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

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 18, 2024

Shmee said:
Congrats on the new parts. The 5700X3D should help some in Cyberpunk, particularly when it comes to framerate smoothness, but also keep in mind that depending on settings, Cyberpunk can may be bogged down with even higher end cards, especially with RT on.

What settings are you playing with Cyberpunk? My recommendations for your card would be to adjust settings to a bit lower, and certainly turn RT off if it isn't already.

I have it on 1440P FSR Ultra Preset going. Its fine in most parts but slightly choppy when lots of objects are around and dips to around 40 FPS. I may try dropping it to 1080p but 1440 looks much nicer IMO.
I ended up getting the open box RX6600 for $118 at my local microcenter so pretty happy with the price considering it has basically the full warranty still.

Only other card i am considering at the moment is a 6700XT w/12 GB of ram someone is selling locally for about $200 USD. That might be worth the extra $?

Shmee · Sep 18, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
I have it on 1440P FSR Ultra Preset going. Its fine in most parts but slightly choppy when lots of objects are around and dips to around 40 FPS. I may try dropping it to 1080p but 1440 looks much nicer IMO.
I ended up getting the open box RX6600 for $118 at my local microcenter so pretty happy with the price considering it has basically the full warranty still.

Only other card i am considering at the moment is a 6700XT w/12 GB of ram someone is selling locally for about $200 USD. That might be worth the extra $?

The 6700XT would be a decent upgrade, certainly. Up to you on which is a better choice. Advantage of the RX 6600 of course is the warranty.

As for settings, I would try adjusting them a bit, maybe some settings down a notch to medium-high, and trying FSR balanced or performance.

DAPUNISHER · Sep 19, 2024

Here is my advice for 2077. Keep it at 1440 FSR 3 Quality. Then use the Hardware Unboxed optimized settings for the expansion. As it is a bit more demanding than the base game.

Once the 5700X3D is up and running you should have no more drops under 60.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 19, 2024

DAPUNISHER said:
Here is my advice for 2077. Keep it at 1440 FSR 3 Quality. Then use the Hardware Unboxed optimized settings for the expansion. As it is a bit more demanding than the base game.

Once the 5700X3D is up and running you should have no more drops under 60.

thank you!
i will check hardware unboxed. good idea!

Mahboi · Sep 19, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
I have it on 1440P FSR Ultra Preset going. Its fine in most parts but slightly choppy when lots of objects are around and dips to around 40 FPS. I may try dropping it to 1080p but 1440 looks much nicer IMO.
I ended up getting the open box RX6600 for $118 at my local microcenter so pretty happy with the price considering it has basically the full warranty still.

Only other card i am considering at the moment is a 6700XT w/12 GB of ram someone is selling locally for about $200 USD. That might be worth the extra $?

Honestly if you're gonna 2K you really shouldn't have picked the rx 6600...way too weak. 6700 xt for $200 sounds like a steal if it's solid.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 19, 2024

Mahboi said:
Honestly if you're gonna 2K you really shouldn't have picked the rx 6600...way too weak. 6700 xt for $200 sounds like a steal if it's solid.

Fair point.
I will go down to 1080 and give it a go. I dont know if the guy locally will accept my $200 offer, I am a bit wary of buying from people locally as well. LOl

DAPUNISHER · Sep 19, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
Fair point.
I will go down to 1080 and give it a go. I dont know if the guy locally will accept my $200 offer, I am a bit wary of buying from people locally as well. LOl

I am too risk adverse to buy used GPUs now, especially those lacking buyer protection. Crypto mining has accelerated most of them on to the wrong side of the bathtub curve/cradle to grave. If it fails in weeks or months you are out those 2 bills or more and right back where you started, looking for a card. I have seen a small S.I. is having some of those remanufactured RX 580 2048 cards starting to fail on customers after a few months. Yeah, no thanks.

Pedro tested with a 5800X3D 1440 high FSR quality last year, and was comfortably over 60fps. As he points out, being on a 42" 4K monitor should be taken into account when evaluating his comments on visuals. Being on a native 1440 display will make it look even better than what he attests too. And my experience is that upscaling is almost always preferable to lowering the res from native. HUB Optimized might get you there without FSR; looking forward to your results.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 23, 2024

I have a slightly obvious question to ask. I decided to return the open box RX 6600 and get a new one with the full warranty as it was only 25 dollars more due to a sale at my local store.
However the 3dmark scores are slightly lower on the new card vs the Open box one. Mind you, this the exact same CPU and GPU ( PowerColor Fighter AMD Radeon RX 6600) just open GPU is open box and one is new. Is 200 points a big drop in 3dmark performance?

Here are the stats:

Openbox 6600:
Firestrike score (DX11) :19441
Graphics Score: 23571
Physics Score: 18078
Combined: 8834

New 6600:
Firestrike score (DX11) :19218
Graphics Score: 22819
Physics Score: 18563
Combined: 9021

Strange that the DX11 scores are slightly higher in the open box , yet the combined scored is higher on the new one. I dont get it.

Openbox 6600:
Time Spy score (DX12) : 7859
Graphics Score: 8192
CPU Score: 6390

New 6600:
Time Spy score (DX12) :7679
Graphics Score: 7909
CPU Score: 6593

in the DX12 score, Open box graphics are 200 higher but CPU is 200 lower eventhough its the same CPU. Strange

Lastly,
I ran the benchmark in Cyberpunk and it seems to have run the same however I forgot to save the stats from the Open box GPU.
I have run OCCT stress tests and ran into no errors either.

SteveGrabowski · Sep 23, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
I have a slightly obvious question to ask. I decided to return the open box RX 6600 and get a new one with the full warranty as it was only 25 dollars more due to a sale at my local store.
However the 3dmark scores are slightly lower on the new card vs the Open box one. Mind you, this the exact same CPU. Is there any issue with that?

Here are the stats:

Openbox 6600:
Firestrike score (DX11) :19441
Graphics Score: 23571
Physics Score: 18078
Combined: 8834

New 6600:
Firestrike score (DX11) :19218
Graphics Score: 22819
Physics Score: 18563
Combined: 9021

Strange that the DX11 scores are slightly higher in the open box , yet the combined scored is higher on the new one. I dont get it.

Openbox 6600:
Time Spy score (DX12) : 7859
Graphics Score: 8192
CPU Score: 6390

New 6600:
Time Spy score (DX12) :7679
Graphics Score: 7909
CPU Score: 6593

in the DX12 score, Open box graphics are 200 higher but CPU is 200 lower eventhough its the same CPU. Strange

Lastly,
I ran the benchmark in Cyberpunk and it seems to have run the same however I forgot to save the stats from the Open box GPU.
I have run OCCT stress tests and ran into no errors either.

Was the open box one clocked higher? Or did it have a better cooler?

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 23, 2024

SteveGrabowski said:
Was the open box one clocked higher? Or did it have a better cooler?

Apologies, its the exact same GPU, PowerColor Fighter AMD Radeon RX 6600. one is new and one is open box. Somehow the Openbox one benchmarks slightly better than the new one (200 points in 3dmark)
Not sure what 200 points means in the real world since it seems to have a slighter different number for the CPU numbers, which is the exact same piece of hardware.

However i forgot to get the exact FPS before switching GPUs. Does that mean anything?

(note: i still have the both GPUs so I might do a proper bench mark tomorrow to see if the FPS are any differnet in Cyberpunk and some other games)

SteveGrabowski · Sep 24, 2024

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
Apologies, its the exact same GPU, PowerColor Fighter AMD Radeon RX 6600. one is new and one is open box. Somehow the Openbox one benchmarks slightly better than the new one (200 points in 3dmark)
Not sure what 200 points means in the real world since it seems to have a slighter different number for the CPU numbers, which is the exact same piece of hardware.

However i forgot to get the exact FPS before switching GPUs. Does that mean anything?

(note: i still have the both GPUs so I might do a proper bench mark tomorrow to see if the FPS are any differnet in Cyberpunk and some other games)

Is it a dual BIOS card? I have a PowerColor RX 6700 XT and it has a switch between a performance BIOS and a silence BIOS on it. That could be the 3% difference in graphics score if so.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 24, 2024

SteveGrabowski said:
Is it a dual BIOS card? I have a PowerColor RX 6700 XT and it has a switch between a performance BIOS and a silence BIOS on it. That could be the 3% difference in graphics score if so.

I dont think so. I just google it and nothing came up. I dont even see any option to upgrade the BIOS for that card.

DAPUNISHER · Sep 24, 2024

It's margin of error/ run to run variance, don't sweat it.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 24, 2024

DAPUNISHER said:
It's margin of error/ run to run variance, don't sweat it.

I reran the benchmarks a couple of times and this is what I came up with (Same exact CPU and GPU but one is a New out of box, and one is open box)

TLDR: The Open Box 6600 seems to run slightly faster in all benchmarks averaging 1-2 FPS faster. Is there any reason for this or something I can fix?
Conclusion I will likely keep the New one anyways as I got it $20 bucks cheaper and it is obviously new so I have a longer warranty, etc. I dont think 1-2 FPS is that big of a deal.

Cyberpunk 2077 Benchmark Tool (Ultra Settings) Average FPS
New GPU: 36.96
Open Box GPU: 38.41

Superposition Benchmark 1080P Extreme
New GPU Score: 4221
Avg FPS: 31.57

Open Box GPU Score: 4388
Avg GPS: 32.82

3dMark Time Spy:
New GPU Score: 7640
Graphics Test 1: 52.15 FS
Graphics Test 2: 44.91 FPS

3dMark Time Spy:
Open Box GPU Score: 7906
Graphics Test 1: 54.02 FPS
Graphics Test 2: 46.67 FPS

DAPUNISHER · Sep 24, 2024

It could just be silicon lottery, with one boosting a little better under identical circumstances. Easily gotten back and more, via a mild overclock. 1-2 FPS isn't going to change the gaming experience either.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 24, 2024

DAPUNISHER said:
It could just be silicon lottery, with one boosting a little better under identical circumstances. Easily gotten back and more, via a mild overclock. 1-2 FPS isn't going to change the gaming experience either.

I figured silicon lottery was the answer!
Its been so long since I did any PC upgrade, just wanted to verify. thanks!

DAPUNISHER · Sep 24, 2024

Don't forget to update us when you get the 3D installed.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Sep 24, 2024

DAPUNISHER said:
Don't forget to update us when you get the 3D installed.

yep! should be interesting.
my 3dmark scores doubled after upgrading from the R9 390, wondering how much further it will go with the 5700x3d!

SpacemanSpiffVT · Oct 1, 2024

Quick Recap and GPU Dilemma:
I'm almost done upgrading my PC (CPU: 5700x3d, Motherboard: Asus Tuf Gaming X570, RAM: 16 GB) and need to choose a GPU.

Option 1: Keep the new Powercolor RX 6600 for $120: I just bought it for $120 and it's brand new with a warranty.
Option 2: Buy a used ASRock Challenger 6700xt for $180 from FB: From my research about 30-40% faster, which is about 30 FPS boost in my games. However, it's used, mild coil whine, has no warranty, and there's a slight risk buying from Facebook Marketplace.

Additional Context:

I don't game heavily on PC as I also have a PS5, Steam Deck, and Xbox Series X. Mostly FPS
6700xt is about 50% more expensive with a 30-40% performance boost.
This is an upgrade from my old R9 390, so either card will be a significant improvement.

What are your thoughts on which GPU to go with?

MrTeal · Oct 1, 2024

I'd keep the 6600 FWIW. As you said it's new and still has the warranty, and if in the future you find that you want more GPU you can also reevaluate then. It's also less effort, you have it in hand and don't have to run around meeting people for the GPU and then returning the 6600.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Oct 1, 2024

MrTeal said:
I'd keep the 6600 FWIW. As you said it's new and still has the warranty, and if in the future you find that you want more GPU you can also reevaluate then. It's also less effort, you have it in hand and don't have to run around meeting people for the GPU and then returning the 6600.

The running around is a excellent point. and if the used card has issues later I will be really mad at myself. lol

DAPUNISHER · Oct 1, 2024

Another vote to keep the 6600.

SpacemanSpiffVT said:
The running around is a excellent point. and if the used card has issues later I will be really mad at myself. lol

That thing could have been a mining slave, and already have problems. As I presume you were going to pick it up, taking their word for it that it is A OK. With what you play, and being used to console frame rates, the 6600 will do fine. Besides, I want to see the difference with the 3D CPU.

SpacemanSpiffVT · Oct 1, 2024

DAPUNISHER said:
Another vote to keep the 6600.

That thing could have been a mining slave, and already have problems. As I presume you were going to pick it up, taking their word for it that it is A OK. With what you play, and being used to console frame rates, the 6600 will do fine. Besides, I want to see the difference with the 3D CPU.

Console framerates lol. Yeah I am not really super bothered about a bit of slowdown as long as its not choppy constantly.
I should be getting the CPU in the next few days and am assuming it will probably give me some more headroom in Cyberpunk, which is all I really care about.
If I can get it to 50 FPS, that would be awesome!

Edit: Just found this benchmark video which will have similar specs to mine in the near future... seems good enough for me. 50-70 FPS depending on settings

marees · Thursday at 11:29 AM

6750 for $290 but that is not a deal

marees said:
Newegg black friday deal

7900 xt - $620
6800 - $340

SpacemanSpiffVT · Thursday at 11:31 AM

I decided to stick with the 6600 and will be posting some benchmarks today or tomorrow. The upgrade the 5700X3D didnt help as much as I anticipated.

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

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