AMD hasn’t yet unveiled a competitor to the GTX 1080 or GTX 1070 and focused on mainstream solutions like the RX 480 instead. Of course, the company hasn’t given up on the high-end segment and is scheduled to release Vega 10 sometime next year. This particular series should provide a legitimate alternative to current NVIDIA offerings and employ the latest form of HBM memory. The specific details remain unclear and it’s unknown how competitive AMD will become, especially when NVIDIA releases their next architecture. Rather surprisingly, a new device ID (687F:C1) has been discovered on the Ashes of the Singularity benchmark website. This is an unannounced AMD graphics card and appears to compete rather nicely with the GTX 1080. Given the naming scheme, it’s highly unlikely that this is a dual-GPU card based on the Polaris architecture. Here we can see some benchmarks which make for really interesting reading:
In a strange turn of events, the GPU was tested at an earlier date and outputted significantly worse performance numbers. Whether this is due to driver enhancements or the core being overclocked remains to be seen.
VideoCardz tested an MSI GAMING X GTX 1080 for comparative purposes and it seems the NVIDIA option slightly edges AMD’s unannounced graphics card. Despite this, the AMD product isn’t finalised and probably has room for some hefty improvements. It’s unknown if this is the first Vega 10 benchmarks, but it’s the most likely scenario. AMD has always spoken about the Polaris series ending with the RX 480 and I doubt they’ll use the existing architecture any further. Hopefully, Vega offers similar performance to the top-tier NVIDIA products while aiming for a more affordable price point.
