AMD Radeon Pro WX 7100 Review

[FormatC]

The FirePro brand is dead; long live the Radeon Pro. AMD puts its Polaris chips and reworked drivers to work in three new workstation graphics cards. We’re about to give the fastest model, the Radeon Pro WX 7100, a real workout.

AMD Radeon Pro WX 7100 Review : Read more

 

[xenol]

Why can't cards of this design make it to the consumer market? I'm sure there are lots of people yearning for a single-slot cooler card.

On that note, it's ridiculous that AIBs slap on a two-slot cooler on lower end cards.

 

[ohim]

the cooler is crap.... nobody wants a single slot card if it gets above 90°C

 

[Rookie_MIB]

The reason why it's single slot is simple enough, when you're looking to cram as much compute performance as possible in a computer, the slot spacing matters. There are some workstations which are ATX based which have 7 PCIe x 16 (or x8 after PLX switching) capable slots. As long as the cards can reliably remain below their temp threshold - that's all that matters.

With a gaming style cooler (dual slot) it reduces the amount of compute performance without really increasing the speed as much. For example. If with a dual slot cooler, you can increase the core/VRAM speed 25-50% (because power usage increases exponentially with speed), that doesn't compare with being able to increase the compute by 100% by adding a second card.

 

[SliSpitfire]

3.5 dB(A) more IS actually more than twice the perceived noise (logarithmic scale).

 

[Virtual_Singularity]

Thanks for the review. They're a great value for their price. One of the biggest changes at AMD since last year, and especially within the past 6 months or so, has been the increased attention to driver optimization for their dGPUs. Their enterprise-oriented cards also benefit. The coolers on these single slot cards may not be the greatest, but for their intended use they're fine.

 

[FormatC]

The price is the best argument. But let's also wait for next Sunday/Monday.
Nvidia will show on their booth (Solidworks World) the new Pascal Quadro lineup.
It's under NDA until next week, but I have the most of this cards already in my hands.

I plan a showdown after this NDA with all available cards from AMD and Nvidia
in real-world applications. I'm sure, the price of the WX7100 will help to survive,
also after the launch

The WX4100, 5100 and 7100 are here, also the Quadro P5000, P6000 and a few
not launched cards 😉

BTW:
The Quadro P6000 beats the Titan X Pascal in Gaming. I tried it with Resident Evil 7
in 4K and Shadow Cache On. Impressive, but expensive. 😀

The WX7100 is from my sight the better RX480. Closer to the sweet spot and more
efficient. And only marginally slower. The RX480 is the result of the stupid arms race
against the GTX 1060 and might be more interesting without such high clicks/voltages.
Just sitting on a RX480 roundup with up to eight cards and some cards takes more than
200 Watts in gaming loops. This is simply too much for a few FPS more.
Polaris is not bad, if the chips are used as constructed. All stronger OC is mostly painful.

 

[shrapnel_indie]

3.5 dB(A) more IS actually more than twice the perceived noise (logarithmic scale).

Actually, 3 dB isn't perceived as twice as loud. you need 10 dB for that.

http://www.noisehelp.com/decibel-scale.html
http://www.acousticsbydesign.com/acoustics-blog/perception-vs-reality.htm
http://www.siue.edu/~gengel/ece476WebStuff/SPL.pdf (Page 5)

 

[TJ Hooker]

3.5 dB(A) more IS actually more than twice the perceived noise (logarithmic scale).

It would be ~twice the power, but human perception of sound is not linear with power.

 

[bak0n]

Why can't cards of this design make it to the consumer market? I'm sure there are lots of people yearning for a single-slot cooler card.

On that note, it's ridiculous that AIBs slap on a two-slot cooler on lower end cards.

RX460 is now out as a single slot card. But yes, I agree with you.

 

[FormatC]

I like the low-profile cards, because I have a lot of very small ITX-cases with no space inside

 

[extremepenguin]

Low profile cards only work if you have a lot of airflow, I run a number of machines with the single slot Quadro's and I have 2 running the WX7100. They are 1U rack mounts in dedicated rooms with AC, need ear plugs to work in there but nobody seems to complain about slow performance, outside the Adobe users.... they are impossible to please.

 

[FormatC]

A small 35 watts card can be cooled with a low profile solution. But all above 40 watts is really painful for the ears, I totally agree.
And - to be honest - Adobe users are very special (me included) 😛

 

[harly2]

had to dig at the excellent 480,....because your toms hardware, and you're shills.

 

[harly2]

anyone notice toms is rarely referenced now? place needs a makeover.

 

[dmitche3]

I know that it is not apples to apples but for once when comparing these high-end workstation cards I would like to see thrown into the mix a high-end desktop card. Why? For the average reader the numbers don't mean much. By putting in something that the everyday person uses they can see the vast difference, or lack of difference between a desktop video card and a workstation.

 

[dmitche3]

I know that it is not apples to apples but for once when comparing these high-end workstation cards I would like to see thrown into the mix a high-end desktop card. Why? For the average reader the numbers don't mean much. By putting in something that the everyday person uses they can see the vast difference, or lack of difference between a desktop video card and a workstation.

 

[FormatC]

All this cards are based on the same chips as the consumer cards, but the drivers are not really comparable.
In each case a workstation card will lose, if both cards are running the same app OpenGL excluded).
The P6000 is an exception. But I have things like Solidworks in my suite, that can't sart with a gaming card.

I'm sitting on a crossover workstation review that will show the advantage/disadvantage of each solution.
I mixed pro and consumer parts to get for each user profile the best solution. And I hope, it will be translated too

 

[80-watt Hamster]

the cooler is crap.... nobody wants a single slot card if it gets above 90°C

So I guess it's good they got it down to 85C, then.

 

[Ne0Wolf7]

Now the question is: How does this $600 card compare to some $600 GTX 1080s?

 

[FormatC]

For what?

The $600 you pay not for the silicon itself, but for drivers, support, certification and so on.
Workstation is not office crap and alone the time to optimize drivers for pro apps costs a lot of money.
In a lot of pro apps this consumer cards will lose, in a few not. Try f.e a consumer card in Siems NX.
The app will start, but the performance is a pain.

This is nothing for gaming, office or multimedia. May be for producer software and huge workloads.

 

[alexnode]

I really want AMD to hit Nvidia hard but they don't care, they want to get the low and mid range market by maintaining the insane prices at the top end , which is Nvidia. Trust me this is what will happen with Rysen too. IT will compete with the low end of Intel too. It's not a genuine competition.

 

[FormatC]

I see Ryzen as a big chance. All this xxx Lake things are nothing new.
It is mostly refurbished from Gen to Next-Gen. A lot of smaller ticks.

I hope, AMD can keep the schedule. If not, I have no idea what we can test in the future. Only Intel?

 

[jdlech]

If they want to take market share, they could resurrect and update the AIW 8xxxDV. Now THAT was a card. It was THE card for the TV/movie/dual display buffs. A modern version would embarrass NVidia.
I think they would be surprised by how many people buy cards with priorities other than straight gaming.

 

[bit_user]

I'm sitting on a crossover workstation review that will show the advantage/disadvantage of each solution. I mixed pro and consumer parts to get for each user profile the best solution. And I hope, it will be translated too

I hope so. I'm looking forward to it.

The $600 you pay not for the silicon itself, but for drivers, support, certification and so on. Workstation is not office crap and alone the time to optimize drivers for pro apps costs a lot of money.

I'm skeptical about the prices, as well. It would be nice if they'd sell the workstation hardware at prices closer to the consumer models, but then have a separate software product for the drivers.

What might be really interesting to test would be to compare the some Windows apps + workstation cards with Linux versions (for those professional apps available on both) using both the workstation and consumer cards. Or simply Windows + workstation card vs. Linux + consumer card.

Even if the AMD proprietary drivers still advantage the workstation card, the opensource drivers might be competitive using only consumer hardware.