XFX Radeon RX 9070 XT Mercury OC Magnetic Air

[Scotter008]

It's bonkers how energy inefficient overclocking is. +90 W (over Sapphire Pulse at stock PL) only give +5% performance.
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If I ever happen to buy an RX 9070 XT GPU I will definitely buy the cheapest one since going beyond 315 W is of almost no fruit.

In a way I kinda think these cards are already overclocked. Look at the 9070 for example. Way lower clocks yet far more effecient. It subsequently makes sense why it takes so much more power for so little since it looks like AMD already chose a good spot on the architechtures voltage-frequency curve (unlike nvidia this time around; leaving considerable clock speed increases on the table).

 

[FreedomEclipse]

I see where they got their inspiration from

 

[Countryside]

Only 800usd

 

[Ninehell]

This card gonna look so good in my pc case after I apply large sticker over the cass

 

[Ser_g11]

A strange decision to use such an evaporation chamber, not designed for cooling and memory. As a result, the memory is cooled by a small copper plate and we see temperatures above 80 degrees, what prevented the use of a full-size chamber for memory and GPU? Another quick-and-dirty cooling design. An example as possible below with RTX 5070 Ti cards.

 

[roadie]

Nope, PowerColor sent 9070 Hellhound

Great, I've one of these arriving today. Obviously I can form my own opinion of the card in terms of the amount of noise it produces but it will be interesting to see your objective results.

I may try to undervolt to boost efficiency.

 

[Macro Device]

I kinda think these cards are already overclocked

Sure. Since around 2010, we have been seeing CPUs and GPUs closer and closer to their limits outta the box. It's surprising to see any additional OC potential in today's tech.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Dual BIOS ships with identical BIOSes

Um, XFX? What is this?

 

[sLowEnd]

View attachment 388488

I see where they got their inspiration from

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Maybe it's a throwback to the HD 5000 series?

AMD Radeon HD 5870 1 GB GDDR5 Review

Today AMD launches their new Radeon HD 5800 Series of graphics cards. They are powered by a brand new graphics processor called "Cypress". Our review goes into all the detail about the new HD 5870 flagship, but we also have HD 5850 scores so you can get an idea what to expect.

www.techpowerup.com

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Maybe it's a throwback to the HD 5000 series?

AMD Radeon HD 5870 1 GB GDDR5 Review

Today AMD launches their new Radeon HD 5800 Series of graphics cards. They are powered by a brand new graphics processor called "Cypress". Our review goes into all the detail about the new HD 5870 flagship, but we also have HD 5850 scores so you can get an idea what to expect.

www.techpowerup.com

I was actually thinking of this while I was posting. Couldn't for the life of me remember why it felt so familiar

 

[Macro Device]

I was actually thinking of this while I was posting. Couldn't for the life of me remember why it felt so familiar

View attachment 388514

Now it's just about time to release AMD-Adrenalin-25.3.2-Win11-WHQL.BAT drivers.

 

[rusty caterpillar]

View attachment 388497
A strange decision to use such an evaporation chamber, not designed for cooling and memory. As a result, the memory is cooled by a small copper plate and we see temperatures above 80 degrees, what prevented the use of a full-size chamber for memory and GPU? Another quick-and-dirty cooling design. An example as possible below with RTX 5070 Ti cards.

View attachment 388498View attachment 388499

They didn't want to connect the heat coming from GPU with the VRAM, but than the plate for cooling the VRAM is insufficient, to thin, not linked properly to heatsink, to small surface.

On the other hand I see the VRAM plate sitting on top of the vapor chamber, strange in did.

 

[londiste]

Nope, PowerColor sent 9070 Hellhound

Did some manufacturer send over a stock/reference 9070XT?

 

[Dawora]

it was so funny to read all those comments about cheap Amd gpus, 500$ or something.. while i allredy know upcoming prices

That is because AMD's reference design pretty much maxed out it's best performance/wattage already.

There's just not much headroom unless you go way over 450W or using way faster GDDR chips.

Anyway; in OC'ed condition the thing is equal to a 4080 pretty much. I love it.

Great review as always Wizzard.

U can also OC 4080, FE model is easy over +10% faster whit OC, some AIB even more
And 5070Ti OC even better..

 

[Dragokar]

Factory curve set for lower temps than others at a higher PL. Fans crank up. Mind you, 36.7dba is still quieter than almost any card from 10 years ago. Btw, you can improve even on Taichi's Quiet Bios results by removing the shroud and installing any decent 120mm fans instead.

I know I still don't buy a card for people at these prices to tell them to do this and that after installed to get it quiet. I want silent cards ootb and that's why I bought the Sapphire Pulse. Personally I could deal with it, but for my friends and so on I don't do this.

 

[tugrul_LordOfDrinks]

So without oc it goes 3100MHz and with +400 oc it goes 3200 MHz?

 

[RedelZaVedno]

MSRPs are a joke at this point of time. dGPU market itself is a joke as a matter of fact. Just look at prices in Europe. Cheapest RX 7090XT costs 929€, 7090 749€, RTX 5070 795€, 5070TI 1155€, RTX 5800 1400€... I mean WTH?! It's becoming clear that ethusiast market of DIY is about to collapse. It's just a matter of time. I hope the collapse is not permanent, but given the fact that we're in this shitshow for nearly a decade I wouldn't count that as impossible. I've been in this hobby since early 90ies, but I can't remember when dGPU market was so bad as it is today.

 

[Krit]

MSRPs are a joke at this point of time. dGPU market itself is a joke as a matter of fact. Just look at prices in Europe. Cheapest RX 7090XT costs 929€, 7090 749€, RTX 5070 795€, 5070TI 1155€, RTX 5800 1400€... I mean WTH?! It's becoming clear that ethusiast market of DIY is about to collapse. It's just a matter of time. I hope the collapse is not permanent, but given the fact that we're in this shitshow for nearly a decade I wouldn't count that as impossible. I've been in this hobby since early 90ies, but I can't remember when dGPU market was so bad as it is today.

That's peoples own fault nobody is forcing to buy these stupid expensive gpus. Every single person who bought RX 9070 XT for more than 720$/€ is guilty the same applies to all new gpus. These stupid decisions are wrecking whole gpu market similar situation was when people where buying RTX 4060 Ti 16GB, RTX 4070/4070Ti, RTX 4080 in big numbers for stupid prices.

 

[Caring1]

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I see where they got their inspiration from

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They always have, even their older cards had the red trim that reminded me of the Batmobile

 

[Vario]

Price seems silly, basically 4070 Ti Super money but the 4070 Ti super has been out for a while now.

 

[Random_User]

Thanks for the review!

The price is bonkers. It's completely unreasonable. There's nothng this card is worth the additional $200 increase. The MBA cards used to have vastly superior vapor chamber (the bad batch of 7900 series was quickly fixed), as well as PCB and components, for much cheaper, than even cheapest AIBs, with inferior PCB design.

And the magnet fans are not giving any benefit, outside the questionable servisability. The sound profile is atrocious, the cooling is not impressive. Also, the card for this price, lacks the PCI 3slot bracket, shich easilly could be added, for better support.

The only plus, is that it has the three 8pin connectors, instead of 12v 2x6. But at this point, it should just had two of them, and stock clocks, to be simultaneously cheaper, and cooler, and quieter.

I bet it's sensors being more accurate than in previous generations on top of a much higher heat density which makes resistance futile. PTM7950 won't do jack.

The nice and bad sides of PTM7950, is that it gains it's "cooling" properties with time. The more it's being used, the more it will bring the temperatures down.

On top of this, this is the worst cooler out of all of the 9070XTs tested so far.

Looks like. But this card is also pushed the clocks towards insanity. Every 9070XT at this point, have clocks pushed long beyond the point of reasonability. These +10% of additional OC, over "XFX applied" one +170/+130MHz stock/boost, are moot. It's not worth the temps and power consumption increase for any AIB card, over AMD's "reference" clocks, which are also under big question. That's why I wrote multiple times, that Sapphire could just make Nitro+ with two slot cooler, and two 8pin connector, with potential of "reasonable" OC.

That's peoples own fault nobody is forcing to buy these stupid expensive gpus. Every single person who bought RX 9070 XT for more than 720$/€ is guilty the same applies to all new gpus. These stupid decisions are wrecking whole gpu market similar situation was when people where buying RTX 4060 Ti 16GB, RTX 4070/4070Ti, RTX 4080 in big numbers for stupid prices.

As if all of the buyers were in the dire need of the VGA... some of them, might have came from previous gen AMD/nVidia. So the people who have already waited for almost a decade, or more, have to wait forever.
Also, the prices are and were set by the the AI/crypto "value", not by their MSRP or BOM. That's why not buying is also not really an option, because AI dudes would buy out the entire stock, even from the scalpers.

 

[Macro Device]

The nice and bad sides of PTM7950, is that it gains it's "cooling" properties with time. The more it's being used, the more it will bring the temperatures down.

What I mean is thermal paste IS NOT A PROBLEM. The problem is very high wattage per sqmm.

 

[InfernalAI]

It's bonkers how energy inefficient overclocking is. +90 W (over Sapphire Pulse at stock PL) only give +5% performance.
View attachment 388394
If I ever happen to buy an RX 9070 XT GPU I will definitely buy the cheapest one since going beyond 315 W is of almost no fruit.

There definitely needs to be more in depth studying of how far you can push these cards. But I got the gigabyte aorus 9070xt. And I have settled on an overclock of +115 to frequency, and -85 voltage. With 2780mhz memory. and power limit I'm only setting to +7.

Results in cyberpunk, show 1440p RT ultra with no upscaling, getting 58 fps avg using the built in benchmark. Now I tried searching around for videos looking for comparisons. In Daniel Owens recent video of the 9070xt, he got 51 fps with same settings. Also I saw older video of him using rtx 4080 and getting 61 fps with those settings. So 3 less fps to the 4080? That is pretty good.

Also I benchmarked unigine superpositon at 4k. And I'd say average I'm getting is 22,400. It has bounced between 22350-22450 max. I saw videos of others who get around 19760 at stock. So around 13% uplift. Power usage shown through adrenaline overlay is around 360-370 when being maxed.

Overall I think that's pretty good. Especially that cyberpunk ray tracing. If it gets that close to Nvidia's 5070ti-4080, that's a real winner.

 

[bug]

Video cards have always been luxury items. People got used to the depressed prices of the great financial crisis and then assumed that high end hardware would always be viable to those with little money. With fierce fab competition in the late 2000s we saw some VERY cheap hardware, but that simply isnt sustainable with todays pricing.

The GTX 8800 was $600 in 2006. $961 today. The 8800 ultra was a $830, over $1200 today. The 1950xtx was a $450 card, or $687 today.

Maybe so, but I was always able to get a decent card at $200-250. Not anymore (even if you adjust that for inflation).

 

[drpoor]

Here we go again. It is all bullshit. AMD are not the saviors, they do not give a shit about gamers/enthusiasts. NVIDIA does not give a shit about gamers/enthusiasts. Same story every launch. What bothers me, and it may not bother you, is that these companies built their brands on the backs of PC gamers and enthusiasts under the unspoken contract that when you "make it to the big time," us gamers that supported you will be rewarded with photo real graphics and cheap cards, cuz , you know.