Official AMD Polaris Review Thread: Radeon RX 480, RX 470, and RX 460

[24601]

Ashes of the Singularity uses Split Frame rendering not AFR.

If you are thinking that it doesn't scale well because of Civ being a title that did it, that was by design:



http://techreport.com/blog/27258/civ-beyond-earth-with-mantle-aims-to-end-multi-gpu-microstuttering



The devs talk about it here as well:



http://www.firaxis.com/?/S=813e3681...antle-multi-gpu-for-civilization-beyond-earth

Anyway, point is that with DX12 SFR can be very effective and we aren't limited to AFR.

You're talking about a horrendous looking game that seems to think that everything should be done in shaders, resulting in a blurry, globby mess.

Basically think a badly designed 1 month developed Unreal Engine 4 game that turned on all the badly implemented blur filters the Unreal 3 and 4 engines are famous for, but worse (graphically).

If you want a game that is actually designed around an engine that is physically based, instead of shader based, you're going to have a bad time trying to SFR your way out of a wet paper bag.

Can you hear my disappointment with Oxide? I was hoping that it would usher in a new age of RTS.

But it looks like it's the blurry mess that "Cinematic Rendering Shader" style got us into because consoles.

 

[dark zero]

So is AMD going back to small chips? From my understanding, even Vega isn't aiming to be a big chip, at least not GP100 big.

I had a 4870X2 and it was a mix bag. It put me off from mGPU for a rather long time and I wouldn't blame AMD for it. (Well directly.)

7970 X2 was fun when it worked, but trying to take on a single GPU with a dual GPU setup doesn't sound like the right approach.

Can they afford to charge more than $550, when dual RX 480 8GBs can go for <$500?

This uphill battle is getting steeper with Vega not seeing light until 2017. Hope AMD is ready.

I feel that is the total opposite... Vega seems to be a way bigger chip that will leave a wide open spot for the mid range for next year.

The only way that Dual Polaris work is by having HBM1 OR GDRR5X

 

[3DVagabond]

I guess no one put this...
http://wccftech.com/amd-rx-490-dual-gpu/

Seems that this is the last shot from AMD this year. I remember that AMD earlier in the year said that Polaris would have a Dual GPU version... so that might have sense.

Also... isn't supposed to Polaris to support HBM2? Maybe it might have it? Or just will have GDDR5X or regular Dual HBM.

Also. I don't be surprised if AMD is improving their chips and in 8 to 10 months in order to prepare the way to Vega they will not only rebrand, but launch the improved chip (Polaris 2.0) with GDRR5X and who knows HBM2 to mobile versions.

WCCFtech starts a dual GPU rumor with every new AMD article. They've been doing it since Fiji was first rumored.

 

[flopper]

I feel that is the total opposite... Vega seems to be a way bigger chip that will leave a wide open spot for the mid range for next year.

The only way that Dual Polaris work is by having HBM1 OR GDRR5X

Vega seems like a different design than Polaris.
RTG has done some reboot on the video card side

 

[antihelten]

DX12 does split frame rendering not AFR like normal CFX / SLI.

Ashes of the Singularity uses Split Frame rendering not AFR.

I don't know why this falsehood keeps on being repeated again and again. No Ashes does not use SFR it uses AFR!

DX12 enables what is known as EMA, Explicit Multi-Adaptor, which can be used for either AFR or SFR. So far no DX12 game has used EMA for SFR (Civ:BE was mantle not DX12).

 

[24601]

I don't know why this falsehood keeps on being repeated again and again. No Ashes does not use SFR it uses AFR!

DX12 enables what is known as EMA, Explicit Multi-Adaptor, which can be used for either AFR or SFR. So far no DX12 game has used EMA for SFR (Civ:BE was mantle not DX12).

That'll learn me to reply to someone as if they know what they're talking about.

So it looks so horrible with literally nothing to show for it? Dang, the situation is worse than I thought.

 

[antihelten]

That'll learn me to reply to someone as if they know what they're talking about.

So it looks so horrible with literally nothing to show for it? Dang, the situation is worse than I thought.

Ashes hardly looks horrible, it may not be the best looking game in the world, but that probably has more to do with the art than the engine though (the game+engine was made on a bit of a shoestring budget, thus not leaving a lot of money for high quality art assets)

 

[24601]

Ashes hardly looks horrible, it may not be the best looking game in the world, but that probably has more to do with the art than the engine though (the game+engine was made on a bit of a shoestring budget, thus not leaving a lot of money for high quality art assets)

My point about it looking horrible doesn't only include the textures and models though, the blur is definitely real in this game, with how the shaders are implemented there actually isn't a single area in the game you can look at that doesn't look blurry.

It hurts my eyes cuz my brain thinks my eyes are out of focus at all times when looking at the game o.o

 

[dark zero]

Guys...
http://wccftech.com/amd-radeon-rx-470-rx-460-reference-models/

AMD Radeon RX 470 Graphics Card &#8211; Polaris 10 Optimized For The $150 Market Segment

The AMD Radeon RX 470 features the same Polaris 10 GPU featured on the RX 480. The only difference is that it is a bit cut down which means it houses lower amount of compute units. The graphics chip on the RX 470 has a total of 32 compute units which total to 2048 stream processors. These processors are clocked at 1206 MHz and feature 5.0 TFLOPs of compute performance. The rated TDP for the Radeon RX 470 at stock clocks is 110W that makes it 40W lower than the full Polaris 10 chip.

MD Radeon RX 460 Graphics Card &#8211; $99 US Compact Design Capable of 1080P Gaming

The AMD Polaris 11 GPU will be featured inside the Radeon RX 460 graphics card which is a $100 US product aimed at the esports market where MOBA titles are very popular. The Polaris 11 GPU features 14 CUs which means it has 896 stream processors. This chip is capable of delivering more than 2 TFLOPs of compute (FP32) performance. The card will be available with 2 GB GDDR5 memory, featuring a 128-bit memory bus interface. Depending on the clock speed used, the card could feature a bandwidth of around 112 GB/s.

They nerfed hard the 470 and 460... since is OEM only card and only beats the Intel Iris Pro... seems that we are expecting...

475 - 8GB GDDR5 - Improved clocks
465 - 4GB GDDR5 - Full Polaris 11

And... where is the Full Polaris 11 then?

 

[garagisti]

Guys...
http://wccftech.com/amd-radeon-rx-470-rx-460-reference-models/





They nerfed hard the 470 and 460... since is OEM only card and only beats the Intel Iris Pro... seems that we are expecting...

475 - 8GB GDDR5 - Improved clocks
465 - 4GB GDDR5 - Full Polaris 11

And... where is the Full Polaris 11 then?

470 was expected to be around that. What is good is core speed is also high at 1200+mhz and with only 110W TDP. Should be close to 970 in DX11 games and expect better in DX12 and Vulkan games (Gameworks is cancer, consider ROTR).

 

[MrTeal]

Guys...
http://wccftech.com/amd-radeon-rx-470-rx-460-reference-models/





They nerfed hard the 470 and 460... since is OEM only card and only beats the Intel Iris Pro... seems that we are expecting...

475 - 8GB GDDR5 - Improved clocks
465 - 4GB GDDR5 - Full Polaris 11

And... where is the Full Polaris 11 then?

Wha?

89% of the 480's CU, 95% of its boost clock giving 85% of its SP performance. Like same memory performance as the 4GB RX 480 and 87.5% of the bandwidth of the 8GB version. That's nerfed? For 75% of the cost of a 4GB RX 480?

I don't even know what you're talking about with it just beating Iris Pro. Even the 460 is going to be wildly faster than Iris Pro. A GTX 750 Ti is decently faster than Broadwell Iris Pro. RX 460 will probably come in being about as fast at a 7870/270X, which itself if quite a bit faster than a 750 Ti.

 

[mohit9206]

Wha?

89% of the 480's CU, 95% of its boost clock giving 85% of its SP performance. Like same memory performance as the 4GB RX 480 and 87.5% of the bandwidth of the 8GB version. That's nerfed? For 75% of the cost of a 4GB RX 480?

I don't even know what you're talking about with it just beating Iris Pro. Even the 460 is going to be wildly faster than Iris Pro. A GTX 750 Ti is decently faster than Broadwell Iris Pro. RX 460 will probably come in being about as fast at a 7870/270X, which itself if quite a bit faster than a 750 Ti.

I agree that RX470 has not been nerfed but actually has great specs considering its price.Should be within 20% of RX480s performance if specs are to be believed.
However the RX460 has been nerfed hard.Like really really hard.14CUs and 896 SPs are too low.Those are almost the same specs as R7 260X but with 2 less CUs.There is no way in hell it will beat or match GTX950 now.Probably somewhere between R7 260X and R7 370.Still fine for a $99 card but AMD had a chance to eradicate GTX950 and 960 in one swift blow.

 

[USER8000]

I agree that RX470 has not been nerfed but actually has great specs considering its price.Should be within 20% of RX480s performance if specs are to be believed.
However the RX460 has been nerfed hard.Like really really hard.14CUs and 896 SPs are too low.Those are almost the same specs as R7 260X but with 2 less CUs.There is no way in hell it will beat or match GTX950 now.Probably somewhere between R7 260X and R7 370.Still fine for a $99 card but AMD had a chance to eradicate GTX950 and 960 in one swift blow.

The R7 260X has 14 CUs too. The R7 260X also is only a two ACE design and the RX460 is a four ACE design,and has colour compression too. The R7 260X is probably bandwidth limited.

The RX480 with 2304 shaders,4 ACEs,256 bit memory controller and only 32 ROPs is trading blows with an R9 390 with 2516 shaders,8 ACEs,512 bit memory controller and 64 ROPs.

The RX480 looks a downgrade in technical specs over a R9 390 on paper,but the RX460 looks an upgrade.

Edit to post.

It seems the chip will have more L2 cache too,more ROPs and higher memory speeds.

 

[rancherlee]

The pricing scheme really seems off, the RX470 for only 50$ more than the RX460 really seems like a head scratcher since it appears to have over 2x the performance. RX470 is a GREAT buy at 150$ though, pretty solid upgrade for those on older GCN 1.0 cards or 2gb Nvidia boards.

 

[dark zero]

The 460 might not hit all the markets.. maybe only in low tier ones.

Also... 460 might come passive without any connector.

Wondering who will be the 1st valiant who puts a 6 pin connector on it to OX hard the chip....

 

[Silverforce11]

RX 460 only makes sense if you need a <75W GPU, otherwise $149 RX 470 should definitely smack it silly for the price.

 

[crisium]

Glad the 470 is 2048SPs. Hardly cut at all. The 7950 was famous for being within single digit % of the 7970 when both at the same clocks. I would expect the same here, less than 10% difference at equal clocks.

If AMD wants success they need multiples AIB 3rd Party coolers available before GTX 1050 launches.

Also, we can see equal core clock and memory speed 470 vs 380X comparisons. The true IPC comparisons.

 

[swilli89]

I'm definitely recommending the RX 470 to all of my friends with aging rigs that just want to play recent stuff on their 1080p monitors.

 

[DidelisDiskas]

So i know we should wait for benchmarks, but from the current specs, the rx 460 looks like it will hardly be a worthwhile upgrade from the r7 360?

 

[f2bnp]

I might actually look into buying the RX 470 myself, depending on price and launch.

 

[Denly]

I don't game but I am waiting for a 1/2 height 460 to give my PII x4 sff some new life. Com'on AMD I have $100 ready for you.

 

[Silverforce11]

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/pc-components/graphics-cards/amd/radeon-rx-480

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/sapp...ddr5-pci-express-graphics-card-gx-37b-sp.html

Custom RX 480, similar in price to the reference model in the UK.

Maybe will land for $249 USD?

 

[littleg]

They've got the Powercolor Devil 13 listed aswell. £254.99.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/powe...ddr5-pci-express-graphics-card-gx-188-pc.html

 

[sze5003]

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/pc-components/graphics-cards/amd/radeon-rx-480

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/sapp...ddr5-pci-express-graphics-card-gx-37b-sp.html

Custom RX 480, similar in price to the reference model in the UK.

Maybe will land for $249 USD?

I hope so too. The nitro seems to calculate out to $264 minus VAT. The powercolor comes in at $267. It seems like people can order them in the UK kind of like a pre order.

Would be cool if the same could be done here in US. I'd like to get me the nitro or the powercolor, either one would do. I couldn't find any dates but I assume by July 22nd although I swear I read the one card should have been out by now since they were announcing the give away contest winners this week.

 

[littleg]

Both have 8 pin power connectors too :thumbsup: