The ASRock RX 6800 XT Taichi X is the company's flagship for the RX 6800 XT Navi 21 generation. ASRock is the youngest member of the AMD Radeon board partner family, having joined that exclusive club in 2018. Since then, their custom designs have come a long way and are now competitive with big names like ASUS, MSI, Sapphire and PowerColor. Out of the box, the Taichi runs at a rated boost of 2360 MHz, which is the highest boost setting available on any custom design. ASUS STRIX, Sapphire Nitro+, and XFX Merc run the same clock speed. In terms of relative performance, this makes the RX 6800 XT Taichi 3% faster than the RX 6800 XT reference at 4K resolution. NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3080 is only 2% faster, the RTX 3090 is 13% faster and much more expensive, and AMD's new RX 6900 XT costs upwards of $1000 and is only 4% faster. Compared to the Radeon RX 6800 non-XT, the Taichi gives you 16% more FPS, and the RTX 3070 is even slower at -26%. Performance uplifts compared to older cards are impressive as well, as it is almost twice as fast as the RX 5700 XT and more than three times as fast as the RX 590.

With these performance numbers, the Radeon RX 6800 XT is the perfect choice for 4K gaming at 60 FPS. It achieved that mark in nearly all titles in our test suite. Things are different once you turn on raytracing. Just like on NVIDIA, there's a hefty performance hit when running with the DirectX Raytracing API. We only tested two games so far, but it seems the loss in performance is bigger than on NVIDIA, who improved in that area with Ampere. Remember, this is AMD's first-generation raytracing implementation. Performance is still very respectable, reaching roughly RTX 2080 Ti levels. Now that RT hardware is available for both AMD and NVIDIA and game developers are making console games on AMD's new RDNA 2 architecture, it'll be interesting to see how raytracing performance evolves in the coming months.

ASRock's triple-slot, triple-fan cooler is quite large, with a length of 33 cm and heigth of 14 cm. It's also one of the heavier cards at over 1.7 kg. In our testing, we saw excellent GPU temperature of only 73°C, which is the lowest we've seen on any custom design. The AMD reference 6800 XT runs at 77°C, so it's not exactly a huge difference. At 35 dBA, noise levels are a tad higher than the AMD reference card, which makes it the loudest RX 6800 XT card we've tested. Don't get me wrong, 35 dBA is still quieter than the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Founders Edition. It just seems ASRock focused more on reducing temperatures than other board partners. Our new apples-to-apples cooler comparison reveals that the ASRock heatsink matches the AMD heatsink in cooling capability and is slightly better at lower heat loads, but slightly worse at higher heat loads. This also means that other custom designs, like the Sapphire Nitro+ or PowerColor Red Devil, do have slightly better cooling potential. If you prefer lower noise levels, ASRock has you covered. The Quiet BIOS can be activated quickly and runs a much more relaxed fan curve, which brings noise levels down to match other cards. With 31 dBA, the card is almost whisper-quiet now. Just like on the AMD reference design, idle fan stop is included on the card, which provides the perfect noise-free experience during desktop work, Internet browsing, media playback, and light gaming.

AMD surprised us with the energy efficiency of their new Navi 21 RDNA 2 graphics processor, beating even NVIDIA's Ampere lineup. Despite the large factory overclock, ASRock's card is even more power efficient than the AMD reference. I find this surprising because ASRock essentially uses the same PCB with one more GPU power phase and an additional 8-pin power input. I double-checked my results, and the Taichi X really uses 40 W less than the AMD reference; it could be that the GPU on my sample really won the silicon lottery. The reduced heat output definitely works well in keeping noise down because the cooler doesn't have to work as hard.

Overclocking on the Taichi X worked really well, better than on any other air-cooled RX 6800 XT card I've tested. This hints at a good silicon, too. The maximum overclock topped out at 2683 MHz, which yielded a performance improvement of 7% on top of the factory overclock. With those performance numbers, the card is faster than the AMD RX 6900 XT even when manually overclocked. The recipe for success is the higher power limit compared to the RX 6900 XT. ASRock's Taichi X has three 8-pin power inputs, which in theory could provide up to 525 W of power. In my opinion, the third power connector is mostly for show. There's no way this card can use that much power, not even when you raise the power limit in Radeon Settings.

The Radeon RX 6800 XT launched exactly a month ago, and there is still zero stock anywhere. Scalpers are listing these cards at way above $1000—let's hope nobody gives in to such obscene pricing. AMD's reference design comes at an MSRP of $650, which is just as much a fantasy. It seems fake pricing was made up to lure potential buyers away from NVIDIA, who aren't much more realistic with their prices either. With almost no stock, everybody in the supply chain is raising their prices, so I doubt we'll ever see pricing close to $650 for the new 6800 XT. The ASRock RX 6800 XT Taichi X is sold at an MSRP of $830, which is a $180 (!) increase over the AMD MSRP and impossible to justify even though the cooler is much bigger—it's just too similar. Performance is 2% higher, definitely not enough for a 28% price increase. At $830, the card will also be competing with NVIDIA's RTX 3080 lineup, which has better RT performance, but is less energy efficient. I'm just hoping we'll see better volume in 2021, so competition heats up and everyone can grab their choice of card at better pricing.