AMD found a new partner in China for the production of Radeon video cards - SoonFoals company

AMD found a new partner in the market of graphic gas pedals.
It became the company SoonFoals, owned by Chinese Weikeng International.
The latter has close ties with a number of other AMD partners, such as Gigabyte and Sapphire.Image source: SoonFoals / WeikengThe SoonFoals company has been a distributor of various electronic and computer components in China and other Asian markets for more than 10 years, where it has established itself as a reliable partner.SoonFoals will sell entry-level and mid-range AMD graphics gas pedals.
In mid-May the company released four models of Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards: Radeon RX 6400, RX 6500 XT, RX 6600 and RX 6560 XT.SoonFoals offers graphics gas pedals based on reference AMD PCBs, but using their own cooling systems.
The solutions do not have any additional embellishments, such as RGB backlighting, and are available in one color - black.All four announced SoonFoals Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards offer reference specifications.
You can see them in the table below.
Source image: VideoCardzThe appearance of a new partner for selling graphics cards in Asian markets will help AMD to expand its coverage in this region.

Graphics card prices in Europe are now on average 2-6% higher than recommended, but there are exceptions

The life cycle of the generation of GeForce RTX 3000 and Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards is coming to its end.
And only now their average price is as close to the recommended (MSRP), says the latest data from the portal 3DCenter, which monitors the market for graphics gas pedals in Germany and Austria.Image source: VideoCardzThe portal 3DCenter began analyzing the graphics cards market since January last year.
The coronavirus pandemic, the associated shortage of components, the transition of the economy to a hybrid remote working from home model, high demand and the simultaneous rise in cryptocurrency prices - all this ultimately led to the most prolonged increase in the price of graphics cards in history.
Nevertheless, the market is slowly coming back to normal.
Some graphics card models are now offered not only at the recommended price, but even cheaper.
However, some models are still sold at prices by 20-30% more expensive than the recommended price.The most popular models Radeon RX 6700 XT, RX 6800, RX 6800 XT and GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, RTX 3070 and RTX 3080 still sell significantly more expensive than their recommended prices.
And yet the markup on them has also decreased - from an average of 23% to 17% over the past three weeks.
At the same time, flagship and entry-level models are often sold below the recommended prices.
Information on prices of gas pedals on the basis of data from German and Austrian retailers provided aggregator Geizhals.
Please note that the prices in the tables below are inclusive of the 19% VAT.
Price trends of GeForce RTX 30-series and Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards.
Source: 3DCenterThe AMD Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards now sell on average 2% more expensive than their recommended prices.
Moreover, you can even find on sale some models of recently released graphics cards that are offered below the recommended value.
An example is the Radeon RX 6750 XT, which hasn't even been released for a month.
According to the latest data, the average price of Radeon RX 6500 XT is 19% lower than the recommended price.
If it were not for the influence of prices of such models as Radeon RX 6800 XT, RX 6800, which are still sold at 22 and 35 percent higher than the MSRP value, the combined average price of gas pedals today was already 3.2 % below the recommended value.The situation with the prices of GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards in general is traditionally worse.
The flagship model GeForce RTX 3090 has the smallest markup - it is offered on average by 2% more expensive than the recommended price.
GeForce RTX 3080 12GB model sells on average 5% more expensive.
Unfortunately, models like the GeForce RTX 3070 and RTX 3060 still sell for significantly more than they should.
Gamers have to overpay at least 12% of the recommended price.As a result, the cost of GeForce RTX gas pedals is on average 6% higher than the recommended prices.
Excluding the models with the highest markups (GeForce RTX 3080 10GB, RTX 3070 and RTX 3060 Ti), the average markup on Ampere gas pedals would be 2% above the recommended price.

In the US, Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards are already selling for an average of 5% more than the recommended price, and some are even cheaper

The popular HardwareUnboxed YouTube channel has shared fresh statistics on graphics gas pedal prices in the US.
The author notes that the price of GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards and Radeon RX 6000 continues to decline.
In this case, the cost of the latter now on average only 5% higher than the recommended price.Image source: VideoCardzIn some cases, graphics cards Radeon RX 6000 are sold even cheaper than the recommended price tag.
We are talking about the models Radeon RX 6900XT, RX 6600XT and RX 6500XT.
At the same time Radeon RX 6800 series gas pedals are still 31% more expensive than the recommended prices.
If not for the impact of this factor, the average price of the entire current Radeon series of gas pedals would have been only 2.4% higher than the recommended price.
In one of the largest U.S.
electronics stores Newegg video cards Radeon RX 6000 fell in price for the month from 6 to 8%.
Price dynamics of AMD Radeon RX 6000 graphic cards in US.
The third column on the right is current price The situation with NVIDIA gas pedals is worse.
Although GeForce RTX 30-series cards also fell in price by 6% over the month in the same Newegg, they are still sold at 24% markup of the recommended price.
However, there are exceptions here as well.
For example, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is offered this month for the recommended $1200.
Price trends for NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3000 graphics cards in the US.
The third column on the right is the current priceAs noted earlier, the sharp price drop in gas pedals is causing problems for NVIDIA in the mid- and low-end price segments.
That's why the company is going to release the GeForce GTX 1630, which will replace the old GeForce GTX 1050 Ti.It is very likely that soon NVIDIA will change tactics, which will lead to an even more serious reduction in the price of graphics cards.
This will allow to quickly sell out the current inventory for the release of the new generation of GeForce RTX 40-series gas pedals.

AMD says Radeon RX 6000 gives better performance per dollar than NVIDIA graphics cards

AMD says its graphics cards give users a better performance-to-price ratio than rival NVIDIA solutions.
That statement was made by Frank Azor, one of AMD's gaming executives, who shared a list on Twitter comparing the Radeon RX 6000 series graphics to current NVIDIA GeForce cards.According to AMD, its most powerful current generation graphics card, the Radeon RX 6950XT, offers 80 percent more performance per dollar (FPS/$) than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090.
In addition, AMD's solution offers the best performance-to-energy ratio - it gives 22% higher frame rate per watt (FPS/watt).The Radeon RX 6800 XT graphics card has the smallest FPS/$ advantage over the GeForce RTX 3080 - only 6%.
And the Radeon RX 6400 and GeForce GTX 1050 Ti graphics cards have the best ratio - the former outperforms the latter by 89% in performance per dollar.
The same pair offers the best performance-to-power ratio - the Radeon outperforms the GeForce by 123%.Note that in all cases AMD indicates not the recommended, but the lowest market prices taken from one of the major American retailers - Newegg - as of May 10.
This means that AMD's pricing statements, while accurate for the announced cards, are not fully relevant to other markets.
It is also worth noting that prices for many graphics cards are now closer to the recommended prices, although they have not yet reached them.

The prices of AMD and NVIDIA graphics cards in Europe are even closer to the recommended values

3DCenter portal has published the latest statistics on the prices of Radeon RX 6000 and GeForce RTX 3000 graphics gas pedals.
Prices of graphics cards have not yet reached their recommended values, but things are moving in the right direction - the prices are even closer to the declared manufacturers.Image source: VideoCardzThe price of graphics cards in general has dropped by about 5 percentage points compared to April.
Thus, the markup on Radeon RX 6000 models now averaged 7% instead of 12 last month, and the markup on GeForce RTX 3000 models has dropped from 19 to 14%.
Image source: 3DCenterAlthough many entry-level and mid-range gas pedal models are selling at a markup of up to 10 percent over the recommended price, many senior segment models are being offered at an average of 22 percent more than the recommended price.
The demand for these cards is now high, because many potential customers put off buying them when the video cards were mostly unavailable or were offered at twice the price or even higher.
The cost of Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards.
Image source: VideoCardz according to 3DCenter The cost of GeForce RTX 3000 graphics cards.
Source image: VideoCardz according to 3DCenter As always, the latest 3DCenter report reflects the price dynamics of graphics cards market in Germany and Austria only.
In other countries the price of gas pedals may be significantly different.

AMD will release fresh Radeon RX 6950 XT, RX 6750 XT and RX 6650 XT graphics cards in May

Rumors that AMD is going to release updated Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards started back in January of this year. Today, VideoCardz portal has shared images of the new products in the reference version and named the timing of their announcement. It is reported that AMD will release at least three graphics gas pedals, which are updated versions of current models: Radeon RX 6950 XT, Radeon RX 6750 XT and Radeon RX 6650 XT.

There is not much information about the video cards yet. In the reference version the cards will get a new look, borrowed from the special version of the gas pedal Radeon RX 6800 XT Midnight Black, which AMD released in April last year. Its distinctive feature is completely black coloring instead of silver-black like the original cards. An interesting detail of the Radeon RX 6650 XT will be the new dual-fan cooling system. Recall that the reference Radeon RX 6600 XT uses a cooler with one fan. And the Radeon RX 6750 XT will have a cooling system with three fans instead of two, as it was with the Radeon RX 6700 XT. At the moment we know that all three updated graphics cards will get higher speed GDDR6 memory with 18 Gbps bandwidth. The current versions of GDDR6 memory runs at a speed of 16 Gbit/sec. There is no information about the GPU frequencies of the upgraded graphics cards yet. But it is noted that all of them are likely to get a higher maximum power consumption. The current reference versions of Radeon RX 6600 XT, Radeon RX 6700 XT and Radeon RX 6900 XT have 160, 230 and 300 W respectively. According to the source, the initial release of the upgraded Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards was expected on April 20. However, according to the new data, it was postponed to May 10.

AMD claimed superiority of its mobile Radeon RX 6500M over Intel Arc A370M in games

AMD has compared the performance of the Intel Arc A370M mobile graphics card and its mobile Radeon RX 6500M. The comparison was not in favor of Intel's newcomer to the discrete graphics gas pedal market.

Although Arc Alchemist graphics cards were officially unveiled two days ago, and some of them, according to Intel, have already gone on sale as part of new notebooks, no one has yet published an independent review of the new products. Therefore, potential customers still have to rely on the official test data provided by Intel during the presentation of these gas pedals.

Arc A370M is based on ACM-G11 graphics processor, which has 8 Xe-core (1024 cores of FP32 operations). Radeon RX 6500M model, in turn, is based on Navi 24 chip with 16 processing units, which includes 1024 stream processors. The similarities between the two gas pedals do not end there. Firstly, the graphics chips in both graphics cards are based on the TSMC process N6. Secondly, both received 4 GB of GDDR6 memory with a 64-bit interface. More importantly, however, both gas pedals have the same power consumption, which ranges from 35 to 50 watts.

The graphics published by AMD show that the mobile Radeon RX 6500M turns out to be faster in at least five games tested, when using 1080p resolution and medium image quality settings. Of course, it should be noted that most of these games are optimized for AMD graphics cards. But «reds» clearly tried to jab Intel with the fact that its graphics cards do not show themselves from the best side in more demanding games.

The cost of NVIDIA and AMD graphics cards has fallen to its lowest value in 15 months

According to 3DCenter's latest analysis of the German and Austrian graphics card markets, the price of GeForce RTX 30-series and Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards by the end of March had dropped to its lowest value in 15 months. At the same time this month NVIDIA graphics cards have fallen in price significantly more than AMD models.

If at the beginning of this month, the average price of AMD Radeon video cards was 35% higher than the recommended price, and NVIDIA video cards & ; 41% higher, then today the average markup on the proposals of both manufacturers is 25%. Since January 2022 the cost of gas pedals was reduced by 10 percentage points every month. Thanks to this, the current prices have reached the values of the end of 2020.

The bulk of retailers are still reluctant to share predictions about when the cost of graphics cards will fall to their recommended values. However, the portal TechRadar still managed to get a comment from one of them. In his opinion, graphics card prices for regular consumers may become «attractive» already by May. I believe graphics card prices will continue to adjust in line with the market's declining boom, which is now coming to a close. By the end of April or early May, prices should be more attractive to customers," said Tyler Davies, spokesman for the British retailer Box.

Other vendors are in no hurry to make similar statements yet. However, the fact that the price of gas pedals has been decreasing every month during the last quarter may speak in favor of such optimistic forecasts. And by the end of the second quarter of this year in stores you will be able to find offers as close to the recommended prices as possible, at least in Europe.

Almost all last generation AMD and NVIDIA graphics cards now cost twice the recommended price

This month marks one year since the release of the Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards. During that time they have not become available at or close to the recommended prices. In the same situation now are the GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards, released in September 2020. According to the latest data from 3DCenter and HardwareUnboxed, the prices of almost all models of current generation graphics gas pedals as of November 21 are twice the recommended prices.

In Europe, particularly in Germany and Austria, whose markets are monitored by 3DCenter, GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards have again increased in price since October. At the same time, the price of Radeon RX 6000 models slightly decreased. According to the source, this happened only because retailers received a new batch of Radeon RX 6800 models, which lowered the average price for the entire series. GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards are now on average 95 percent more expensive than the manufacturer recommends. But the GeForce RTX 3080, for example, costs about 1,500 euros, which is more than double the recommended 719 euros.

Prices for the GeForce RTX 30-series and Radeon RX 6000 in Germany and Austria.

A fresh price analysis by YouTube channel HardwareUnboxed of the U.S. market also shows a steady price increase for GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards. Almost all models are offered at twice the recommended price, except for the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. The latter was originally launched with an increased recommended price tag. In the current environment, its cost is 60% higher than the recommended price. Generally speaking, GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards on the eBay marketplace are selling on average 113% more expensive than their recommended prices. And since October, their price has added another 6%;

Prices for 30-series GeForce RTX on eBay.

Radeon RX 6000 prices are also higher than they were last month. On average, AMD graphics cards are twice as expensive. Compared to October, they're up 9 percent in the U.S.

Radeon RX 6000 prices on eBay.

Both sources note that the actual availability of video cards is not a problem & ; the gas pedals are available in stores. However, finding them at a reasonable price, and without bundling them with other PC components  an impossible task. Retailers are not going to reduce their profits, because distributors do not want to reduce the selling prices of video cards. The rising cost of cryptocurrencies and the upcoming holiday shopping season are definitely not helping to stabilize and lower the prices of gas pedals either.

AMD released the Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.11.2 driver, which improves the performance of Radeon RX 6000 cards in Battlefield 2042

AMD has released a new Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.11.2 graphics driver package for Windows 10 and Windows 11 operating systems. This new version of the video driver improves the performance of Radeon RX 6000 series graphics gas pedals in Battlefield 2042.

The company indicates a performance increase of up to 14% in Battlefield 2042 at 4K resolution and maximum quality settings on Radeon RX 6900 XT graphics cards, a performance increase of up to 15% at the same image quality settings using Radeon RX 6800 XT graphics cards and a performance increase of up to 11% at the same quality settings using Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics cards compared to the previous version of the driver.

Known problems:

When playing Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy on some systems with Radeon RX 5500 XT graphics cards, you may experience video driver timeouts. As a temporary measure, it is suggested to disable the Radeon Anti-Lag feature in the Radeon Software settings; Some users may experience increased disk space consumption by the Multimedia Athena Dumps folder; Some AMD graphics products such as Radeon RX 6800M may show some visual artifacts in Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War; AMD Radeon software may crash or stop responding in some DirectX 11 games, such as PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, with multiple displays connected in advanced mode. A temporary solution would be to press the Alt + R key combination on your keyboard; Advanced sync can cause a black screen to appear when turned on in some games and system configurations. Users who may have problems with extended synchronization enabled should disable it; Radeon performance metrics and logging features may occasionally report very high or incorrect memory clock speeds.

Download the latest version of the Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.11.2 graphics driver from the AMD official website.

NVIDIA and AMD graphics cards of the latest generation have almost stopped cheapening, never reaching the recommended prices

3DCenter released another comprehensive review of retail video card market in Germany and Austria. The data about the price of GeForce RTX 30-series and AMD Radeon RX 6000 gas pedals from the retailers was collected since the beginning of the year & ; when the prices of new (and not so new) graphics solutions began to rise rapidly.

For example, AMD Radeon RX 6000 GPUs went up in price by 3 percent in two weeks, and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3000s fell in price by the same percentage. It is important to note that the average price of NVIDIA graphics cards was partially affected by the relatively recent release of GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3070 Ti models.

Note that prices in Germany and Austria should not be directly compared with the cost of graphics cards in other regions. However, in general we can note that the supply of European stores with video cards has significantly improved. In many regions, retailers are forced to pay dearly to local distributors who do not wish to decrease their profits, and retailers themselves do not mind profiting from the deficit & ; therefore the price drop is slower than gamers would like.

NVIDIA and AMD graphics cards of the latest generation have almost stopped cheapening, never reaching the recommended prices

3DCenter released another comprehensive review of retail video card market in Germany and Austria. The data about the price of GeForce RTX 30-series and AMD Radeon RX 6000 gas pedals from the retailers was collected since the beginning of the year & ; when the prices of new (and not so new) graphics solutions began to rise rapidly.

While video cards have noticeably fallen in price since May's «peak» price spike and have been steadily declining since then, the drop has noticeably slowed in the past couple of weeks, and in some cases the cards have even gone back up slightly in price.

For example, AMD Radeon RX 6000 GPUs went up in price by 3 percent in two weeks, while NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3000s fell in price by the same percentage. It is important to note that the average price of NVIDIA graphics cards was partially affected by the relatively recent release of GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3070 Ti models.

Note that prices in Germany and Austria should not be directly compared with the cost of graphics cards in other regions. However, in general we can note that the supply of European stores with video cards has significantly improved. In many regions, retailers are forced to pay dearly to local distributors who do not wish to decrease their profits, and retailers themselves do not mind profiting from the deficit & ; therefore the price drop is slower than gamers would like.

Lenovo is preparing a gaming laptop with AMD Ryzen 7 5800H and Radeon RX 6600M

Network informant rogame found information about an unknown gaming laptop from Lenovo with AMD Ryzen 5000H series processor. The novelty is interesting because it is equipped with a Radeon RX 6600M graphics gas pedal.

An unknown Lenovo laptop powered by Ryzen 7 5800H and Radeon RX 6000 mobile graphics appeared in the database of the performance test UserBenchmark. Unfortunately, the source does not specify the model of the laptop, so the novelty can refer to any series of laptops from the manufacturer, from IdeaPad Gaming models and ending with a purely gaming series Legion.

It should be recalled that the company already offers IdeaPad and Legion models based on Ryzen 5000H processors, but all of them are equipped with NVIDIA Ampere graphics gas pedals. The illuminated laptop hints that Lenovo may be preparing its first notebook based solely on components made by AMD. VideoCardz portal notes that different power requirements for AMD Radeon RX 6000M mobile graphics cards compared to NVIDIA GeForce RTX should not be a problem, as even the Legion 5 Pro gaming notebooks are designed to support GPUs with a TDP of up to 140 W. To recap, Radeon RX 6600M graphics card is based on the Navi 23 GPU with 1792 stream processors. This graphics card is designed to play games at high-medium settings at 1080p resolution. According to AMD, the gas pedal is able to compete with the mobile version of GeForce RTX 3060.

Despite the fact that AMD introduced this graphics card more than a month ago, so far none of the laptop manufacturers have not released a device with the novelty. Moreover, the card is not even listed in Radeon drivers, which may indicate a delay in its release. Thus, AMD's earlier statements that the graphics card is supposedly «already delivered» most likely serve only as a diversion.

Today - AMD presentation, where Radeon RX 6700 XT will be presented

AMD will hold an online presentation today called Where Gaming Begins Episode 3, where new graphics cards will be announced. The event will take place in the evening, at 19:00 Moscow time. You will be able to follow the live broadcast directly on this page or on the official AMD YouTube channel.

AMD itself promises that at the event «ll reveal more details about the latest update of the Radeon RX 6000 family of graphics cards». By these words, the company apparently means the announcement of new graphics cards of the last generation. Almost certainly there will be Radeon RX 6700 XT, and with it, most likely, Radeon RX 6700. Perhaps some other models, such as Radeon RX 6600 (XT) will keep them company.

According to rumors, Radeon RX 6700 XT will get a GPU with 2560 stream processors and will be equipped with 12 GB of video memory GDDR6 with 192-bit interface. GPU frequency is not specified, but most likely it will be higher than 2000 MHz. Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card should be a direct competitor to the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti. The cost of Radeon RX 6700 XT is still difficult to predict. Moreover, due to the huge demand for graphics cards and accordingly total shortage, the novelty is unlikely to buy at the price that AMD will claim.

AMD has hinted at the junior Radeon RX 6000 models and showed off their reference design

In the presentation AMD showed the reference design of low-end Radeon RX 6000 desktop graphics accelerators, based on RDNA2 architecture. Unfortunately, the company didn't go into details about these upcoming products, but announced that the graphics cards will be available in the first half of 2021.

It was expected, that the manufacturer will tell about low-end Radeon RX 6000 models in today's broadcast, but unfortunately AMD did not dwell on this point. Instead, during the broadcast the company's CEO Lisa Su showed a promotional slide showing two junior Radeon RX 6000 models in a reference design.

AMD is on track to launch the first notebooks with #RDNA2 in the first half of 2021, and you'll see mainstream RDNA 2 desktop graphics card designs in the first half of the year as well. #CES2021 pic.twitter.com/EW2fBpSFDq & ; Radeon RX (@Radeon) January 12, 2021

The company did not specify the names of future new products. Probably one of them is Radeon RX 6700. Judging by the slide, the reference variant of this video card will get a cooling system with two fans. The cards of the lower models will be equipped with even simpler cooling system with one fan. According to rumors, Radeon RX 6700 will be based on Navi 22 graphics chip, while the lower-end models (with one fan in the CO) & ; on Navi 23. According to the same reports, the Radeon RX 6700 should be available around March.

AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT and RX 6700 graphics cards will not be released until spring

According to French resource Cowcotland, citing its sources, AMD will unveil Radeon RX 6700 series graphics cards only by the end of March. So, we can't expect these cards at the upcoming CES 2021, where AMD CEO Lisa Su will be giving a presentation and announcing some new products.

According to our sources, AMD has planned to release two graphics accelerators by the end of the first quarter of this year, that is, in late March» & ; resource indicates. Additionally it is said that Radeon RX 6700 series graphics cards will be based on Navi 22 GPU, which is capable to offer up to 40 processing units with 2560 stream processors. Thus, the senior version of Radeon RX 6700 XT will get half the number of stream processors compared to the flagship model Radeon RX 6900 XT. The younger version of the Radeon RX 6700, on the other hand, is likely to be trimmed down in terms of stream processors in some way. The source also reports that even the younger Radeon RX 6700 model will be equipped with 12 GB of video memory with 192-bit bus. The same applies to the Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card. That's likely why, according to rumors, NVIDIA is going to release another version of the GeForce RTX 3060 with 12GB of video memory, despite the existence of the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti with 8GB of memory. Unfortunately, information on the range of operating frequencies of Radeon RX 6700 graphics accelerators resource is not given. It is worth recalling that the image of reference Radeon RX 6700 leaked in the network a few months ago, a couple of weeks before the official announcement of the older Radeon RX 6000 based on the Navi 21 GPU. According to the leak, the reference graphics card will get a dual-fan cooling system, as well as up to two 8-pin auxiliary power connectors.

AMD just changed its mind: Radeon RX 6000 reference graphics cards will continue to be produced

Yesterday we reported that AMD stopped producing Radeon RX 6800, RX 6800 XT and RX 6900 XT reference graphics cards. However, plans are inherently changeable, and this is exactly the case. AMD representative said that AMD will keep releasing new video cards in reference version for a little bit more indefinitely.

This was announced by Scott Herkelman, Senior Vice President of AMD Radeon Technologies Group. In his tweet, he wrote: «We just officially extended [production of Radeon RX 6000] reference design graphics cards indefinitely due to high demand. Thanks for the feedback».

We've just officially extended the reference design builds indefinitely due to popular demand. Thanks for the feedback. & ; Scott Herkelman (@sherkelman) December 9, 2020

It turns out that AMD has changed its mind on numerous fan requests, or at least wants everyone to think so. In fact, the reference design of the current generation graphics cards looks quite successful. Reviewers noted a very quiet and efficient cooling system, which has a fairly massive radiator and three fans. So it's nice that customers will be able to buy solutions of successful design for some time. However, the situation with the availability of video cards AMD Radeon RX 6000-series remains deplorable. It is actually impossible to buy both reference and non-reference models in stores. Many retailers have to cover their previous orders, and they do not accept new ones. The situation promises to improve only by the spring.

AMD has promised up to 15% performance improvement with Smart Access Memory

Yesterday AMD released its flagship Radeon RX 6900 XT graphics card based on RDNA 2 architecture. One of the advertised features of this and other Radeon RX 6000 series cards is AMD Smart Access Memory (SAM) technology. More and more motherboards of 400 and 500 series (for example, recently reported by Biostar) support this technology, and AMD decided to present a commercial about this technology.

AMD introduced the SAM technology during the announcement of the Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards and initially announced it only for the Ryzen 5000 processor. While conventional Windows-based PCs can only access up to 256MB of graphics memory at the same time, this technology allows the processor to extend the data channel, allowing the entire video memory array to be accessed at once, eliminating potential bottlenecks and achieving improved performance in some games. This is especially true now, when the amount of video memory used often exceeds 10 GB.

In this video, the company promises a noticeable performance increase in some games when activated SAM. For example, Forza Horizon 4 and Assassin's Creed Valhalla get a 1440p resolution gain on AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT up to 15 %, while Ashes of Singularity: Escalation in 4K shows a 13 % gain. The company still recommends using the technology on AMD 500 series motherboards with AMD Ryzen 5000 processors and AMD Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards. This requires the AMD Radeon Software Driver 20.11.2 or later, a motherboard with fresh firmware based on AMD AGESA 1.1.0.0 and activation of Above 4G Decoding and Re-Size BAR Support in the BIOS:

Recall: SAM is based on Resizable BAR (Base Address Registers) sizing technology, which is part of the PCI Express interface specifications since version 2.0 and is not an exclusive of AMD. SAM works quite well on Radeon RX 6000 and Intel processors on ASUS and ASRock boards, but AMD Ryzen 3000 and older processors do not support it hardware. Since this is part of the PCI Express specifications, NVIDIA also plans to add SAM support to some of its graphics gas pedals.