Competition Works: AMD RX 7800 XT/ RX 7700 XT Review vs RTX 4070/ RTX 4060 Ti Review

[Kenrou]

Nvidia cutting prices to better compete? The new AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT and 7700 XT show some impressive stuff from the new Navi 32 silicon... and the 7800 XT is competitively priced too. Rich has the lowdown on AMD's impressive specs and performance, but is it enough to counter Nvidia's cutting-edge new technologies?

 

[mackerel]

I forget who said it, or if it was even about GPUs (it might be CPUs) but it was something along the lines of people want AMD to be more competitive so they can buy Nvidia cheaper. That pretty much describes my position at the moment. The nvidia software stack is so much better and doesn't show up in fps/$ charts. For people who are looking at it from a pure gaming perspective, 7800XT could be interesting.

 

[Woomack]

Maybe I'm getting older, but more often I look at efficiency. RTX 4070, that people hate for some reason, use about 200W under load. RX 7700XT about 240W, RX 7800XT about 250W. Looking at the average FPS, RTX4070 is closer to RX7800XT in performance.

 

[Zerileous]

Prices are interesting rn. 6800Xt/$500/up to 300w vs 7800xt/$500-$530/250w vs 4070/$550/200w.

I was wondering about the software, I'm not loving AMDs drivers.

Benchmarks I've looked at they're all pretty close (as in I'd probably never know the difference on a 3700x system), but the 6800xt seems to hold a lead in rasterization, sometimes up to 20%.

Womack has a point, heat, noise and all matter, especially if I'm going to stay on air.

I guess I'm leaning towards the 4070 for $550. Ugh I love having choices but I hate making them. Another factor is the 6800xt is a solid partner design (red dragon) whereas the newer cards are not as good of board/coolers (i.e. MSI Ventus 2 fan, but probably plenty for a 200w card).

 

[Woomack]

One clear advantage of AMD are still regular 8-pin power plugs. Other than that, Nvidia somehow looks better. My brother has a 6800XT, but he is not playing often, so the power usage doesn't matter to him. I have a 6800XT that I wanted to use, but it has a full-cover block, and I have no PC where I could use it. It can be power-limited to keep about 230-240W and still perform not much worse than stock, but stock is 280W+.
RTX 4070 FE is silent in a closed case. At least I can hear other things much more, so I can't separate the graphics card noise. I'm really happy about this card, but I'm using it mainly for tests In my gaming PC is still RTX 3070, which is 200W with limited power.
I see that people still complain about AMD drivers, but since the RTX 6000 series, I had no problems at all. The same if my brother had problems, then would complain all the time, and he said no word. He is also too lazy to update anything.

 

[Kenrou]

7700xt looks on average to be about as slow as my 3070 from the reviews? Why would I get one of those unless (MAYBE) I was building a new rig or comes with a prebuilt? 7800xt/4070 seem much better overall.

 

[Zerileous]

I would want to buy that from you if you were in the US lol. I am glad to hear that drivers are better. Leaning towards the 6800XT red dragon. The white dual Ventus 4070 is attractive but somehow it looks cheap and spending 10% more for lower performance is never fun.

 

[Kenrou]

I thought mine wasn't anything special until I started looking at the new Cinebench results (got 11341, expected ~10k), 2 profiles, 2000mhz 1v for gaming/benching and 1800mhz .85v for everything else. Keep in mind that from what I've seen in reviews, although the 6800xt keeps up with the 7800xt in most scenarios, the 7800xt pulls ahead with RT and several newer games while chugging less power.

 

[Zerileous]

And a reference 7800xt would be easier to find a block for...

 

[mackerel]

Most don't change GPUs every gen like we might around here. If you're upgrading from a few gens back, pretty much everything today is a good upgrade. Even the 4060 is faster than a 1080 Ti.

Also personally I'm not too worried about power, as long as it doesn't get too silly. I think every GPU I've owned is up to 250W class. By class, it might be a bit more of less depending on factory OC. If I had managed to get a 3080 last gen that would have pushed it to 300W. Say incremental costs from 50W extra even 24/7 over a year isn't that significant even at recent power pricing given the hardware we throw around.

BTW my 4070 is in my system on my desk and I can hear that spinning up in summer. Now it is cooler I hardly notice it. I'll be happy when I have more space and it goes back on the floor.

 

[JLK03F150]

Leaning towards the 6800XT red dragon

It is much, much easier to find a water block for a red devil (and probably a reference 7800xt) than a red dragon. I've been very happy with my air-cooled red dragon though.

 

[Zerileous]

It is much, much easier to find a water block for a red devil (and probably a reference 7800xt) than a red dragon. I've been very happy with my air-cooled red dragon though.

Yep I feel like getting the 6800xt RD is committing to not WC (which is maybe fine, I'm terrible at loop maintenance) while getting the reference 7800xt is almost committing to getting a block (none are around now) becaus reference coolers are not the greatest. The MSI Ventus 2 fan 4070 will probably never have a block either. I like that it's white tho.

Edit (I made a very similar reply to my shutdown thread, I wouldn't bother reading both): Well I went with the 6800xt red dragon. I figured I really would not notice the difference between all three cards, performance being within 5% of one another, roughly. That said, I didn't see the need to spend an extra $50 and pay the green tax (though the power usage and some of the features were compelling). And Woomack's point about the connector was also a factor (I know they work well and it was all user error, but it's one less thing to mess with). So other things being similar, I chose the best cooler. I'm a little sad deciding to move away from water cooling, but I did not want to gamble with a reference cooler or commit to spending $100-200 on an aesthetic / for the fun of it item.

I will keep the CPU under water for now, but I won't be tied to it for a future socket. I'm not so good at maintaining things and although I love it, the next few years being in school I need fewer extra little things to deal with. I'll still have maintenance for the CPU but the 3700x is so over cooled I'll have some room to fudge. Also the block is a lot easier to work on, and draining the loop will be much easier without a bottom rad. If I get the chance to drop in a 5900x I won't have to worry about cooling it.