AMD has launched the RX 6500 XT, a $200 graphics card that essentially prices close to $200 in 2022. Erm, if you can come across a person, at the very least. Early signals on the secondhand market clearly show prices closer to $400 because of to the GPU lack, and it looks like AMD produced as well a lot of concessions with this release to get paid a location between the very best 1080p graphics playing cards.
Hardware Unboxed calls it the worst graphics card release in two decades, and Linus Tech Tips claims it’s a GPU for the desperate. I’m even now waiting around on a sample for my own testing, but the benchmarks that are out now paint a crystal clear photograph: The RX 6500 XT doesn’t glance like a great graphics card.
There are a number of motives why, which I’ll dig into at the bottom of this posting. For now, all you will need to know is that the RX 6500 XT is generally outclassed by graphics playing cards that are a number of many years old, and even at inflated secondhand charges, people playing cards must give better attributes and efficiency. Right here are a few overpriced graphics cards you ought to obtain rather of the RX 6500 XT.
AMD RX 5500 XT 4GB
Of course, the last-gen variation of the RX 6500 XT is a greater option, even at its inflated price ranges. This card released in 2019 for just beneath $200, and you can come across secondhand products on eBay for all around $200 to $250. That is for the 4GB design, which is continue to greater than the RX 6500 XT. The 8GB product is much more high-priced and performs improved, clocking in all around $300 on the secondhand current market.
It appears like the RX 5500 XT performs about as nicely was the RX 6500 XT, buying and selling blows up or down by a number of frames relying on the video game. The issue with the RX 6500 XT is bandwidth, so even though it should really theoretically carry out superior than the RX 5500 XT, it does not show up to in follow.
You are supplying up hardware-accelerated ray tracing by likely with the more mature card, but none of AMD’s recent-gen playing cards are great with ray tracing anyway. It is extra costly, technically, although I consider the RX 5500 XT will provide for less when the original stock of RX 6500 XT has created its way into the hands of scalpers.
Nvidia GTX 1070
If you want a pure efficiency enjoy, the Nvidia GTX 1070 is for you. The card launched in 2016 for about $400, and in 2022, you can obtain secondhand choices involving $300 and $400. That is not horrible supplied how inflated selling prices are appropriate now, even for a graphics card that is five several years previous.
You are searching at anywhere from a 20% to 50% effectiveness advancement above the RX 6500 XT depending on the video game. In addition to a efficiency uplift, the GTX 1070 features twice the amount of video clip memory for much more powerful workloads. It doesn’t have ray tracing or Nvidia’s Deep Understanding Super Sampling (DLSS), but people are not too essential when stacked versus the RX 6500 XT.
AMD RX 580
The poster kid of funds graphics cards, the RX 580 is a improved offer than the RX 6500 XT, even at massively inflated selling prices. On eBay, you can get an RX 580 for all over $300, which is a fantastic offer as opposed to the RX 6500 XT. The card released in 2017 for around $250.
Primarily based on early assessments, some video games favor one card about the other, but on ordinary, the RX 580 and RX 6500 XT are near. If anything at all, it looks like the RX 580 has a slight edge.
It is essential to retain in intellect how well-liked the RX 580 was as a mining graphics card, although. There are a ton of options on the secondhand market, but be thorough to stick with reliable sellers.
Why the RX 6500 XT is a terrible invest in
It’s 1 matter that the RX 6500 XT is disappointing, but that does not commonly justify recommending graphics playing cards that are several years aged and only offer you similar efficiency. In most circumstances, it is much better to buy a finances graphics card from the final pair of generations than it is to buy a high-conclude card from several generations again.
The RX 6500 XT is an exception. The very first and key situation is bandwidth. The RX 6500 XT makes use of PCIe 4. x4, indicating it will take up 4 PCIe 4. lanes. Which is fine if you’re utilizing an Intel 12th-gen or AMD Ryzen 5000 processor, equally of which assist PCIe 4.. If you are on anything older — and let’s be honest, this card is not qualified at gamers with the most current technology of processors — you’re locked to PCIe 3..
Which is PCIe 3. x4. Most graphics cards use an x16 slot, and even final-gen’s RX 5500 XT utilized an x8 interface. Early assessments demonstrate that makes a major change. The PCIe 3. x4 interface handicaps the card, at times by a sizeable margin, main to reduce performance on older platforms simply just for the reason that of bandwidth limitations.
The memory works into all those constraints, also. The RX 6500 XT only has 4GB of video memory, which is not terrible on its individual. Even so, that memory is squeezed via a 64-bit memory bus, which is half of the dimension of the RX 5500 XT. The outcome is much lessen memory bandwidth, which will cause stuttering when you first load online games as the belongings are streamed into memory.
Then there is the silent killer: Encoding and decoding. The RX 6500 XT doesn’t assistance AV1 decode or HEVC encode. AV1 is a newer characteristic, and none of the GPUs earlier mentioned aid it, so AMD will get a go below.
The deficiency of HEVC encode is a big challenge, though. This has been a standard feature on graphics cards for quite a few generations now, and it’s obtainable on all of the playing cards earlier mentioned. If you want to do any encoding with the RX 6500 XT, you’re out of luck. Streaming? Forget about about it. Online video enhancing? Only in your goals. This is a gaming-only graphics card that hardly manages gaming from the looks of it.
Editors’ Suggestions
