AMD Radeon RX 5700 & 5700 XT Graphics Card Review

AMD Radeon RX 5700 & 5700 XT This week is shaping up to be one of the most exciting in AMD history. Not only that, but it's also been one of the busiest weeks we've ever had at eTeknix too. There are dozens of new X570 PCIe 4.0 motherboards launching today, and we've reviewed 11 of them! Not only that, but AMD launched their 7nm 3rd Gen Ryzen CPUs too, and we've reviewed 2 of them. If that wasn't enough, we now also have brand new 7nm Radeon GPUs; the 5700 and the 5700 XT. Links for all the other reviews are below! So what's the deal? Well, the new cards are out to tackle competition from Nvidia, with the 5700 expected to go head-to-head with the RTX 2060, and the 5700 XT against the RTX 2070. Now, what's crazy is that I'm writing this review on the day it goes live. So, we already know that AMD has dropped their prices to counter the RTX Super launch, so this battle just got pretty fierce. But, will it be enough? Do AMD have the performance? That's what I'm about to find out. AMD Radeon RX 5700 The base model features 36 compute units and like the higher end XT, features their new 7nm design. Rather than the HBM2 memory, which we saw on the previous Radeon cards, they’ve opted for 8GB of GDDR6 memory this time, which has a 14Gbps memory speed, with a 256-bit interface. That gives us an impressive 448 GB/s memory bandwidth. With the GPU running at 1465 MHz up to 1725 MHz Boost, we should see performance to rival the Nvidia RTX 2060 series of cards. AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT While this card features the same core design at the non-XT part. It does, however, feature 40 Compute Units vs the RX 5700’s 36. It also has a much higher clock speed, which runs between 1605 MHz and a whopping 1905 MHz. This takes the card from 15.9 TFLOPS up to a much more impressive 19.51 TFLOPS. This should put it more in-line with the Nvidia RTX 2070 series of cards. Just like the RX 5700 though, it also features the same 8GB of GDDR6 memory. Features and Technologies All of the cards will feature the latest AMD FreeSync 2 HDR technology, and TrueAudio Next. Of course, their new RDNA core architecture is on all of the cards, as is support for the latest APIs. All of the cards feature an 8-pin + 6-pin PSU connector and AMD recommend a 600W PSU. Of course, we’ll update you with real-world power requirements when the reviews go live. Radeon Media EngineRDNA ArchitectureVSR (4K)Radeon™ FreeSync TechnologyTrueAudio NextDirectX 12Vulkan API Show Me More! Gigabyte X570 AORUS Master Motherboard ReviewGigabyte X570 AORUS Pro Motherboard ReviewASUS RoG Crosshair VIII Hero (WiFi) Motherboard Review ReviewMSI MEG X570 GODLIKE Motherboard ReviewASUS TUF Gaming X570-Plus (WiFi) Motherboard ReviewASUS ROG STRIX X570-E Gaming Motherboard ReviewMSI MEG X570 ACE Motherboard ReviewGigabyte X570 I AORUS Pro WiFi Motherboard ReviewGigabyte X570 AORUS XTREME Motherboard ReviewASRock X570 Motherboard ReviewASUS PRIME X570-Pro Motherboard ReviewAMD Radeon RX5700 & 5700 XT Graphics Cards ReviewAMD Ryzen 7 3700X & Ryzen 8 3800X Processor Review Radeon 5700 XT Radeon 5700 How We Test We continue to update our testing methods around once per year. As such, we re-test older hardware to reflect changes over time. These can be driver updates, Windows updates, game patches, and more; all of which have an impact on performance figures. Furthermore, we update our test bench to newer and more relevant hardware. This means that our new reviews aren’t always comparable to those of older reviews, so please compare the testing methodology on older reviews should you be trying to compare them with newer ones. Replicate Our Results When it comes to our benchmarks in our reviews, the benchmarks are pretty self-explanatory and kept as simple as possible, although there are a few exceptions. Remember that your choice of graphics card, CPU, the silicon lottery, and other factors can yield different numbers, and there’s always a margin for error when using any software. Links are provided below, as well as the settings we use. We encourage you to not just look at how one product compares to any other, but how it compares to your own. If you’re looking to build a new system, you should benchmark your current PC using the benchmarks available to you. You should then look at the percentage improvement from your current hardware to the hardware tested here to give you a ballpark figure of how much of an upgrade this will provide you with. Graphics Card Test System Motherboard – Aorus Z390 Gaming MasterProcessor – Intel Core i9-9900K (Stock)RAM – Crucial Ballistix Gaming 32GB (4 x 8GB) 3000 MHzCPU Cooler – Noctua NH-D15SPower Supply – Be Quiet Power Zone 1000WMain Storage Drive – Toshiba OCZ VX500 500GBChassis – Thermaltake Core P5 TGOperating System – Windows 10 64-bitMonitor – AOC 28-Inch 4K Gaming Monitor Additional Hardware Killawatt style electricity usage meter wall plugPrecision Gold N05CC Decibel meter Gaming To gauge performance levels which are easily reproduced time after time, by both ourselves and our readers, we now stick strictly to games default profiles. With our previous reviews, we used the “Medium or Normal” preset. However, as GPUs get faster, we’ve now moved that up to “High” profiles for all games, at all resolutions. V-Sync is always disabled in our testing, as is FreeSync and G-Sync technologies or similar. Graphics card power usage set to optimised or balance, and the system power mode set to High Performance within Windows and the available GPU driver software. Identical settings are used for all resolutions unless otherwise stated. Games and Settings Used Shadow of the Tomb Raider DX12 High Preset1080p1440p2160pDeus Ex: Mankind Divided DX12 High Preset1080p1440p2160pGhost Recon: Wildlands High Preset1080p1440p2160pBattlefield V DX12 High Preset1080p1440p2160pBattlefield V DX12 High Preset (DXR Enabled) NVIDIA RTX Cards ONLY1080p1440p2160pMetro Exodus DX12 High Preset1080p1440p2160pMetro Exodus DX12 High Preset (RT, then RT and DLSS Enabled) NVIDIA RTX Cards ONLY1080p1440p2160pFar Cry New Dawn High Preset1080p1440p2160p The Division 2 High Preset1080p1440p2160p Software Used 3DMark Fire Strike (download)FireStrike Ultra BenchmarkUnigine Superposition (download)4K Optimised BenchmarkHWMonitor (download)GPU-Z Noise Everyone has a reasonable noise level preference when it comes to comes to components on a computer. Some can handle all fans at 100% load to keep temperatures down; some want an entirely silent computer. To accurately gauge the noise output of a graphics card, we position a Precision Gold N05CC one meter above our open-air test bench and take an average reading at idle and load. Gaming noise levels are taken during a CPU vs CPU match a preset match in Soul Calibur VI. Power Consumption We take power readings during idle state with no background applications running. Then again at 50% completion of the Unigine Superposition benchmark, using the average as the final published result. Gaming power consumption is taken during a CPU vs CPU match a preset match in Soul Calibur VI. Temperatures We take temperature readings after 10 minutes of desktop idle with no background programs running, then take the recorded maximum delivered from Unigine Superposition after a 4K optimised run, confirming the numbers are accurate with HWMonitor. Furthermore, the ambient temperature is always kept +/- 1c from 21c. Gaming temperatures are taken during a CPU vs CPU match a preset match in Soul Calibur VI. Synthetic Benchmarks 3DMark FireStrike Ultra Straight away, the RX 5700 is doing exactly what we expected of it. It's beating out the RTX 2060 comfortably, putting it very much inline with the GTX 1080 and the lower end of the RTX 2070 series of cards. Interestingly, it's pretty similar to the VEGA 64. However, keep in mind that the Sapphire VEGA 64 we tested was and still is an absolute monster of a GPU (review here). The 5700 XT stepped up too, beating out the RTX 2070's, and sitting just behind a 1080 Ti. 3DMark TimeSpy Again we see fairly similar results, with the RX 5700 nipping in with the RTX 2060 cards, and the XT performing similarly to the RTX 2070 cards, just beating the 1080 Ti here, and matching that of the Radeon VII. Unigine Superposition Moving up to 4K didn't change much either, albeit the Nvidia cards are slightly fast, but so little so that in a blind study I couldn't pick the two apart. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Gaming performance on these cards is right where you would expect it to be also. Obviously, the XT is a bit faster than the standard RX 5700, but they're not a million miles apart either. Their real strength seems to be at 1440p, which is primarily the main market for a card in this price range, so that's good to see. At 1080p both cards beat the RTX 2070's, and at 1440p they were even beating out the RTX 2080 Ultra from EVGA! Albeit, by a small margin. Ghost Recon: Wildlands The good times keep on rolling for AMD here too. With the RX 5700 matching the RTX 2070's and the XT was only beaten by the RTX 2080 Ti at 1440p, although dropped down a bit at 4K, it was still hitting some good FPS. Battlefield V Again at 1080p, the RX 5700 and 5700 XT were blazing a trail, beating all but the flagship Nvidia cards that are more than twice the price. The same is true at 1440p, where we hit 101 FPS on the 5700 XT. Again, it did drop down at 4K, but the XT was still scoring a respectable 55 FPS at the higher resolution. Metro Exodus Ah Metro, where GPUs go to get punished. Still, we were pushing 58 FPS and 64 FPS for each card at 1440p, which is enough to beat out a lot of impressive cards easily enough. The VEGA 64 and the Radeon VII did better at 4K by a small margin, likely due to their use of HBM2. Far Cry New Dawn At 1080p, both cards closely matched that of the RTX 2080 cards, and kept high on the charts at both 1440p and 4K too; closely matching the RTX 2070 and 2080 series cards. The Division 2 No big surprises in our final game either, with the RX 5700 pulling ahead of the RTX 2060 at all three resolutions, giving performance very similar to a GTX 1080. However, the 5700 XT was either matching or just ahead of the RTX 2070 in all three tests too. Again, right as we expected they would. Power Consumption AMD have always been a bit of an easy target for power consumption jokes, but laugh no longer. The 5700 and the 5700 XT pulled 274.1 and 304.3 Watt each. Given their performance closely aped that of the VEGA 64 and Radeon VII, which used 515 and 530 Watts, that's a freaking GIANT leap in the right direction. It's also, to little surprise, similar to the RTX 2070, and less than the RTX 2070. It seems then, AMD finally have their power usage in line with the competition. Even the VEGA 56 still uses nearly 450 Watts! Temperatures Temperatures are a little higher, but still within a reasonable limit. Remember blower cards exhaust heat at the back of the card, not into your chassis. So while the cards run warmer they exhaust the heat, thus not warming your system as much over time. There are pros and cons to both, but we saw no evidence of the cards throttling as a result. That being said, the RX 5700 was no hotter than the RTX 2070, and the XT was no hotter than a typical RTX 2080. Acoustics The downside of a blower design is the noise level, at least on our test bench. The higher frequency noise is easily muted in a decent PC case though, at least from my own experience. We test on open air benches though, so it was audible. That being said, I don't think they were as harsh to listen to as the Radeon VII was, which sounded like a server card. How Much Does It Cost? The AMD Radeon RX 5700 was meant to launch at a higher price. However, just two days ago, AMD revealed a tasty price drop to counter their green-team rivals. The cards are now priced as below. AMD only confirmed the price in USD though, so please use the links below to check up to date pricing in both the UK and the US. 50th Anniversary Edition AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT – $449 UK / USAMD Radeon RX 5700 XT – $399 UK / US AMD Radeon RX 5700 (Non-XT) – $349 UK / US For comparison an RTX 2060, ranges from around $340 - $410 (£400 - £450), and an RTX 2070 from $460 - $510 (£510 - £570). Overview Honestly, I went into this review with slightly lower expectations than the cards deserved. The Radeon VII just didn't hit the market for me personally, even though it can deliver some impressive performance in its own respect. Rightfully though, I have changed my tune, and I'm walking away pretty damn impressed with what AMD has done this generation. Does Nvidia have faster cards? Yeah, they do. However, the market is much MUCH bigger than what's happening at the extreme end. For this price range, where most people tend to spend their money, AMD is a genuinely competitive option once again. Performance The gaming figures speak for themselves really. The cards set out to compete and even beat the performance of the RTX 2060 and RTX 2070 cards. However, not only did they manage this quite consistently, they even gave the RTX 2080 a run for its money at some resolutions. Plus, AMD has been able to compete with Nvidia on the higher end cards for some time, but at the cost of huge power usage. Now that AMD has its power and heat under control, the playing field is a lot less bumpy than it has been for several generations. Should I Buy One? RTX has Ray Tracing. I can't avoid that little point. You may want it, you may not care. However, right now AMD is offering similar and better gaming performance at a lower price and are easily some of the best all-around AMD cards we've seen for a long time. The performance is ideal for 1440p gamers. Plus, for those using FreeSync displays, it's a no brainer, and so much more. Plus, with the new price cut, picking between red or green just became a lot more difficult. Gigabyte X570 AORUS Master Motherboard ReviewGigabyte X570 AORUS Pro Motherboard ReviewASUS RoG Crosshair VIII Hero (WiFi) Motherboard Review ReviewMSI MEG X570 GODLIKE Motherboard ReviewASUS TUF Gaming X570-Plus (WiFi) Motherboard ReviewASUS ROG STRIX X570-E Gaming Motherboard ReviewMSI MEG X570 ACE Motherboard ReviewGigabyte X570 I AORUS Pro WiFi Motherboard ReviewGigabyte X570 AORUS XTREME Motherboard ReviewASRock X570 Motherboard ReviewASUS PRIME X570-Pro Motherboard ReviewAMD Radeon RX5700 & 5700 XT Graphics Cards ReviewAMD Ryzen 7 3700X & Ryzen 8 3800X Processor Review