AMD Radeon VII Review

Team Red’s comeback to high-end desktop graphics is the AMD Radeon VII. The 7nm manufacturing method is being used for the first time in a graphics processor (GPU). The card has a high boost frequency of 1,800MHz and 16GB of video memory (VRAM). It competes against the Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 and outperforms it in a few areas.

Specs and Features:

With a staggering 16GB of HBM2 VRAM, the new AMD Radeon VII graphics card has twice as much visual memory as the previous generation. The Nvidia Titan RTX is the only other graphics card with larger video RAM. It also has 3,840 AMD Graphics Core Next (GCN) cores and a 1,800MHz maximum boost clock, which is 300MHz faster than the Vega 64. It won’t support AMD’s CrossFire technology for connecting multiple graphics cards, but we can’t fault the business for that.

Synthetic benchmarks:

Futuremark’s Fire Strike Ultra remains a top choice for 4K gaming. The Radeon VII takes a beating here, losing by double digits against the GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition. This DirectX 12 benchmark is newer than 3DMark Fire Strike, which is based on DirectX 11. It makes extensive use of API features such as explicit multi-adapter and multi-threading.

Performance:

The AMD Radeon VII is a powerful graphics card that outperforms Nvidia’s RTX 2080. On the Fire Strike (Ultra) DirectX 11-based benchmarks, it is neck and neck with its green-tinted counterpart, but it falls short on the DirectX 12-based TimeSpy (Extreme) scores. Outside of benchmarking, we’re blown away by how helpful 16GB of video RAM is in today’s games.

Real-World Gaming:

At 1440p and 4K, AMD’s Radeon VII card beat Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition. The game is well-optimized for PC, but higher quality settings make it highly demanding. Far Cry 5 and Far Cry Primal are DirectX 11-based games, yet they are still demanding. At 1080p and 1440p, the Radeon VII falls short of the GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition, but it outperforms it at 4K. The AMD card would appear to be an essential investment for playing AAA games at that resolution with maxed-out settings.

Thermals:

The AMD Radeon VII’s triple cooling fans easily rise above background noise while running at full speed. Even with the case door closed on our test equipment, the fans could be heard throughout a medium-sized room. The temperatures were not affected by overclocking. Although the junction temperature of 112 degrees Celsius felt high to me, it was well below the rated maximum of 120 degrees Celsius.

Pros:

True two-slot case compatibility.
In terms of 4K gaming performance, it’s comparable to the GeForce RTX 2080.
The addition of 16GB of video memory ensures that the device is future-proof.

Cons:

Extremely loud cooling fans.
High power usage on the board.
There is no VirtualLink port.

Conclusion:

The Radeon VII, AMD’s new top graphics card, is a worthy though the power-hungry alternative to the GeForce RTX 2080 for 4K gaming, but it isn’t as quick at 1080p or 1440p settings.