Question R9 390 Upgrade - RX 6600 vs 6650 XT vs 7600

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 4, 2024

I have a 10 year old R9 390 and have been slowly upgrading the entire PC. CPU is a Ryzen 3600 and I will probably buy a 5600 at some point. I have a freesync 144hz monitor but don't game that much on my PC since i have Xbox Series X and PS5 , mostly just shooters and things that are much better with mouse and keyboard.

At my Local microcenter, here are my options:

RX6600	$130	Open Box
RX6600 XT	$155	Refurb
RX 7600	$200	Refurb
RX6650 XT	$210	New

What would be the best performance/ $$ value of these options?

I have no real budget, but am looking for the best value or longer term solution.

marees · Sep 4, 2024

I would take a chance on the open box 6600 for $130

DAPUNISHER · Sep 4, 2024

I agree the 6600 is the best deal if open box has full manufacturer's warranty. MC refurb policy is 90 days only.

I'd also consider holding out for the holidays and seeing what kind of deals there are on new.

blckgrffn · Sep 5, 2024

The 6600 is such a great card. It would be a stupidly large jump from the 390 in terms of perf per watt and a big jump up outside of that. Idle power might drop a lot too.

6600 at $130 gets my vote too.

My 290x was a space heater. The 6600 is basically the opposite of that, it’s one of the lowest power yet performant GPUs out there, the Nvidia 4060 is certainly in its own class above that but at a huge premium. If you get tired of the heat and noise the 390 brings to the table, the 6600 is such a huge relief on that front that I would suggest just giving it a go.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 5, 2024

DAPUNISHER said:
I agree the 6600 is the best deal if open box has full manufacturer's warranty. MC refurb policy is 90 days only.

I'd also consider holding out for the holidays and seeing what kind of deals there are on new.

i could also wait until the holidays. no particular rush at this point honestly. are the sales better then?

I also was thinking about upgrading from my 3600 to a 5700X3D... would that be a big increase as well?

marees · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
i could also wait until the holidays. no particular rush at this point honestly. are the sales better then?

Maybe you could get a 6750xt for cheap ($250?)

That trumps everything else in the range you have given

marees · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
I also was thinking about upgrading from my 3600 to a 5700X3D... would that be a big increase as well?

This should be huge for games

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 5, 2024

marees said:
Maybe you could get a 6750xt for cheap ($250?)

That trumps everything else in the range you have given

where do you see it for that price?

blckgrffn · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
where do you see it for that price?

I bought one (6700xt) used locally for $230 about a year ago. My guess is that is a used scenario atm.

That said upgrading to 6700xt and 5700x3D is really a great spot to get to. The 5700x3D is essentially the best CPU you can buy for gaming and casual PC use for the AM4 socket. You’ll never have to wonder about upgrading again.

The 6700xt is truly a full tier above the other cards you are considering and is still lower power usage than the 390. It’s a “safe” card too I that it is very similar to the level of power offered by the Xbox series X and the PS5, meaning many titles will be optimized for that level of performance and that architecture in particular.

The upside of waiting is also probably maybe RDNA 4 will be released. It might be advisable to get the basic tier of that card instead, or maybe we will see a lot of pressure on something like the 7700xt which could present a great value.

marees · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
where do you see it for that price?

I was referring to sale in nov/dec. Currently it goes for $300, I believe

blckgrffn said:
The upside of waiting is also probably maybe RDNA 4 will be released. It might be advisable to get the basic tier of that card instead

I expect the wait to be longer for the lower tier RDNA 4 cards. Definitely only in Q2 next year

However what happens as per MLID is that top RDNA 4 (navi 48 xtx) could be released this year & this should bring the prices of $500+ cards crashing down !!!

blckgrffn · Sep 5, 2024

marees said:
I was referring to sale in nov/dec. Currently it goes for $300, I believe

I expect the wait to be longer for the lower tier RDNA 4 cards. Definitely only in Q2 next year

However what happens as per MLID is that top RDNA 4 (navi 48 xtx) could be released this year & this should bring the prices of $500+ cards crashing down !!!

Right, I was just expecting even that release to put downward pressure on the entire stack and maybe unlock some value that otherwise is another 3-6 months away.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 5, 2024

blckgrffn said:
I bought one (6700xt) used locally for $230 about a year ago. My guess is that is a used scenario atm.

That said upgrading to 6700xt and 5700x3D is really a great spot to get to. The 5700x3D is essentially the best CPU you can buy for gaming and casual PC use for the AM4 socket. You’ll never have to wonder about upgrading again.

The 6700xt is truly a full tier above the other cards you are considering and is still lower power usage than the 390. It’s a “safe” card too I that it is very similar to the level of power offered by the Xbox series X and the PS5, meaning many titles will be optimized for that level of performance and that architecture in particular.

The upside of waiting is also probably maybe RDNA 4 will be released. It might be advisable to get the basic tier of that card instead, or maybe we will see a lot of pressure on something like the 7700xt which could present a great value.

Thanks! that is exactly what i was hoping to hear, I will get the 5700x3D for my Asus x570 mobo and I may just wait for a good deal on 6700xt or another GPU in the mean time.
Really useful info thanks.

blckgrffn · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
Thanks! that is exactly what i was hoping to hear, I will get the 5700x3D for my Asus x570 mobo and I may just wait for a good deal on 6700xt or another GPU in the mean time.
Really useful info thanks.

My only note here is to not expect a big seat of the pants difference prior to also getting a new GPU. The 3600 is a great pairing with the 390 in that it is fast enough that the GPU is the real bottleneck. Moving to a more powerful CPU will simply tip the scales even further in that direction.

While I was stutter stepping between my 5700XT and 6800 I briefly fell back to the 290x and it really surprised me (I don't know why) how big of a fall back it was in terms of performance. At that time I had a 3600 as well. It stuck out in my memory though.

The upshot being with a 5700x3D when you do upgrade the GPU you will get the full value of that upgrade!

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 5, 2024

blckgrffn said:
My only note here is to not expect a big seat of the pants difference prior to also getting a new GPU. The 3600 is a great pairing with the 390 in that it is fast enough that the GPU is the real bottleneck. Moving to a more powerful CPU will simply tip the scales even further in that direction.

While I was stutter stepping between my 5700XT and 6800 I briefly fell back to the 290x and it really surprised me (I don't know why) how big of a fall back it was in terms of performance. At that time I had a 3600 as well. It stuck out in my memory though.

The upshot being with a 5700x3D when you do upgrade the GPU you will get the full value of that upgrade!

Thanks, that makes sense. I am not really in a big rush as I have a PS5 and Xbox Series X. I mostly wanted to upgrade as I play most of my shooters on the PC w/ mouse and KB so the R9 390 is really chugging these days.
I only upgrade my Desktop every 5 years or so and have somehow used the R9 390 for 9 years lol.

blckgrffn · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
Thanks, that makes sense. I am not really in a big rush as I have a PS5 and Xbox Series X. I mostly wanted to upgrade as I play most of my shooters on the PC w/ mouse and KB so the R9 390 is really chugging these days.
I only upgrade my Desktop every 5 years or so and have somehow used the R9 390 for 9 years lol.

I hear you. Borderlands 3 was the end of my 290x, and honestly my Intel build at that time.

Had I upgraded CPU first I wonder how much longer it would have lasted, because in the end it was the big minimum FPS dips coming from the CPU side even when paired with the 5700xt (which hugely increased the max and avg fps) that pushed me over the edge.

That 290x was finally retired a few months ago when the kid I gifted it to was complaining about VR not working on it, so I gifted him a GTX 1660 that I had gotten as part of another build and that fixed the codec issues he had. It's fair to say that card had a 9+ year run as well. It was a good run!

Mahboi · Sep 5, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
RX6600 $130 Open Box
RX6600 XT $155 Refurb
RX 7600 $200 Refurb
RX6650 XT $210 New

What would be the best performance/ $$ value of these options?

6600 is ~15-20% less perf than 6600 XT.
6650XT is a factory overclock with a few extra percent, ~5+.
A 7600 has almost exactly a 6650XT's perf and power draw. Notably it also has AV1 encoding that is pretty decent, so if you want to record video or stream, I'd much more recommend that one.

In pure price/perf, the RX 6600 is easily the most solid. It's ~25% less good than a 7600, but you are missing out on AV1. The other two aren't super compelling, new or refurbed. Unless you think the 6600 XT is somehow "just the perf you need", which is unlikely.

Mopetar · Sep 5, 2024

marees said:
This should be huge for games

I don't think it would make much difference with a 6600 as games will largely be GPU bound even at 1080p. Unless it's a particular title like Factorio that's actually CPU heavy, it won't do much.

I could be wrong about this, but unless the price difference is negligible, I don't see much of a reason to get an X3D CPU. A regular 5600 is going to be just as good 99% of the time.

marees · Sep 5, 2024

Mopetar said:
I don't think it would make much difference with a 6600 as games will largely be GPU bound even at 1080p. Unless it's a particular title like Factorio that's actually CPU heavy, it won't do much.

I could be wrong about this, but unless the price difference is negligible, I don't see much of a reason to get an X3D CPU. A regular 5600 is going to be just as good 99% of the time.

True. But it is a $130 GPU

If the case & PSU support, you can upgrade to a $500+ GPU in the future

The 3d vcache cpu maximizes the AM4 slot & so is the best value, imo.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 6, 2024

blckgrffn said:
I hear you. Borderlands 3 was the end of my 290x, and honestly my Intel build at that time.

Had I upgraded CPU first I wonder how much longer it would have lasted, because in the end it was the big minimum FPS dips coming from the CPU side even when paired with the 5700xt (which hugely increased the max and avg fps) that pushed me over the edge.

That 290x was finally retired a few months ago when the kid I gifted it to was complaining about VR not working on it, so I gifted him a GTX 1660 that I had gotten as part of another build and that fixed the codec issues he had. It's fair to say that card had a 9+ year run as well. It was a good run!

Its amazing how long you can keep using these systems if you slowly piecemeal upgrade and arent chasing FPS records lol. Kinda sad to give up my R9 390, it was a powerhungry beast but rock solid. I have had a crash or two with this 6600

Mahboi said:
6600 is ~15-20% less perf than 6600 XT.
6650XT is a factory overclock with a few extra percent, ~5+.
A 7600 has almost exactly a 6650XT's perf and power draw. Notably it also has AV1 encoding that is pretty decent, so if you want to record video or stream, I'd much more recommend that one.

In pure price/perf, the RX 6600 is easily the most solid. It's ~25% less good than a 7600, but you are missing out on AV1. The other two aren't super compelling, new or refurbed. Unless you think the 6600 XT is somehow "just the perf you need", which is unlikely.

Mopetar said:
I don't think it would make much difference with a 6600 as games will largely be GPU bound even at 1080p. Unless it's a particular title like Factorio that's actually CPU heavy, it won't do much.

I could be wrong about this, but unless the price difference is negligible, I don't see much of a reason to get an X3D CPU. A regular 5600 is going to be just as good 99% of the time.

marees said:
True. But it is a $130 GPU

If the case & PSU support, you can upgrade to a $500+ GPU in the future

The 3d vcache cpu maximizes the AM4 slot & so is the best value, imo.

I agree with @marees and @blckgrffn, I am thinking I will just get the 5700x3D as it seems to the best price/performance CPU for the AM4 socket. That way I shouldn't need to update CPU/mobo for a long time. You can find it on aliexpress for $120-$140 depending on the deals which is nice.

Regarding GPU, I may just stick with the 6600 for now as it will probably sufficient for the short to mid term, just so my current games are not chugging. My PS5/Xbox Series X/ Steam deck take up the majority of time, not even sure if I should really bother with this upgrade lol.
Does this seem like a reasonable strategy?

One last q, I have G.Skill Trident Z RGB 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory. I don't think I need to upgrade this but just curious what you guys think? Would it make sense to throw another 16 GB of the same memory in there just to have 32GB for the long term? its only $47 USD, or could I mix in another 16 GB of another set of RAM that is even cheaper? i dont care about the RGB lol and obviously can't install DDR5 ram.

blckgrffn · Sep 6, 2024

I think 32GB is the way to go now, yes. Especially while it is inexpensive and you can match up what you have. The 3D cache, among other things, is much more forgiving with regards to memory speed and latency compared to the non-equipped chips, so there is that benefit as well.

That's a bummer on the 6600 crashing - given the open box nature I would really test it out while you are in the return window. It might be a bum!

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 6, 2024

blckgrffn said:
I think 32GB is the way to go now, yes. Especially while it is inexpensive and you can match up what you have. The 3D cache, among other things, is much more forgiving with regards to memory speed and latency compared to the non-equipped chips, so there is that benefit as well.

That's a bummer on the 6600 crashing - given the open box nature I would really test it out while you are in the return window. It might be a bum!

Yeah I am a little suspect about these open box ones. It was returned twice already so I may just look for a new one on sale in the near future.

Could I get 2 different types of DDR4 on the mobo as long as they are paired on slot 1 & 3 and 2 & 4 or would it be better to get the exact same model numbers. Non RGB options are about 20 bucks cheaper. no biggie if not honestly

blckgrffn · Sep 6, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
Yeah I am a little suspect about these open box ones. It was returned twice already so I may just look for a new one on sale in the near future.

Could I get 2 different types of DDR4 on the mobo as long as they are paired on slot 1 & 3 and 2 & 4 or would it be better to get the exact same model numbers. Non RGB options are about 20 bucks cheaper. no biggie if not honestly

Can you? Yes.

Will it work out great? :/ I don't know. That could be a lot of time chasing it down and trying to tune to speed.

If possible I would duplicate what you have or splurge out for a full new 32GB kit in 2 sticks, its less than $50:

Amazon.com

Again, the 3D chip will let you run "value" type ram and hide it really well.

Sell your shiny RGB kit locally for ~$25-$30 and its really a cheap upgrade.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 6, 2024

blckgrffn said:
Can you? Yes.

Will it work out great? :/ I don't know. That could be a lot of time chasing it down and trying to tune to speed.

If possible I would duplicate what you have or splurge out for a full new 32GB kit in 2 sticks, its less than $50:

Amazon.com

Again, the 3D chip will let you run "value" type ram and hide it really well.

Sell your shiny RGB kit locally for ~$25-$30 and its really a cheap upgrade.

Sounds good, I won't be overclocking the ram or anything so I might just try mixing.

DAPUNISHER · Sep 6, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
Sounds good, I won't be overclocking the ram or anything so I might just try mixing.

I have populated all 4 slots on B450, B550, X570 but only used mixed kits on B550 I think. T-Force and Patriot, both 3600 CL 18. No problem running XMP. Always pick the slowest kit's speed and timing to be safe. The other kit should do it no sweat.

I have 4 matched 8GB sticks of that Silicon Power EDIT: 3200 CL16 that was so cheap, in my kid's 6yr old B450 and it's solid.

Shmee · Sep 7, 2024

I definitely recommend upgrading to 32GB of RAM. You can mix RAM sticks, but you gotta be careful about it. What matters is that you get similar DRAM dies with matching timing/frequency/voltage profiles. In this PC, I have 4x16GB of Gskill DDR4, one kit is Trident Z, the other is FlareX. But they both use Samsung B-die, and are rated for 3200MT/s with same timings at 1.35V. They work fine at set XMP together, and can even OC a bit, though I find it doesn't help much with the 5800X3D.

My secondary comp has 4x16GB of DDR4, running a 5900X. One is Patriot, the other Gskill Ripjaws. But both use the same SK Hynix chips, with same timings at 3200MT/s, at 1.35V. They work fine together at XMP.

So my advice would be to do your research on what kits have the same chips and profiles, and buy a deal on a similar kit. Should be pretty cheap on Amazon or Ebay, either used or refurbished.

Question R9 390 Upgrade - RX 6600 vs 6650 XT vs 7600

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