Comment by jaapz
4 days ago
AMD will be very happy when they do. They are already making great cards, currently running an RX7800XT (or something like that), and it's amazing. Linux support is great too
4 days ago
AMD will be very happy when they do. They are already making great cards, currently running an RX7800XT (or something like that), and it's amazing. Linux support is great too
I got an.. AMD (even today I still almost say “ATI” every time) RX6600 XT I think, a couple years ago? It’s been great. I switched over to Linux back in the spring and yes the compatibility has been fine and caused no issues. Still amazed I can run “AAA” games, published by Microsoft even, under Linux.
My very gaming experienced and data oriented 13 year old wants to switch from Nvidia to AMD. I don’t understand all his reasons/numbers but I suppose that’s as good an endorsement as any for AMDs GPUs.
Similar with nvidia, you've got to consider what partner companies AMD likes working with. AMD/nvidia design chips, contract TSMC to make them, then sell the chips to the likes of ASUS/MSI/gigabyte/etc to put them on cards the consumer buys. The other market AMD serves is Sony/MS for their consoles and I'd argue they're a major motivator driving radeon development as they pay up-front to get custom APU chips, and there's synergy there with Zen and more recently the AI demand. Ever since ATi bought up the company (ArtX) that made the Gamecube GPU it seems to me that the PC side is keeping the motor running in-between console contracts as far as gaming demands go, given their low market share they definitely don't seem to prioritize or depend on it to thrive.
RX 7900gre, can confirm as much.
Wow, yeah, I picked up one of these a few months before the new generation came out for $350. Everything shot up after that.
My son is using that card, today, and I'm amazed at everything that card can still power. I had a 5080 and just comparing a few games, I found if he used the SuperResolution correctly, he can set the other game settings at the same as mine and his frame-rate isn't far off (things like Fortnite, not Cyberpunk 2077)
There are many caveats there, of course. AMD's biggest problem is in the drivers/implementation for that card. Unlike NVidia's similar technology, it requires setting the game at a lower resolution which it then "fixes" and it tends to produce artifacts depending on the game/how high those settings go. It's a lot harder to juggle the settings between the driver and the game than it should be.
For games that have FSR built-in you can enable it in the game settings, then it'll only scale up the game content while rendering the HUD at native resolution. And can use the better upscaling algorithms that rely on internal game engine data / motion vectors, should reduce artifacts.
The other cool things is they also have Frame Gen available in the driver to apply to any game, unlike DLSS FG which only works on a few games. You can toggle it on in the AMD software just below the Super Res option. I quickly tried it in a few games and it worked great if you're already getting 60+ FPS, no noticeable artifacts. Though going from 30=>60 doesn't work, too many artifacts. And the extra FPS are only visible in the AMD software's FPS counter overlay, not in other FPS counter overlays.
I recently got a Asus Rog Flow Z13 gaming "tablet" with the AMD Strix Halo APU. It has a great CPU + shared RAM + ridiculously powerful iGPU. Doesn't have the brute power of my previous desktop with a 4090, but this thing can handle the same games at 4k with upscaling on high settings (no raytracing), it's shockingly capable for its compact form factor.
AMD will certainly be very happy to raise prices significantly when they have a defacto monopoly over the market segment alright.
If it’s too expensive, I will play on my phone or my macbook instead of a gaming pc. They can’t increase the prices too much.
I keep hearing this and yet history has proved, time and again, that any overly greedy monopolist achieves the reverse effect of monopoly.
Don't get too worried. People still can and do vote with their wallets. Additional vector of attack against greedy capitalists is also the fact that the economy is not doing great either.
They cannot increase prices too much.
I also predict that the DDR5 RAM price hikes will not last until 2027 or even 2028 as many others think. I give it maximum one year, I'd even think the prices will start slightly coming down during summer 2026.
Reading and understanding economy is neat and all but in the modern age some people forget that the total addressable market is not infinite and that the regular customers have relatively tight budgets.
> I keep hearing this and yet history has proved, time and again, that any overly greedy monopolist achieves the reverse effect of monopoly.
this is true in general
but the barrier to entry for gaming GPUs is massive (hundreds of billions)
intel have been working at it for close to a decade and now just about have a workable product, at the low end
1 reply →
Well I certainly hope you're right. The sheer amount of knowhow it takes to produce usable silicon and the relative undersupply seems like a massive problem when the end result with basically the same upfront investment can go for 3k or 30k in different markets.
I'm hoping the Chinese fabs can finally catch up enough to provide a meaningful alternative both for memory and compute. They're more or less the only ones still making consumer grade stuff in lots of other segments, the rest of us just make overpriced low volume products for the highest bidder.