Today, we are covering the XFX Radeon RX 5600 XT THICC III Ultra, which is the company's most premium RX 5600 XT model. Last week, we had posted a review of the THICC II Pro, which is the THICC III's smaller brother. The key difference between both cards is that the THICC II uses a dual-fan cooler, whereas the THICC III comes with three fans and slightly more fins in the heatsink. Both PCBs are nearly identical except for the length difference, and have the same VRM configuration. While the THICC III has a higher power limit and higher rated boost clock, both cards effectively deliver the same performance. This is a bit surprising as one is rated for 1750 MHz boost and the other for 1620 MHz boost. In our real-life testing, actual measured average GPU frequency is nearly identical: 1733 MHz and 1723 MHz. Looking at our other RX 5600 XT reviews we can see that all the cards are achieving real clocks between 1700 and 1725 MHz, so it's not the GPU frequency that's making a difference. The bigger factor for performance is the memory clock. While the majority of RX 5600 XT cards run at 1500 MHz GDDR6, a handful of models from various vendors have received a BIOS update to 1750 MHz, which yields around 5% extra performance. Unfortunately, XFX's THICC III Ultra runs at 1500 MHz memory, so it'll be unable to match the performance of these higher memory-clocked models.

Overall, when averaged over our testing suite at 1080p resolution, we see XFX's RX 5600 XT THICC III right behind the NVIDIA RTX 2060 by 3%. The aging RX Vega 64 is just 4% faster. NVIDIA's GeForce 16-series lineup is far behind, as the GTX 1660 Ti is 13% slower and the GTX 1660 Super is 15% slower. AMD's next-fastest SKU, the Radeon RX 5700, is just 12% faster and starts at around $15 more. NVIDIA's RTX 2060 Super is 16% faster than the RX 5600 XT. Other premium custom designs (MSI Gaming Z, PowerColor Red Devil, and ASUS STRIX) are slightly faster, by 5%, as mentioned before. The cheapest RX 5600 XT models will end up 5% slower than the THICC III. Overall, the RX 5600 XT is a great card for 1080p gaming with plenty of headroom for future titles, but it can also handle 1440p well, maybe not at Ultra details in every single game, but it'll be a very decent experience overall.

XFX is following the design theme set forth by their earlier Navi cards, but they definitely listened to feedback and made improvements to the cooler. Being a pure dual-slot design, the THICC III is also thinner than most other RX 5600 XT cards we've tested so far, even Sapphire's Pulse uses more than two slots. While dual-slot isn't that important nowadays with CrossFire effectively dead, it's still an important difference that should also set expectations for cooling performance and noise levels. It seems the focus with the THICC III vs. the THICC II was to improve noise levels, not to reduce temperatures. With 74°C, the THICC III runs a little bit warmer than other cards, but there's still plenty of thermal headroom. Due to the triple-fan design, the card is longer, which gave XFX more room to build a larger heatsink with more fins, which results in more surface area for heat dissipation. The THICC II impressed with good noise levels, but the THICC III is even better. At full load, the card is pretty much inaudible, emitting just 27 dBA—that makes it the quietest RX 5600 XT we ever tested. Technically, there's a "quiet" BIOS on the card that reduces fan speed even further, but the difference was impossible to make out subjectively (RPM did change from 850 to 650). All other RX 5600 XT cards we've tested so far are very quiet, too, so the noise differences are minimal. In a surprise reversal, AMD's graphics cards are now quieter than their competing NVIDIA counterparts—who would have expected that. XFX also included the highly popular idle-fan-off capability with their card, which completely shuts off the fans in idle, browsing, productivity, and light gaming. Some competing NVIDIA cards lack that capability, too.

Due to the cooler design, memory temperatures are a little bit higher than on the competition, but it's not a big difference because of the heatsink improvements by XFX. Thermal headroom on memory also isn't that important on the RX 5600 XT since AMD locked down memory overclocking—they all run at 1860 MHz, which is the end of the slider range in Wattman. It's good to see that XFX is using 14 Gbps memory chips from Micron, which have excellent memory overclocking potential. Actually, XFX is looking into creating an optional BIOS update to 1750 MHz memory frequency, which might be released soon.

With a typical gaming power draw of 140–160 W, the XFX THICC III is very power efficient, better than most of NVIDIA's Turing lineup; only the GTX 1660 Ti and GTX 1650 are more efficient. Very impressive! XFX swapped out the IRF voltage controller used on nearly all cards for a more cost efficient model from OnSemi. This definitely improved power efficiency, so it was a smart decision. The only drawback is that the controller does not report VRM temperature to the host system, which isn't a big deal in my opinion unless you are a sensor aficionado who wants to monitor as much as possible. The card's low power draw means that people who are upgrading from an older graphics card won't have to worry about upgrading their power supply, too, which would incur additional expenses.

Back when NVIDIA launched the RTX 2060 with 6 GB VRAM, the Internet was full of hate. Now, AMD does exactly the same, and it still makes perfect sense for me. 8 GB VRAM on a card that's targeted at 1080p/1440p isn't worth it, especially if you have to meet a certain price point to make the card attractive. Looking through our performance results I can identify only a single clear case: Assassin's Creed Origins. Here, we see the RX 5600 XT fall behind at 1440p, but all the other games are running fine. If you absolutely must have 8 GB VRAM, then be ready to pay for it: RX 5700 and RTX 2060 Super have you covered. It's not something I would do in this case where money matters.

The next and certainly bigger controversy will be real-time ray tracing support. NVIDIA's RTX 2060 supports hardware accelerated ray tracing and the RX 5600 XT does not. While proliferation of RTX is limited today, several big titles with RTX support are coming out this year. Next-gen consoles will also have support for hardware ray tracing, which will further push game developers to embrace the new technology. Still, I would say ray tracing isn't the most important capability to have right now in this market segment. On the other hand, the RTX 2060 is barely more expensive than the RX 5600 XT, and it has that unique selling point, making this a close call.

The XFX RX 5600 XT THICC III Ultra is currently listed online for $320, which is a $40 price increase over the AMD MSRP, and $30 more than the THICC II. At that price point, and with what the THICC III delivers over the THICC II, I'd opt for the cheaper THICC II. I have no doubts that the extra fan and longer PCB cost a few dollars more, but $30 is pushing it. On the other hand, if you are looking for a super-low-noise card that's dual-slot and are willing to pay for it, the THICC III could be worth it. Another good alternative is Sapphire's RX 5600 XT Pulse which comes at AMD MSRP—$40 cheaper, its performance is also higher because of its 1750 MHz memory frequency. I think XFX definitely needs to release a 1750 MHz BIOS update for their THICC III Ultra to achieve parity with other similarly priced high-end RX 5600 XT cards. For just $15 more you could also get a RX 5700, which has an additional 2 GB VRAM at improved memory bandwidth. Last but not least, NVIDIA's RTX 2060 brings strong competition to this segment, too, with its $300 price point and RTX support.