AMD RX 480: : Let’s Talk

I know I’m a wee bit late to this party, but that does not mean I have been sitting with my eyes and ears shut while AMD has been racking attention for it’s 200$ beast, ie, the AMD RX 480. So I thought I would take out some time and write all that I know and give my opinion, on what the Red Team is doing and how it will impact the GPU market and PC gaming overall.

Performance

Facts:

First and foremost, the matter that concerns thee is the performance of the card. As will history tell you, with a price bracket of 200$ most of the GPUs have struggled to push games of their generation to the limits. AMD has done a decent job in this sector, with cards like R9 270/280 and previously the AMD 7000 series. But with the RX 480, AMD i trying to break the trend and push boundaries even further. According to their latest demonstration, an AMD RX 480 2-way Crossfire beats the GTX 1080 by a few frames in the game, Ashes OF The Singularity.

Now that is quite an achievement in itself, a dual GPU setup of 400$ beats a single 700$ GPU. That is enough to raise quite a few brows. But there is uncertainty here, there was always the fact that a R9 Fury X beat Nvidia’s previous flagship in the same game at 4K, and the same could not be said for the other games. But coming in at a price-point of 200$ there is no denying that this will be rather the best value for money card out there. Here are some of the specs laid out for the RX 480:

Assumptions:

Trying to estimate the performance of a single RX 480, we all know that both SLi and Crossfire setups having dual GPUs of same caliber, provide a performance equivalent to approximately 1.5 times that of the single card. So I’m assuming that a single RX 480 will be able to beat a GTX 980 as per the benchmarks of AOTS show us. Considering the fact that Vulcan will better the performance, we can say that the RX 480 may be able to match even the GTX 980 Ti in some cases.

Rivalry:

Nvidia have already launched their flagship in the form of the GTX 1080, and clearly, it is the new king, with groundbreaking performance coming in at a much lower cost. AMD has never been able to take the throne in terms of the pinnacle of performance and this time around, it seems unlikely as well. But while the 1080 may be the pinnacle of GPU performance, the little brother, ie, the GTX 1070 may face some troubles in the market against the RX 480, unlike it’s predecessor, the GTX 970, which was most popular Mid-ranged GPU till now. Following the trend, it is very likely that we will see a RX 490 as well as a RX 470, and they may seriously be able to give Nvidia a run for their money at the lower and mid range. Similar to their Green rivals, AMD is trying to make GPUs more cost efficient and AMD has done a pretty decent job till now, but this time around, they have taken that extra step. It’d be spectacular if Nvidia would be able to come up with a counter.

Market:

For some unknown reason, Nvidia has been dominating the market for a very long time, even at the lower end of the spectrum. It seems that the PC gamers think that Nvidia is the Tier 1 brand and AMD the Tier 2, which is not actually the case. Maybe, it is because many streamers and YouTube techies use Nvidia cards, or maybe because AMD has never produced the so called ‘King’ of GPUs. AMD has had problems in the past such as overheating, but never have the cards been of sub-par quality. I think I have also mentioned this somewhere in one of my articles that- AMD cards do not overheat because it’s a problem, they overheat simply because, that is their working temperature. As for the market, promoting and selling a VR capable card at 200$ a piece, it’ll definitely dominate that segment of the market. AMD is not focusing on dethroning Nvidia from the peak of performance, that only a handful people will buy, rather it is going for the Price/performance effectiveness that the mass will be looking for. It is a great way to turn heads, but living up to expectation is hard. We have yet to get benchmarks on other games, but the result will not be much different.

Console Wars:

Now that a GPU with a 200$ price point has 1440p and VR capabilities with flying colors, we can easily build a PC within the 400$ budget which is the cost of a console. So basically a PC that comes at the cost of a console, will be capable of 1080p Ultra 60fps and 2K with a 30fps. Enough said.

For The General Gamer:

All the Geeky and Corporate aspects aside, how does the latest AMD powerhouse look at the general gamer? Well for starters, it is a very cheap card, coming in at about 200$(16K INR, including taxes), and the powerhouse AMD is claiming it to be, it would not be surprising if people flogged in front of stores at midnight to get their hands on the card. In general, this will make VR gaming and gaming in general, a comparatively cheaper affair. AMD has opened up the option of build a beast of a PC under 400$, and effectively now eradicated the need for people to say PC gaming is costly. If you are on a tight budget, look no further than this and if you are on a poor man’s budget, just save something for this, since this is the best value for money card you can get out there when it releases. Those who are stuck with the GTX 670s and Radeon HD 7750s will be looking for an upgrade to this card, as it will give them a huge jump over their GPUs. All in all, this card is going to be ‘THE’ thing, if it is able to perform as per the revealings.

What do you think about the RX 480? Is the tempt enough to make you wanna buy a newer card, or are you going to wait for Nvidia’s answer to it? Let us know in the comments below.