevant in the market.
I don't have a problem that it competes with 1070 and 1080 at possibly lower prices nor the power draw at this point. I don'd mind that it comes out more than a year later, and (probably) cannot beat the topdog (Ti).
The biggest problems I see are the HBM and die size, and how much money can AMD actually make with these chips, and those prices?
Another issue I'm seeing is, who is the target audience for Vega. If a product like this got released in Aug 2016 ppl would have a choice. Unfortunately, the fact is, NV fans undoubtedly went for Pascal, and while AMD fans waited for this, all those neutral buyers had no other option when it comes to upper-mid segment.
So what happens now? Let say 20% of the ppl were holding out for Vega to arrive, and let say 10% (at best) that got Pascal will jump ship just for the sake of having fancy new hardware. That is still extremely low and those are probably best case scenarios. Now, maybe the review will show a different story, maybe it can take the fight to the 1080Ti, and there still is the G-Sync price premium over Freesync if you want to go that way, but thats a lot of straw grasping.
And it looks like the supply will be low as well, not to mention the fact that you'll have to jump through rings of fire to get your hands on one.
Sure the Ryzen combo is cool and all, but most buyers that wanted a Ryzen CPU already got one. Imagine how awesome it would have been if Ryzen and Vega launched alongside each other, with these prices and these combo deals. Another missed opportunity for AMD.

Don't think I can say I'm disappointed, as new hardware is always exciting, but I strongly believe that AMD made a huge amount of wrong moves regarding everything Vega related. The videos, the teasing, the demos, the release frame, not going for AIBs from the get go (expect more of the RX480 reference cooler crap)...

Now if it's true that Navi is actually Raja's "from the ground up" project, and that when he got to AMD Polaris and Vega were already massively in development, than that gives me hope that Navi will truly be RTG's Zen and more.

 

[bug]

@ShurikN At this point, I can't imagine Nvidia having a hard time shedding ~$50 from the MSRP of 1070 and 1080, making life even more complicated for AMD.