When Will AMD Launch the RX 7700 and RX 7800?

AMD published a blog yesterday highlighting the following: The Importance of Having Enough VRAM for 1440p Gaming. A quick summary suggests that you need 12GB or 16GB to get the most out of 1440p gaming. This is an interesting take, as there are still no AMD RDNA 3 architecture GPUs with 12GB or 16GB of his VRAM. In particular he’s talking about the RX 7800 (XT) and RX 7700 (XT) which are Navi 32 based parts but at the moment these haven’t been out for a long time and the previous generation parts are the best graphics cards will compete for the seat of

Of course, there’s a reason AMD hasn’t launched another GPU series yet. Similar to the current catastrophe in discrete graphics card sales, last quarter was the lowest number of units sold. decades. ah.

Previous generation AMD RX 6000 series GPUs are still on warehouse and retail shelves, even at heavily discounted prices. All this reminds me of the RX 500 series parts that were left at rock bottom in 2018-2019. In fact, the surplus didn’t go away until the 2020 GPU shortage finally ran out of stock for all GPUs.

At the same time, AMD would have ordered wafers over a year ago and planned to launch the new Navi 32 GPUs. There are probably chips lying around, waiting for a good time to launch. AMD could take on the waiting game, but at some point it will have to push out his new generation Navi 32 GPUs.

AMD now has the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT, originally priced at $999 and $899, but now retailing for around $950 and $780. The next step down for the RX 7000 series is the RX 7600 and its massive drop to $269 launch price. Everything in between the RX 7600 and even below the RX 7600 is still serviced by previous generation parts. One of the biggest complaints I had about the RX 7600 was that it was only comparable in performance to the existing RX 6650 XT at an extra $40.

AMD certainly knew this was a problem, but what else could they do? If they lowered the price of the RX 7600 any further, the RX 6650 XT and below would either suffer from sluggish sales, or they would have to cut back on their GPUs. There will be even lower in pricing. Potential buyers then return to the same dilemma. So, are you paying more for the latest generation architecture and features with roughly equivalent performance, or are you paying more for a previous generation card?

If you really need/want AV1 support, that’s the biggest draw for AMD’s RX 7600 right now. However, our video encoding tests show that AMD’s quality still falls short of Nvidia and Intel. Perhaps the additional compute provided by RDNA 3 will start impacting more games and applications in the future, but so far, GPUs appear to be well below their theoretical potential. Now, let’s go back to Navi 32.

It’s pretty easy to hear about the Navi 32 and the upcoming RX 7800 and 7700 class GPUs. Similar to the Navi 31 and RX 7900 class GPUs, chiplets are used. The MCD (memory controller die) is exactly the same as the 7900 XTX/XT, but the GCD is different. Navi 32’s GCD (Graphics Compute Die) will be 60-64 CUs and 4 MCDs instead of support for up to 96 Compute Units (CUs) and 6 MCDs. The size is also about 200 mm^2 compared to the 300 mm^2 Navi 31 GCD.

After that, AMD plans to launch at least two variants. The top solution is a full GCD with 4 MCDs, giving the RX 7800 (or RX 7800 XT) support for his 16GB GDDR6 memory with 64MB infinity cache. The trimmed GCD removes one of the MCDs and has 12GB of GDDR6 and 48MB of Infinity Cache as the RX 7700 (probably XT).

One interesting tidbit is that RDNA 3 will likely not offer a configuration with 10GB of memory and a 160-bit interface. This is what the standard RX 6700 10GB uses and one of the MCDs should only be connected to a single GDDR6 chip. It’s probably not impossible, but in a crowded GPU market where the RX 6700 has always felt like an afterthought and sales are sluggish, it would be better for him to have fewer SKUs than push it between products. SKUs are reserved for a brighter future when PCs become ubiquitous. Component sales also begin to recover.

When will AMD finally launch these Navi 32 based GPUs? There are hints that it could happen in the July-August period just in time for the back-to-school season. Also, AMD and its partners want to get rid of as much of his RX 6800/6700/6600 series inventory as possible in the meantime. His article highlighting the importance of 12GB VRAM in 1440p gaming may help in that effort, but for a two-year-old card it’s becoming increasingly difficult to sell. Maybe we’ll have a nice Prime Day sale on the RX 6800/6700 series to help push things forward.

RX 6000 series GPUs are priced well right now, but have bounced back in the last month or so (since the launch of the RX 7600, RTX 4070, and RTX 4060 Ti). There are sales other than Father’s Day, and now, RX 6950 XT Pricing Starting at $579, RX 6800 XT Pricing Starting at $469and RX 6800 starting at $459. (For reference, the RX 6800 XT is the most valuable of these.)

on the other hand, RX 6750 XT Pricing Starting at $359slightly slower RX 6700 XT is priced at $309and the RX 6700 10GB Priced at $279. If you need an AMD card with 10GB or more of VRAM, these are the only options other than significantly more expensive (and faster) cards. $779 RX 7900 XT and $959 RX 7900 XTX.

You might be wondering, “If the RX 6000 series parts already pretty much fill the mainstream to high-end price point, why would AMD need an RDNA 3 replacement?” . The answer is efficiency and the desire for new product names. OEMs and system integrators like to sell something new instead of his RX 6800 XT example from two years ago. But let’s talk about efficiency right away.

Nvidia paid for TSMC Piper to get great efficiency out of its RTX 40-series GPUs and 4nm TSMC 4N node. AMD’s RDNA 3 GPUs are also on TSMC’s new process node, at least for GCD, and utilize TSMC N5, opting to go with N6 for MCD for cost reduction reasons. Below are the current and previous generation GPUs from AMD and Nvidia sorted by performance per watt at 1440p.