As with the older RX 400 Series generation, AMD is addressing the mainstream customer who needs to upgrade an outdated graphics card to support HD gaming and high-quality VR. The cards also target customers relying on integrated graphics components, which don’t meet the minimum requirements for the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive.
So let’s dive in and check each one out versus the RX 400 Series card they will replace:
Radeon RX 580
| RX 580 | RX 480 | |
| Graphics core: | Polaris 20 XTX | Polaris 10 XT |
| Compute units: | 36 | 36 |
| Stream processors: | 2,304 | 2,304 |
| Base speed: | 1,257MHz | 1,120MHz |
| Boost speed: | 1,340MHz | 1,266MHz |
| Memory: | 4GB/8GB GDDR5 | 4GB/8GB GDDR5 |
| Memory interface: | 256-bit | 256-bit |
| Memory bandwidth: | 256GB/s | 256GB/s |
| Memory speed: | 8GHz | 8GHz |
| Peak performance: | Up to 6.17 TFLOPS | Up to 5.83 TFLOPS |
| Maximum power: | 180 watts | 150 watts |
| Power connector: | 1x 8-pin | 1x 6-pin |
| Target market: | Beyond smooth HD gaming | Premium VR Experiences |
| Starting price: | $199/$229 | $199/$229 |
| Availability: | April 18 | June 2016 |
As previously revealed in photos of an engineering sample, the RX 580 is based on an entirely new board design (C940) backed by a new 8-pin power connector. This indicates that the card can be overclocked at the expense of a higher power requirement. Even AMD says that the RX 580 supports “aggressive tuning for higher clocks.”
According to AMD, the RX 580 can crank out 78 frames per second in Doom using a 1440p resolution and “High” settings. The Strix GTX 970 with the same settings can only manage 58 frames per second, while the Radeon R9 380X can only generate 52 frames per second. In other words, the RX 580 is somewhat of a large leap compared to the older GPUs.
Radeon RX 570
| RX 570 | RX 470 | |
| Graphics core: | Polaris 20 Pro | Polaris 10 Pro |
| Compute units: | 32 | 32 |
| Stream processors: | 2,048 | 2,048 |
| Base speed: | 1,168MHz | 926MHz |
| Boost speed: | 1.244MHz | 1,206MHz |
| Memory: | 4GB/8GB GDDR5 | 4GB/8GB GDDR5 |
| Memory interface: | 256-bit | 256-bit |
| Memory bandwidth: | 224GB/s | 224GB/s |
| Memory speed: | 7GHz | 7GHz |
| Peak performance: | Up to 5.10 TFLOPS | Up to 4.94 TFLOPS |
| Maximum power: | 150 watts | 110 watts |
| Power connector: | 1x 6-pin | 1x 6-pin |
| Target market: | Max 1080P Gaming | High visuals |
| Starting price: | $169/TBA | $149/$179 |
| Availability: | April 18 | June 2016 |
Circling back to Doom, AMD says that this card manages 92 frames per second with a 1080p resolution and “Ultra” settings. Meanwhile, the EVGA GTX 960 only churns out 59 frames per second and the Radeon R7 370 only does 40 frames per second. The 570 also beats out those two older cards in Resident Evil 7 too, with 103 frames per second versus 68 frames per second and 38 frames per second, respectively.
Radeon RX 560
| RX 560 | RX 460 | |
| Graphics core: | Polaris 21 | Polaris 11 |
| Compute units: | 16 | 14 |
| Stream processors: | 1,024 | 896 |
| Base speed: | 1,175MHz | 1,090MHz |
| Boost speed: | 1,275MHz | 1,200MHz |
| Memory: | 2GB/4GB GDDR5 | 2GB/4GB GDDR5 |
| Memory interface: | 128-bit | 128-bit |
| Memory bandwidth: | 112GB/s | 112GB/s |
| Memory speed: | 7GHz | 7GHz |
| Peak performance: | Up to 2.93 TFLOPS | Up to 2.2 TFLOPS |
| Maximum power: | ? | 75 watts |
| Power connector: | 1x 6-pin | 1x 6-pin |
| Target market: | Efficient 1080p Gaming | Efficient 1080p Gaming |
| Starting price: | $99/unknown | $99/$199 |
| Availability: | Early May | June 2016 |
Based on AMD’s numbers, this card does rather well in Doom, with 67 frames per second at a 1080p resolution. The GTX 750 Ti manages only 33 frames per second, while the Radeon R7 360 is capable of 35 frames per second.
Radeon RX 550
| RX 550 | |
| Graphics core: | Polaris 12 |
| Compute units: | 8 |
| Stream processors: | 512 |
| Base speed: | Unknown |
| Boost speed: | 1.183MHz |
| Memory: | 2GB/4GB GDDR5 |
| Memory interface: | 128-bit |
| Memory bandwidth: | 112GB/s |
| Target market: | 4K Home Theater |
| Starting price: | $79 |
| Availability: | May 20 |
AMD doesn’t provide a Doom benchmark with this card, but does throw out numbers regarding Rocket League and Overwatch. Check out the comparisons:
| Overwatch | Counter-Strike: GO | |
| Radeon RX 550: | 98 FPS | 97 FPS |
| Radeon R7 250: | 44 FPS | 59 FPS |
| Intel HD 530: | 18 FPS | 24 FPS |
Finally, here are some of the cards sold by third-party manufacturers based on the new Radeon RX 500 Series family. Remember, models based on the RX 560 and RX 550 won’t hit the market until next month (May):
| Asus | Gigabyte | MSI | Sapphire | TUL |
| RX 570 STRIX OC 4GB ($189) —— |
RX 580 Aorus OC 8GB ($259) —— |
RX 580 Gaming 8G ($245) —— |
RX 580 Nitro+ Limited Edition 8GB ($275) —— |
RX 580 8GB Red Devil Golden Sample ($269) —— |
| RX 570 STRIX 4GB ($179) |
RX 580 Aorus 8GB ($229) —— |
RX 580 ARMOR 8G ($229) —— |
RX 580 Nitro+ 8GB ($249) —— |
RX 580 8GB Red Devil ($249) —— |
| RX 580 Gaming 8GB ($219) —— |
RX 580 ARMOR 4G ($199) —— |
RX 580 Pulse 8GB ($229) —— |
RX 580 8GB Red Dragon ($229) —— |
|
| RX 580 Aorus 4GB ($199) —— |
RX 570 ARMOR 4G ($175) |
RX 580 Pulse 4GB ($209) —— |
RX 580 4GB Red Dragon ($199) —— |
|
| RX 580 Gaming 4GB ($189) —— |
RX 570 Nitro+ 4GB ($199) —— |
RX 570 4GB Red Dragon ($175) |
||
| RX 570 Aorus 4GB ($179) —— |
RX 570 Pulse 4GB ($169) |
|||
| RX 570 Gaming 4GB ($169) |
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