AMD’s Radeon RX 9070 Series Takes on Nvidia’s RTX 5070 in Mid-Range GPU Battle
AMD has officially unveiled its highly anticipated Radeon RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT graphics cards, setting the stage for a fierce competition in the mid-range GPU market against Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 5070 and RTX 5070 Ti, respectively. Gamers eager to see how these new cards perform won’t have to wait long, as both are slated to launch on March 6th through various OEMs.
AMD is betting big on the mid-range market, a segment they believe resonates most with gamers who aspire to play their favorite titles at a stunning 4K resolution. A key highlight of this launch is the aggressive pricing strategy. The RX 9070 is priced at $550, matching the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070. Meanwhile, the RX 9070 XT boasts a $600 price tag, significantly undercutting Nvidia’s RTX 5070 Ti by a substantial $150. This price difference could be a major draw for budget-conscious gamers seeking high-performance experiences without breaking the bank.
Interestingly, AMD has opted to skip the RX 8000 series nomenclature. This decision appears to be a strategic move to align the GPU naming convention with their latest Ryzen 9 series CPUs. However, it’s crucial to understand that this doesn’t necessarily translate to a two-generation leap in technological advancement. The RX 9070 series is engineered with 4K and 1440p gaming in mind, specifically targeting the demands of modern, graphically intensive games.
Delving into the specifications, the RX 9070 features 56 RDNA 4 compute units. It also has 16 GB of GDDR6 VRAM clocked at 20 Gbps, running on a 256-bit memory bus. The card boasts an impressive boost clock of 2.54 GHz. The RX 9070 XT steps up the game with 64 compute units, enhanced AI accelerators, and a higher boost clock of 2.97 GHz. Importantly, the higher-end model retains the 16 GB VRAM capacity, matching the configuration of Nvidia’s RTX 5070 Ti.
AMD is making bold claims about its performance capabilities. They assert that the RX 9070 XT can achieve native framerates at or above those offered by the RTX 5070 Ti at 4K resolution. However, the true picture will only emerge after rigorous testing and comparisons of AMD’s and Nvidia’s respective upscaling technologies. The $600 price point of the RX 9070 XT looks particularly attractive, especially considering the current supply chain challenges and price volatility surrounding the RTX 50-series.
The RX 9070 incorporates 53.9 billion transistors, a figure closely aligned with the RX 7900 XT’s 55.8 billion. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s famous proclamation that "Moore’s law is dead" is certainly relevant here. The fact that the 7900 XT, launched in 2022, contained 84 RDNA 3 compute units suggests that AMD is focusing on efficiency and architectural improvements. Each RDNA 4 compute unit is designed to support higher clock speeds compared to its RDNA 3 predecessor. Moreover, AMD claims that these new GPUs are more power efficient than previous or current generation cards. This means they should deliver superior performance compared to the RX 7900 series, despite having fewer total compute units.
The RX 9070 has a board power demand of 220W, lower than the RTX 5070’s 250W. The RX 9070 XT requires 304W of total board power, slightly more than the RTX 5070 Ti’s 300W. Despite these differences in power consumption, both AMD cards recommend similar power supply units (PSUs) as their Nvidia counterparts. The RX 9070 recommends a 650W PSU, while the 9070 XT suggests a 750W power supply.
The RDNA 4 architecture introduces a redesigned structure with an additional computing unit specifically tailored for ray tracing. According to AMD, this compute unit is 40% faster than the one found in RDNA 3. Additionally, they promise a two-fold increase in ray tracing performance per compute unit compared to the previous generation architecture. This improvement is attributed to a reconfigured and optimized ray tracing pipeline. The new architecture also supports PCIe Gen 5, HDMI 2.1b, and DisplayPort 2.1a.
AMD is also emphasizing the advancements in its second-generation AI accelerators. The RX 9070 is expected to achieve a peak of 1,165 TOPS of AI performance, while the RX 9070 XT is projected to reach 1,557 TOPS.
Beyond the AI capabilities, AMD believes that many gamers are looking to upgrade from older GPUs like the RX 6800 XT or the Nvidia RTX 3080 and RTX 3090. In terms of generation-on-generation performance improvements, AMD claims a 33% performance boost in Cyberpunk 2077 at 1440p with ray tracing enabled on the RX 9070, compared to last year’s RX 7900 GRE. The RX 9070 XT is expected to deliver over 66% better performance in the same game at 4K ultra-performance settings compared to the RX 7900 GRE. While the frame rate increases might be less dramatic in games like F1 24 or Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2, there is still a significant uplift in native gaming performance.
AMD strategically revealed the final pricing of the RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT during its full announcement, recognizing that pricing is a critical factor for most gamers. The current market is challenging, and Nvidia’s recent availability issues with the RTX 50-series have made consumers apprehensive about upgrade costs. AMD has stated it is working closely with its AIB partners to ensure sufficient stock availability at launch, but only time will tell if these efforts are successful.
AMD aims to differentiate itself by not competing in the ultra-expensive, high-end GPU market segment dominated by Nvidia. Instead, they are focusing on mid-range GPUs that are more accessible to a wider range of gamers. However, it’s important to note that these cards are still not "cheap."
While AMD has concentrated on producing cards priced under $700, Nvidia maintains an advantage in gaming software. AMD is banking on the idea that more gamers would prefer to save money (and be able to actually purchase a card) rather than relying on features like multi-frame generation. However, AMD is actively promoting the improvements in its next generation of FSR, which is designed to deliver better framerates.
AMD’s FidelityFX Super Resolution 4 (FSR 4) for the RDNA 4 architecture aims to improve upscaling technology. It will compete with Nvidia’s DLSS 4 by addressing common issues such as ghosting and anti-aliasing artifacts. Like previous versions, FSR 4 takes a lower-resolution image and upscales it to a higher resolution, while maintaining the performance of the lower-resolution image. AMD claims that FSR 4 can create "near-native results" for its supported games on the Radeon RX 9070 and 9070 XT.
The effectiveness of these claims will be scrutinized by gamers eager to identify any imperfections in non-native frames, especially when frame generation is involved. AMD compared native 4K rendering to FSR 3.1 and FSR 4, claiming that the latter provides visuals that are closer to native resolution, with better detail in fine lines and distant objects. In terms of performance, AMD showcased a greater FPS uplift on the 9070 XT in games like Warhammer 40K: Space Marine II, increasing from 53 FPS to 102 FPS at 4K. Frame increases were slightly lower in games like Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered. All of these results are before the implementation of frame generation. AMD has indicated that they have worked on prototypes for multi-frame generation, but are mainly using them for benchmarking purposes rather than focusing on improving the user experience.
Ultimately, upscaling is a valuable asset for gamers who cannot afford a $2,000 RTX 5090. The key question will be how FSR 4 compares to DLSS 4. AMD is also introducing a new AMF 2.1 model to smooth out generated frames. Nvidia has heavily promoted the transformer model used in DLSS. AMD’s widening software gap is particularly evident in features like 3x or 4x multi-frame generation, which are exclusive to the RTX 50 series GPUs. While generating more frames using AI can introduce artifacts, the extra frames might be worth the drawbacks for budget-conscious gamers looking at mid-range GPUs.
AMD plans to support more than 30 games with FSR 4 at launch, including recent titles like Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and Kingdom Come Deliverance II. The chipmaker aims to have over 75 games supporting the technology by 2025. FSR 4 will be exclusive to RDNA 4, while AMD promises ongoing support for FSR 3.1 with more games being added throughout the year.
