Question 7900XT or 4070 Super?

[Barry_4]

7900XT is now only $50-80 more, making them directly comparable. I game at 1440p and don't mind fake frames. In fact I can't tell the difference between the real thing and fake frames.

7900XT's biggest pros are 20gb of VRAM and faster rasterization. 4070 Super's strong points are faster RT and lower power usage. Normally I wouldn't care about RT, but new games like Indiana Jones have me concerned. If games will require RT in the near future, wouldn't the 4070 Super be a much better buy?

On the other hand, many say the 4070 Super's 12gb VRAM will soon hinder its performance in newer titles.
So which one is the better buy?

 

[QyInvoLing]

wait til march for 9070xt.

 

[-Why]

In raster, the 7900XT is about 10 to 20% faster.
In RT, it is about equal with the 7900XT winning by a bit. (It varies on a title basis)
For the VRAM, since you are in 1440p, 12GBs shouldn't be a problem, but 20GBs is better/safer.
The drivers are better on Nvidia's side, but the AMD drivers are fine. (I run a 6800XT and I've had a few issues with YouTube and VR streaming but nothing dealbreaking and you can just roll back the drivers)

As for FrameGen, it is a huge bonus for the 4070S (if you cant tell the difference), since any game that has RT will probably have FG as well.

I would recommend the 4070 Super for DLSS, FrameGen, Much Lower Wattage (220W vs 310W), equal-ish RT performance.

But the price to performance differential (Raster only) is slighty worse (about 5%) than the 7900XT

 

[Syntaximus]

wait til march for 9070xt.

This, especially since you're concerned about RT and the 4070S's (even 5070's) amount of VRAM.
Wait for everything to come out and base your decision off of the reviews and pricing that works for you.

 

[SyCoREAPER]

50/90-series respectively look like a disaster on both teams. I wouldn't wait because if they do bomb, those cards you mentioned will skyrocket.
The 4090 for example never came down in price even though people said once the other 40-series come out they would. Didn't happen.

I have a 4090 and 7900XT. The quality and size of the card I give hands down to AMD. I couldn't believe the size difference and how much more premium it felt vs Nvidia which feels industrial.

However on the driver's side, Nvidia wins hands down no contest. AMD perpetually breaks their own drivers. If you try and sideload, Windows will attempt to self destruct itelself with a basic/incorrect driver even if you have drivers hidden. Nvidia drivers just work. They come out often and if there is something broken they release new drivers quickly.

Performance, the 7900XT is very impressive for what it is. It's not a ray-tracing card but very capable 1400p card or lowered 4K settings. As you mentioned you also get more VRAM but that seems to be becoming increasingly irrelevant.
The 4070 S which I don't have has less VRAM and less raw power but has DLSS Frame-Gen.***
You're facing a tradeoff of; do I want a Powerful V8 Engine but it drinks a lot of gas or a 4 cylinder turbo which makes decent power but is all add-on jangle.

I'd go with the 7900XT if you want 1440. 4070 S if you want low-mid 4K with a ton of processing.

It's worth mentioning a few things. The 40-series is at this time not getting DLSS 4 which is a loss of bull, it's likely the only way they can justify the 50-Series.
FSR4 which is leaps and bound improved is coming to the 7900xtx and likely will come to the 7900xt since it has a unused AI core.

Lastly, the *** above. While not always perfect, games can be modded to force DLSS and DLSS Frame-Gen on AMD. Some games its perfect, others it's not. Some games DLSS on AMD knocks the shorts off FSR in looked and performance.

TLDR; 1440 I'd go 7900xt

 

[ohio_buckeye]

I would say I disagree on drivers. AMD drivers imo are pretty decent the last few years on AMD. Get the card the extra vram. Not sure what you’re paying for the xt, but I recently got an xtx for 800 so you might look around. AMD does have frame generation, nvidia may be ahead but especially if fsr 4 comes to the 7000 series then I’d say the 7900xt with it’s extra vram will likely do better long term than the 4070.

 

[Barry_4]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge. How is VRAM increasingly irrelevant? I'v heard the opposite. That is, fake frame and DLSS use even more VRAM and 12gb is becoming inadequate.

I currently have AMD 6700XT and the driver has been fine.

As for prices, I'm seeing slightly over $600 for 4070S and just over $650 for 7900XT.

If I remember correctly, Nvidia has said they will implement DLSS 4 on even 3000 series cards. I can't imagine AMD would make FSR 4 exclusive to RDNA4 in current competitive environment.

 

[SyCoREAPER]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge. How is VRAM increasingly irrelevant? I'v heard the opposite. That is, fake frame and DLSS use even more VRAM and 12gb is becoming inadequate.

I currently have AMD 6700XT and the driver has been fine.

As for prices, I'm seeing slightly over $600 for 4070S and just over $650 for 7900XT.

If I remember correctly, Nvidia has said they will implement DLSS 4 on even 3000 series cards. I can't imagine AMD would make FSR 4 exclusive to RDNA4 in current competitive environment.

To clarify, it will become more important with newer let's call it lazy coding where AI cores won't be enough and will need to offload. VRAM won't be irrelevant I just don't personally think it will need to keep going up and up.

My 4090 chokes on processing power before it can fill or come close to filling VRAM. Nvidia is playing it too low on the 4070 and below cards. AMD is in the right ballpark with what they ship for what the cards do.

I used a variation before MBHD (RIP being a good YT'er). Buy based on what you get today, not the promises of tomorrow.

 

[gogreen123]

Hey dude if u buy 7900 xt even though nvidia has better perfomance in RT.7900 xt still has better perfomance even with RT on compare to 4070 super.the difference is quite huge ,7900 xt still also win against 4070 ti super in pure perfomance.i have 7900 xtx magnetic air the perfomance is very great i got 130 fps average in cyberpunk 1440 max

 

[LordVile]

7900XT is now only $50-80 more, making them directly comparable. I game at 1440p and don't mind fake frames. In fact I can't tell the difference between the real thing and fake frames.

7900XT's biggest pros are 20gb of VRAM and faster rasterization. 4070 Super's strong points are faster RT and lower power usage. Normally I wouldn't care about RT, but new games like Indiana Jones have me concerned. If games will require RT in the near future, wouldn't the 4070 Super be a much better buy?

On the other hand, many say the 4070 Super's 12gb VRAM will soon hinder its performance in newer titles.
So which one is the better buy?

It depends. For a start the VRAM thing is nonsense, literally every test done regarding VRAM either shows no difference or only shows significant percentage difference when you're getting like 30FPS at 4K and 6 frames is a 20% disparity.

Overall though if you want the bells and whistles, stable drivers etc go Nvidia. If you're willing to deal with more headaches, more power draw etc go AMD. At 1440p you're not going to notice a ton of difference as they're within 10% without DLSS/ Frame gen and once you turn those on the 4070 is the better card.

 

[LordVile]

Hey dude if u buy 7900 xt even though nvidia has better perfomance in RT.7900 xt still has better perfomance even with RT on compare to 4070 super.the difference is quite huge ,7900 xt still also win against 4070 ti super in pure perfomance.i have 7900 xtx magnetic air the perfomance is very great i got 130 fps average in cyberpunk 1440 max

It's around 10% in raster and dead level in RT before you turn frame gen on and once you turn on the various upscaling and frame gen AMD gets blown away in frame rate and quality of the "Rendering". Plus Nvidia has things like shadowplay which actually work unlike ReLive which has been broken for literally years.

The XTX isn't the same as the XT, it's literally like 20% slower.

 

[gogreen123]

It's around 10% in raster and dead level in RT before you turn frame gen on and once you turn on the various upscaling and frame gen AMD gets blown away in frame rate and quality of the "Rendering". Plus Nvidia has things like shadowplay which actually work unlike ReLive which has been broken for literally years.

The XTX isn't the same as the XT, it's literally like 20% slower.

amd also have fsr 3 for 7900 xt.the pure perfomance is higher with 7900 xt and with fsr 3 turn on it get better

 

[LordVile]

amd also have fsr 3 for 7900 xt.the pure perfomance is higher with 7900 xt and with fsr 3 turn on it get better

And FSR3 is not of the same quality as Nvidias alternative, XeSS is better than FSR at upscaling. It has a 10% advantage in raster which isn’t exactly a massive gain when you’re trading it for driver and software issues.

 

[ohio_buckeye]

Though the demos of fsr 4 I’ve seen people seem impressed. As for dlss 4, traditionally nvidia hasn’t made new dlss versions available on older generations so not sure if they’ll reverse course there. But keep in mind dlss etc will take some vram. The other thing, if you keep your cards a long time and nvidia stops supporting some of those features you’ll probably want the card with more vram and raw processing power at that point.