ASRock Radeon RX 6950 XT OC Formula

[W1zzard]

ASRock's Radeon RX 6950 XT OC Formula is one of the fastest RX 6950 XT custom designs we've reviewed, and its great cooler achieves excellent temperatures. The card also has a super-strong VRM with 21-phases, more than any other RX 6950 XT.

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[the54thvoid]

I mean, the perfortmance is impressive but 33% higher power draw for 10% more performance isn't appealing, not at least to me. But, I'm not the target market. At least these cards are more realistically priced than Nvidia's BS SKU stack.

 

[Space Lynx]

This may be my dream card. Hits everything I am looking for, plus it would be kind of neat to do an all ASRock build. The temps are amazing... and unlike W1zz, I would be using an even slightly stronger fan curve... not too crazy of course, but I bet I would shave even a few celsius on the top of that.

AC Valhalla at 1080p... with the extra OC I may be able to hit 165 fps at 165 hz at 1080p... that's pretty much my standard requirement for my next gpu purchase. I want that experience.

 

[ARF]

I mean, the perfortmance is impressive but 33% higher power draw for 10% more performance isn't appealing, not at least to me. But, I'm not the target market. At least these cards are more realistically priced than Nvidia's BS SKU stack.

I believe it can be undervolted without losing performance.

The card is excellent - in some games it is the fastest card on the market, in others maybe driver/game engine optimisation and more work is needed.

What causes this so large performance gap between it and the original RX 6900 XT in Days Gone?
31% performance improvement or 45 FPS more may suggest driver optimisation.

ASRock Radeon RX 6950 XT OC Formula Review - Days Gone | TechPowerUp

 

[W1zzard]

What causes this so large performance gap between it and the original RX 6900 XT in Days Gone?
31% performance improvement or 45 FPS more may suggest driver optimisation.

Yeah I think they optimized Unreal Engine 4 among others

 

[HeadRusch1]

Question one would be for slightly more money would a 3080 Ti overclock close the gaps where this card pulls ahead, I think the answer is yes. Question two would be is it really relevant to discuss buying a card like this at $1100 (or any card at this price/performance point) to be concerned with 1920x1080p numbers? Most of the games referenced in these benchmarks benefit almost zero from having framerates as high as these cards are achieving, they aren't online twitch or eSports shooters. 1440 and 2160p performance is what matters, and probably to VR users as well who are driving similarly demanding resolutions in modern headsets.

 

[Face_]

What model of 6900 XT is that in the list? How does this card compare against the ASRock 6900XT OC? The factory oc on that card is very aggressive, how much better could the 6950 version really be? Does the 18 vs 16Gbps memory clock really make that much of a difference?

Side note, the Adrenaline software auto overclocks my 6900xt oc vram to 2180, that's within spitting distance of the 2200mhz clock on the 6950xt oc. Not sure what you're really getting for the extra money over the 6900xt oc.

 

[W1zzard]

What model of 6900 XT is that in the list?

Reference of course

How does this card compare against the ASRock 6900XT OC?

ASRock Radeon RX 6900 XT OC Formula Review - This Card is Fast

The ASRock Radeon RX 6900 XT OC Formula is built using AMD's new Navi 21 XTXH chip, which runs much higher clocks than what the regular RX 6900 XT can achieve. In our testing, this is the first AMD card in a long time to beat NVIDIA's current-generation flagship, the RTX 3090.

www.techpowerup.com

 

[mosFAT]

The two reviews sadly cant be compared, since they use different driver/ game versions. This can be seen by comparing the numbers of the reference card. In the 6900 xtxh review the reference design achieves 156 fps vs 161 fps in the 6950 review in Doom Eternal. Sometimes this gap is even bigger. In reality, differences between both cards will be so small, that the silicon lottery might be the deciding factor. And even then we are talking single digit numbers. So it might me something you can measure but will never feel in game. I own the XTXH version and I can run gameclocks of 2600 Mhz with 1.075v -and I`m talking metro exodus full ray tracing etc. This seems to be nothing special for a good XTXH card. If I max out everything (with the default air cooler) timespy is possible with 2800 Mhz on the clock. So I would simply decide on the prices you find. Personally, I would not pay more than 50€ extra for the 6950 upgrade.

 

[progste]

It looks like AsRock did a good job with it, but OOF that power draw and OOF that price tag!
I don't think I'll buy a 6950 XT anytime soon.

 

[mosFAT]

In germany the 6900 OC Formula can be bought for 975€ putting it on par with the more premium 3080s (non ti). You can shave off quite a bit of power with undervolting while even gaining some clock speed if you are willing to tinker around a bit.

 

[ItsAdam]

I believe it can be undervolted without losing performance.

The card is excellent - in some games it is the fastest card on the market, in others maybe driver/game engine optimisation and more work is needed.

What causes this so large performance gap between it and the original RX 6900 XT in Days Gone?
31% performance improvement or 45 FPS more may suggest driver optimisation.

View attachment 250413
ASRock Radeon RX 6950 XT OC Formula Review - Days Gone | TechPowerUp

Not sure if those numbers were redone with the preview or latest drivers (which were launched with the x50 series) where all amd cards get a huge boost.

It looks like AsRock did a good job with it, but OOF that power draw and OOF that price tag!
I don't think I'll buy a 6950 XT anytime soon.

Why would you? New Cards soon xD

In germany the 6900 OC Formula can be bought for 975€ putting it on par with the more premium 3080s (non ti). You can shave off quite a bit of power with undervolting while even gaining some clock speed if you are willing to tinker around a bit.

Not entirely true, a 6900 is between a 3080 and 3090.

 

[mosFAT]

I was referring to the more premium models like the strixx etc. since the asrock is a top of the line product with high end custom pcb, cooler etc. But you can definitely get a 3080 below that price! Im not saying it's a steal -what is in the gpu market of today? but it has come down significantly and CAN make sense in comparison to a 3090 that is 40% to 50% more expansive or 3080 that is just a few bugs cheaper. Im not an asrock sales rep btw. and run a tuf 3080 in my itx system.

 

[ItsAdam]

I was referring to the more premium models like the strixx etc. since the asrock is a top of the line product with high end custom pcb, cooler etc. But you can definitely get a 3080 below that price! Im not saying it's a steal -what is in the gpu market of today? but it has come down significantly and CAN make sense in comparison to a 3090 that is 40% to 50% more expansive or 3080 that is just a few bugs cheaper. Im not an asrock sales rep btw. and run a tuf 3080 in my itx system.

My RTX 3090 SUPRIM X was a toaster.. Actually scratch that, a full blown electric oven.

Also 10GB VRAM was a mistake, any way you want to argue it is fine, it should have been 12GB MIN as per the 2080 Ti.

The 3080 and 3090 cards are hot runners, christ I bet 3090 Tis will be blamed for global warming soon enough..

 

[waltc]

Good review! I thought I'd mention one tiny little thing that I've seen in a couple of AMD GPU reviews of late, and that is that if the reviewer doesn't see a connector on the card for Crossfire/MutliGPU he assumes that the cards don't support it, accordingly. But ~4 years ago, if memory serves, AMD moved the GPU interconnect for Crossfire/MultiGPU between GPUs to the PCIe bus exclusively, doing away with the need for physical connectors. Before I purchased a 5700XT from AMD in July 2019, I used an rx480 8GB purchased much earlier with an RX 590 8GB (Fat Boy) a year later, and Crossfire & MultiGPU worked really well with those two cards--no physical connectors on either card--worked beautifully through the PCIe bus as advertised. Seemed a lot more elegant to me than the old physical connectors. The only multiGPU games I own are the Crystal Dynamics Tomb Raider games, and SotTR supported D3d12 multiGPU from day one. And if memory serves, then CD back-ported D3d12 multiGPU support to Rise, as well--which I also own, and was a nice surprise to see..,.

Having said that, I don't know if AMD still supports multiGPU on its latest GPUs (although I know they have dropped support for Crossfire totally) because D3d12 multiGPU is a part of the D3d12 spec, so I would think the support for multiGPU is intact--although I don't know... And of course, since D3d12 multiGPU must be supported in the game engine by the developer, there seem to be very few games that have bothered to support it. These days, these beast GPUs are fast enough all by themselves, which is enough to seal the fate of the long Crossfire/SLI run and the much shorter multiGPU run in game development thus far.

 

[F-man4]

Yeah I think they optimized Unreal Engine 4 among others

Sad to hear that 6950XT’s UE4 improvement is a hardware one but not a driver fix.

 

[W1zzard]

Sad to hear that 6950XT’s UE4 improvement is a hardware one but not a driver fix.

afaik it is a driver fix that will apply to all cards

 

[Luckspywater]

Solid review. I particularly like the price point vs features.

 

[NerfHabibi]

I have a question i have same gpu but i was searching for almost a week and i didn't find any water block for this gpu please if someone knows where can i find it ??

 

[progste]

I have a question i have same gpu but i was searching for almost a week and i didn't find any water block for this gpu please if someone knows where can i find it ??

it's very rare for non-reference cards like this one to get a waterblock made for them, if you stil want to watercool it you may have to use modular blocks instead, but I would advice to ust give up or swap it for a reference GPU or one that comes with a waterblock already.
Looking around it seems that some waterblocks exist for the 6900XT version, you could check if those are compatible (but make sure that really is the case or it could lead to issues).

 

[dalekdukesboy]

Hey Wizz,

... One thing missing before next gpu's arrive is a review of a water cooled 6950 xt like the Toxic etc, any hope of having such a review?

Best gpu reviews online are yours in my opinion so was hoping to see one, few reviews I saw of a wc'd 6950 xt were lacking imo.

 

[VeganJoy]

I have a question i have same gpu but i was searching for almost a week and i didn't find any water block for this gpu please if someone knows where can i find it ??

Bykski makes a block for the 6900XT version, I have one on my OCF. Running 2700-2800mhz, which I suspect is roughly equal to this “new” 6950XT’s gaming performance. It also seems that they’re using a worse bin, as Wizzard squeezed 2850mhz out of the 6900XTXH in his review as opposed to 2800mhz from these

 

[dalekdukesboy]

Bykski makes a block for the 6900XT version, I have one on my OCF. Running 2700-2800mhz, which I suspect is roughly equal to this “new” 6950XT’s gaming performance. It also seems that they’re using a worse bin, as Wizzard squeezed 2850mhz out of the 6900XTXH in his review as opposed to 2800mhz from these

I noticed that.. However it may sustain noticably higher clocks in average; because short of driver improvements there's no other way performance would increase.

 

[VeganJoy]

I noticed that.. However it may sustain noticably higher clocks in average; because short of driver improvements there's no other way performance would increase.

Well compared to a stock 6900xt of course, even ignoring the anomalous results mentioned earlier in the thread. But compared to the original XTXH I’d bet it’ll be considered worse for hardcore OC

 

[ARF]

How did AMD improve the idle consumption so much from 6900 XT to 6950 XT?
Down from 28 W to only 7 W and 10 W?

ASRock Radeon RX 6950 XT OC Formula Review - Power Consumption | TechPowerUp