AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT vs. Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Super: $400 GPU Throwdown

[Admin]

Which high-end graphics card is best if you have about $400 to spend, AMD’s Radeon RX 5700 XT or Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 2060 Super? We put the two cards head to head to find out.

AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT vs. Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Super: $400 GPU Throwdown : Read more

 

[Darkbreeze]

has good driver and software support

Really? And how exactly do you figure that to be accurate when AMD themselves admit they are still trying to iron out problems on Navi that have existed since day 1, 7 months later?

https://www.techspot.com/news/84005-gamers-ditching-radeon-graphics-cards-over-driver-issues.html

 

[Makaveli]

Really? And how exactly do you figure that to be accurate when AMD themselves admit they are still trying to iron out problems on Navi that have existed since day 1, 7 months later?

https://www.techspot.com/news/84005-gamers-ditching-radeon-graphics-cards-over-driver-issues.html

Not everyone is having issues.

Even in that link Techspot themselves say they have rarely ran into any issues with any of the Navi radeon's they have.

Not saying it doesn't happen just not everyone is affected.

 

[travsb1984]

Both these cards should have come out at $250 max and been down to $200 by now. The fact that they did not is why many will probably be migrating to the next gen console when it comes out. Whether AMD and Nvidia would keep prices sky high after the mining craze has been answered loud and clear. They could have gotten a couple hundred bucks out of me every year and a half or so. Now it looks like they'll get 150 of my bucks through Microsoft and that'll have to last them around 5 or 6 years... I think in the long run their greed will bite them in the butt.

 

[Darkbreeze]

It doesn't matter that not everyone is having issues. If SOME are having issues, it makes "good driver and software support" a lot less, believable. And you apparently didn't read the article well because they also clearly said that this is not limited to Navi, neither the problems, nor the poll, nor the driver issues were limited to Navi, but primarily many of the core issues, especially the black screens etc., are. Seriously, we just had one member who updated his drivers and ALL FOUR of his working AMD cards instantly began having problems. FOUR. Just from a driver update. Two days ago.

Last year we noticed that batches of RX 580 cards were dying off right after some driver updates. So yeah, the fact that not everybody is affected does not forgive the fact that there is a problem.

AMD themselves SAY there IS a problem, and that they are working on it. So how do you refute what they've said themselves? Not everybody had coil whine or was bothered by the GTX 970 3.5GB memory issues either, but they are/were STILL problems, regardless. Nobody would have said "The GTX 970 has terrific memory support" in light of the issues surrounding the architecture despite the fact that for most people it was a non-issue.

 

[mrface]

...is why many will probably be migrating to the next gen console when it comes out....

This dead horse is touted out after each architecture release and propped up with a price point that never comes to fruition. While I agree that greed is the reason (xCOIN mining market is long been reduced to niche enthusiasts and most people who still worry about crypto rely on trading coins rather than mining coins) they havent dropped the price and is ridiculous, however, people will not be moving in droves away from PC gaming when the next gens come out. Its just as preposterous as someone saying "PS5 will be $500+, PS gamers are going to be flocking to other consoles or PC." Neither is a good argument as humans are innately tribal when it comes to their wants and cost is rarely a factor if someone decides to make a change, mostly due to brand loyalty and change is due to a major event.

 

[mrface]

It doesn't matter that not everyone is having issues. If SOME are having issues, it makes "good driver and software support" a lot less, believable.

As mainly a ATi/Radeon/AMD plebe for years(since atleast the 7500 series, :X), I will say AMD is really lacking on the driver side of the house.

 

[Makaveli]

i've been using Radeon's since the Radeon 64 DDR

And the drivers are alot better compared to back in the day. And for me personally I've not had many issues in the 20+ years i've been using ATI gpus.

And as far as the article I read it before you posted it here as I'm a member on techspot.

Not had a single issue on my RX580 which spent many years in my old x58 i7-970 build and now transfered to my Ryzen 3800x build.

 

[gallovfc]

Why they test 1080p Medium, and 1080p, 1440p and 4K only at Ultra I cannot understand...
Why 1080p medium ?!? Why not 1440p and 4K medium???
1080p Ultra is easy for these cards, 1440p medium could allow players to get high fps,
But specially 4K medium (or high) would ALLOW these cards to RUN 4K, since they obviously CAN'T at 4K Ultra...
So here's my request: for 1440p capable cards, forget about 1080p medium, add 1440p and 4K medium.

 

[Darkbreeze]

i've been using Radeon's since the Radeon 64 DDR

And the drivers are alot better compared to back in the day. And for me personally I've not had many issues in the 20+ years i've been using ATI gpus.

And as far as the article I read it before you posted it here as I'm a member on techspot.

not had a single issue on my RX580.

Like I said, your sample of one is not indicative of any trends throughout the worldwide community, nor are even 75% of people not having problems an indication that no problems exist. If ten out of every 100 Navi owners have a problem, then it's a problem. Period.

 

[Makaveli]

Like I said, your sample of one is not indicative of any trends throughout the worldwide community, nor are even 75% of people not having problems an indication that no problems exist. If ten out of every 100 Navi owners have a problem, then it's a problem. Period.

And if you read my original post I did say the problem was there just not effecting everyone. Very last line of my post.

no where did I say it was not a problem but you keep pushing that to further your point. Which was a point I never made.

 

[gallovfc]

Not everybody had coil whine or was bothered by the GTX 970 3.5GB memory issues either

Well the card HAS 4GB, and they WILL use 4GB fully in 95% + of the games without issues...
The thing is the last 512MB is slower, but since the game doesn't RUN on memory (it only serves the GPU) then games perform just fine, with occasional textures popping a bit later.
I had a 970 SLi setup the moment the card came out, and it worker very very well...
Just re-watch JayZTwoCen'ts comparison of 970 SLi vs the 980 Ti... it has no slow downs due to the memory... the low minimuns are given because of SLi itself... other SLi'ed cards perform the same...
So yeah, games run on GPUs not VRAMs.

 

[gallovfc]

"Still, on paper the RX 5700 XT has 9.0 TFLOPS and 448 GBps of bandwidth going up against the RTX 2060 Super's 7.2 TFLOPS and 448 GBps. That's a 25 percent advantage for AMD, but (spoiler!) it almost never shows up to that level in games. "

Of course it doesn't... The card is badwidth starved!!
Every single AMD 5000 series card should have 2 extra GB to free their chips from this bottleneck by adding more VRAM bandwidth...

And all of them could save $ on slower 12Gbps RAM and still be faster, with more VRAM and cheaper:

The 5500 XT should have been a FIXED 6GB card, with 192 bit bus, 12Gbps = 29% more bandwidth + 2GB
The 5600 XT should have been a 8GB card, with 256 bit bus, 12Gbps = 14% more bandwidth + 2GB
The 5700 should have been a 10GB card, with 320 bit bus, 12Gbps = 7% more bandwidth + 2GB
The 5700 XT should have been a 10GB card, with 320 bit bus, 14Gbps = 7% more bandwidth + 2GB

They would have even saved power by running at 12Gbps instead of 14...

 

[techgeek]

I read the article and nearly choked over drivers being awarded to AMD. I'm hardware agnostic and have bought whatever hardware provided the best bang for the buck at the time of purchase. I can say that ATI/AMD have been plagued with driver issues from the first ATI card I owned (9700 Pro). One issue I've seen crop up in multiple generations of card is the fan not spinning and GPU heating up while in monitoring software says the fan is spinning at 100%. This issue when I dealt with it usually took a reboot to resolve. I was not surprised to see Jay (JayZTwoCents) expressing the same concerns in the 5000 series. I had issues with this with my X1900XTX and the card that replaced it X2900XT. Just so you don't think less of me, I didn't purchase the X2900XT (which was complete dog excrement), it was what Memory Express replaced my X1900XTX when I started getting memory artifacting at temperatures above 60C.

I do agree with the author about the login requirement for GeForce Experience, very annoying. Particularly since I don't have to login to it very often, so it can be hard to remember that password. If memory serves me, GeForce Experience when it first released (and for sometime afterwards) didn't require a login. I wish they'd go back to that. I know a lot of people who don't think it's suggested settings are necessary, but I find it a good kicking off point. Also not everyone who is into PC gaming has extensive knowledge about all the graphics settings found in today's games. It can be more than a little daunting for someone new to PC gaming (particularly if they've been attracted to it coming from playing on a console) to manage all those settings without either getting subpar performance or having their resolution or graphics settings set too low.

I don't disagree with the rest of the article. Had the 5700XT been out when I wanted to purchase I would have gotten it over the 2060 Super I did buy. Don't get me wrong, I got Wolfenstein Youngblood and Control for free with the purchase and I really liked ray tracing in those titles (though I had to go back to Youngblood after I finished it to experience ray tracing), but it wouldn't have been enough to sway me had I had the option of getting a 5700XT (with a custom cooler, not the leafblower).

 

[TheAlmightyProo]

For me, it's not looking like I'll be needing to make a choice at this time.

Two of the above benchmarked games that I have, Hitman 2 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider, run so very close to those 1080p ultra averages with either 1070 I have. For the available resolutions I'm yet still running at; 2560x1080 144Hz dedicated desktop monitor, 1080p 120Hz laptop screen (and 1080p 60Hz TV I could steam link or cable to) I might as well hang on to my 1070's (stock for the laptop, premium for the desktop) until well into Nvidia 3xxx/big Navi releases (when I'll better be able to also afford a resolution jump to go with it)

That aside, and as much as I was pleased to see AMD stepping up towards the top end with a new line and architecture in 5700/XT those driver issues are in their own way getting to be as heavy a deal for AMD. As such they could be more telling than the GTX 970 deal ever was for Nvidia due to AMD's still being behind and fragile in the GPU race. Reputation and goodwill are assets that Nvidia yet have in spades, while AMD still can't afford to lose good support over poor support (so to speak) whether they mean to or even can compete well at higher tiers or not. On the CPU front they're doing well enough to shift resources across to make good on this even if it's inefficient in the short term.
Let's hope they get on top of things by the launch of big Navi, lest it sell as badly as the Radeon VII, even if better on paper.

 

[mitch074]

I'm very happy with my AMD drivers: they are open source. Yeah, I game on Linux. Gasp an infidel!

 

[calken]

I suffered from the black screen across both monitors about 2 times per day, never a hard reset or crash, just like a black out. I originally thought it was my old CPU+mobo combination but after upgrading, it was still happening.

Since I updated my drivers 3 days ago, it's not happened. Touch wood, fingers crossed etc.

 

[mrface]

I suffered from the black screen across both monitors about 2 times per day, never a hard reset or crash, just like a black out. I originally thought it was my old CPU+mobo combination but after upgrading, it was still happening.

Since I updated my drivers 3 days ago, it's not happened. Touch wood, fingers crossed etc.

I know it sounds like bollocks; go into your driver software and drop the max performance clocks on the gpu by about 50MHz(and trickle down from right to left on your graphs.). I never had coil whine but would get the occasional Black screen on EFT(I know, its a badly optimized game,) and that solved it for me. To be fair, that was the only game that it happened.

Additionally, the previous driver generation with Radeon Chill(or what ever it was called) would completely crash my system. I had to remove that piece altogether.

 

[pahbi]

It doesn't matter that not everyone is having issues. If SOME are having issues, it makes "good driver and software support" a lot less, believable.

I agree with this 110%.

I'm not spending $400 just to hope and pray I get a lucky RX 5700 XT that doesn't have problems.

I'm not interested in overclocking, or voltages, or driver roll backs, or anything like that.

If I'm building a computer, I just want to buy correctly rated parts, put everything together, install drivers, and things work. That is a completely reasonable expectation.

- P

 

[techgeek]

I'm very happy with my AMD drivers: they are open source. Yeah, I game on Linux. Gasp an infidel!

You know I was never that disturbed to use proprietary drivers in Linux. Open source is great (Nouveau for nVidia), but if the proprietary driver offers more features and performance then I'll use them. I'm not a GPL purist. I don't have an issue with companies that spend R&D dollars and want to protect their IP contained in their drivers.

 

[mitch074]

You know I was never that disturbed to use proprietary drivers in Linux. Open source is great (Nouveau for nVidia), but if the proprietary driver offers more features and performance then I'll use them. I'm not a GPL purist. I don't have an issue with companies that spend R&D dollars and want to protect their IP contained in their drivers.

I didn't have to spend much (here : I spent €270 in 2016 for a card that is still showing consistent 70+ FPS on Doom 2016 in 1440p in Nightmare mode and even Wolf2 on High @1440p is perfectly playable, and I get ever improving performance on games I enjoy for 4 years - outside of consoles, who can claim that?
As for feature, indeed I don't get a fancy control panel - I only get DriConf, which is community-maintained, and allows me to enable or disable this or that feature on a per-game basis.
About driver IP protection : only Nvidia is spending big buck into protecting their drivers' IP : pretty much all other GPU makers (not only on PC) find it actually more efficient to share techniques and codes. I'd rather have a game looking like the developer intended than blurrier because a GPU maker added an "optimized" shader just for that game that saved on CPU cycles, and have those same developers working on improving code paths and algorithms to get the same results in less GPU cycles.
Also, don't forget that when Nvidia spend money protecting their driver's IP, that money comes out of your pocket. For what result? Proprietary technologies that end up outdated and unsupported when public specifications / official standards outclass them (see : G-Sync, GameWorks, specific shaders in DirectX VS. Vulkan, and soon RTX, etc.)
So I'll enjoy my free ever-improving support instead of having to wrangle huge blobs with quirky installers.

 

[MoxNix]

High end?!

More like midrange.

 

[joeblowsmynose]

Not everyone is having issues.

Even in that link Techspot themselves say they have rarely ran into any issues with any of the Navi radeon's they have.

Not saying it doesn't happen just not everyone is affected.

The only issue I have is the custom fan curve is a bit weird, but I'm not going to complain about that because Nvidia doesn't even attempt to give you such options.

I've also noted that about 80% ogf all people complaining about the AMD driver problems ... are people who aren't having these problems because they don't even own an AMD card ... am I the only one noticing this? I'm not saying the new 2020 adrenaline with Navi hasn't had some teething pains, I'm not denying that, but seriously -- look who's almost always the people complaining about these issues ... Nvidia owners. lol.

 

[travsb1984]

This dead horse is touted out after each architecture release and propped up with a price point that never comes to fruition. While I agree that greed is the reason (xCOIN mining market is long been reduced to niche enthusiasts and most people who still worry about crypto rely on trading coins rather than mining coins) they havent dropped the price and is ridiculous, however, people will not be moving in droves away from PC gaming when the next gens come out. Its just as preposterous as someone saying "PS5 will be $500+, PS gamers are going to be flocking to other consoles or PC." Neither is a good argument as humans are innately tribal when it comes to their wants and cost is rarely a factor if someone decides to make a change, mostly due to brand loyalty and change is due to a major event.

True this has been said following video card launches before but it's different now, because there is actually new consoles coming out this year around the time the next generation of graphics cards will be released. Nobody is going to ditch the PC for a 4 or 5 year old console so we've been kind of stuck for several years now... And now the hardware in the consoles will just about be on parity with mainstream PC cards which in reality means they'll run much better on the console...

 

[mrface]

Nobody is going to ditch the PC for a 4 or 5 year old console so we've been kind of stuck for several years now... And now the hardware in the consoles will just about be on parity with mainstream PC cards which in reality means they'll run much better on the console...

Its a fair point, but as far as migrating away from PC games due to cost of GPU is going to be negligible, in my opinion. However, we will have to see. The driving need behind migration from X console to Y console vice PC will be availability of software (instant gratification, if you will or exclusivity to X/Y/PC.) Ray Tracing comes to mind, but will it have that much effect? I, personally, doubt its effect will be much to an average [insert non-streaming gamer] player of games. I believe this biggest drive will be because of how deals go down with content management software rather than hardware.

Lets say the regular PC gamer has older but equitable hardware of the new consoles; what would make them go away from any PC to any console? Especially if the games they play are cross platform? Conversely, what would make a PS5 gamer switch to PC if hardware is comparable? The cost of an upgrade(GPU @ $500ish) would not make me buy a new console (@$500ish) and vice versa.