AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT Could Get a 32 GB GDDR6 Upgrade

[AleksandarK]

AMD's Radeon RX 9000 series GPUs are expected to come with up to 16 GB of GDDR6 memory. However, AMD is reportedly expanding its RX 9070 lineup with a new 32 GB variant, according to sources on Chiphell. The card, speculatively called the RX 9070 XT 32 GB, is slated for release at the end of Q2 2025. The current GDDR6 memory modules used in GPUs carry a capacity of 2 GB per module only, meaning that a design with 32 GB of VRAM would require as many as 16 memory modules on a single card. No 2 GB+ GDDR6 memory modules are available, meaning that the design would require memory module installation on both the front and back of the PCB. Consumers GPUs are not known for this, but it is a possibility with workstation/prosumer grade GPUs employing this engineering tactic to boost capacity,

While we don't have information on the GPU architecture, discussions point to potential modifications of the existing Navi 48 silicon. This release is positioned as a gaming card rather than a workstation-class Radeon PRO 9000 series product. AMD appears to be targeting gamers interested in running AI workloads, which typically require massive VRAM amounts to run locally. Additionally, investing in a GPU with a big VRAM capacity is essentially "future-proofing" for gamers who plan to keep their cards for longer, as recent games have been spiking VRAM usage by a large margin. The combination of gaming and AI workloads may have made AMD reconsider some of its product offerings, potentially giving us the Radeon RX 9070 XT 32 GB SKU. We have to wait for the Q2 to start, and we can expect more details by then.



View at TechPowerUp Main Site | Source

 

[Quicks]

Well at least AMD is not stringy with their VRAM.

Still would like AMD to try a 350 - 400W card with 24GB - 32GB VRAM and + 30% - 50% of the cores of the 9070XT and see what's the best performance they can get out of it.

Price is king, they just need to price it right and people will buy it.

 

[TPUnique]

I got interested for a nanosecond, contemplating delaying my GPU purchase for something that could be very useful for ML tasks. Then I remembered that AMD was still lagging in the ML department, so I'll try to order a 5070Ti on the 20/02 as planned.

I have a 2nd computer to replace, so I'll see next year what Intel and AMD have in store by then.

 

[kondamin]

That would make the card a whole lot more interesting.
cant they stack 2 ram chips without making it hbm

 

[csendesmark]

This one got my attention!!!!

 

[londiste]

Clamshell usually. Pro and datacenter cards have this often enough. Rarer in consumer space. 3090 and 4060Ti 16GB come to mind from recent times.
Either way, a 32GB 9070XT would be immediately bought up for AI. Given relative lack of performance improvement for gaming the SKU probably does not make much sense.

 

[W1zzard]

I got interested for a nanosecond, [...] could be very useful for ML tasks. Then I remembered that AMD was still lagging in the ML department

Exactly what just happened to me.

No doubt, AMD is trying to sell this to AI people, but the developer experience is so terrible compared to CUDA. Unless you're buying a few hundred and can spread the developer cost among these units I doubt it will make a big difference

 

[Chomiq]

I guess it will have its use for ML applications. That being said I would still prefer 9090 XTX with 32 GB of vram.

 

[Nhonho]

CUDA

I would like to buy Radeon VGAs, but I am forced to buy Geforce VGAs because there are more software compatible with CUDA and also because the quality of videos encoded by Geforce NVENC have better image quality.

 

[NoneRain]

doubt, but it would be awesome.

 

[InVasMani]

Pricing would be my concern, but looks appealing otherwise.

 

[Onasi]

Useless for gaming, kind of useful as a bone thrown to the AI crowd, but, as noted above, it would have to be priced very aggressively to compensate for the lack of NV amenities like CUDA.

 

[Sound_Card]

I called it lol. I knew this was in the works somehow.

Useless for gaming, kind of useful as a bone thrown to the AI crowd, but, as noted above, it would have to be priced very aggressively to compensate for the lack of NV amenities like CUDA.

People are starting to work around CUDA, and you don't even need it to build your own LLM. A 32Gb 9070xt for half the price of a 5090 would be a major deal for the AI people.

 

[csendesmark]

Exactly what just happened to me.

No doubt, AMD is trying to sell this to AI people, but the developer experience is so terrible compared to CUDA. Unless you're buying a few hundred and can spread the developer cost among these units I doubt it will make a big difference

Try to run a 30GB model on a fancy 24 or 16GB RTX with CUDA and compare the experience against a Radeon with 32GB VRAM.
VRAM is valuable real-estate!

 

[AusWolf]

I don't see the point. Sure, Nvidia's 12 GB lineup is anaemic as f*ck, but this is unnecessary in this class of GPU (unless it's targeted at purely AI purposes, I guess).

 

[csendesmark]

I don't see the point. Sure, Nvidia's 12 GB lineup is anaemic as f*ck, but this is unnecessary in this class of GPU (unless it's targeted at purely AI purposes, I guess).

Gaming wise, there is little point moving above 12~16GB VRAM in 2025Q1.

 

[Octopuss]

However, AMD is reportedly expanding its RX 9070 lineup with a new 32 GB variant

What's the bloody point?

 

[Sound_Card]

Try to run a 30GB model on a fancy 24 or 16GB RTX with CUDA and compare the experience against a Radeon with 32GB VRAM.
VRAM is valuable real-estate!

Ya, this will sell like hotcakes and perhaps lighten the demand on gaming cards.

I don't see the point. Sure, Nvidia's 12 GB lineup is anaemic as f*ck, but this is unnecessary in this class of GPU (unless it's targeted at purely AI purposes, I guess).

32GB would be purely AI.

 

[Jtuck9]

If it's a similar architecture hopefully this bodes well for the software suite on the other cards

 

[PaddieMayne]

Fantastic news i hope they do a 24gb model.

 

[Krit]

32GB is not a gaming gpu it will be artificially expensive. Mainly for work or for gamers with low iq 16GB is more than enough for gaming.

 

[AusWolf]

Fantastic news i hope they do a 24gb model.

If they did that with 3 GB memory modules while keeping the Navi 48 core intact, that would be awesome (still not necessary for gaming, but makes a bit more sense than 32 GB).

 

[Legacy-ZA]

32GB is not a gaming gpu it will be artificially expensive. Mainly for work or for gamers with low iq 16GB is more than enough for gaming.

Not necessarily; remember, nGreedia moved to GDDR7, there is going to be a lot of GDDR6/X chips that still need to be sold.

 

[PixelTech]

 

[3valatzy]

A bad decision - over engineered.

The chip is too slow to make use of so large VRAM pool, the bottleneck will be in the limited memory bandwidth, shaders count and generally poor micro-architecture performance / read IPC.