AMD confirms: yo guys, yeah, Radeon RX 7900 XTX is a GeForce RTX 4080 competitor

AMD's next-gen Radeon RX 7900 series graphics cards are now official, with the Radeon RX 7900 XTX and Radeon RX 7900 XT both dropping on December 13... but now we're hearing a little more about where the Radeon RX 7900 XTX lines up against its competitor.

NVIDIA unleashed its GeForce RTX 4090 with the biggest generational leap ever, absolutely demolishing the GeForce RTX 3090 (and GeForce RTX 3090 Ti) with most people expecting AMD's new chiplet-based Navi 31-powered Radeon RX 7900 XTX would topple it.

But it won't, and AMD has confirmed that.

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AMD has said that its new Radeon RX 7900 XTX graphics card, based on the Navi 31 GPU and packing 24GB of GDDR6 memory is NOT competing against the GeForce RTX 4090, but rather the upcoming GeForce RTX 4080 graphics card. Ex-Alienware CEO and now Chief Architect of Gaming Solutions & Marketing at AMD, Frank Azor, confirmed the news during the RDNA 3 reveal event in Las Vegas.

• Read more: AMD announces FSR 3 tech, dropping into Unreal Engine 5 in 2023
• Read more: AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX announced: Navi 31 GPU, 24GB GDDR6, costs $999
• Read more: AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT announced: Navi 31 GPU, 20GB GDDR6, costs $899

Frank said that the new Radeon RX 7900 XTX is designed to go against the GeForce RTX 4080 and that they don't have the benchmark numbers for the GeForce RTX 4080. Frank explains that that's the "primary reason" why there weren't any NVIDIA GeForce RTX series GPUs (at all) in the charts to compare against AMD's new Radeon RX 7900 series graphics cards.

Frank did make some great points, saying that AMD's new Radeon RX 7900 XTX is a $999 card so it's NOT a GeForce RTX 4090 competitor... which costs 60% more at $1599+ (try living overseas, where in Australia it's $3500+ AUD). Frank reiterated, saying that (being the Radeon RX 7900 XTX) "this is a 4080 competitor".

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Just to bring you up to speed: NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX 4080 will have 16GB of GDDR6X memory and will have pricing starting at $1199... $500 less than the GeForce RTX 4090. But, interestingly... AMD will have more VRAM on its $899 graphics card in the Radeon RX 7900 XT (20GB GDDR6) and the same VRAM as the GeForce RTX 4090 with its $999 graphics card in the Radeon RX 7900 XTX (24GB GDDR6).

Frank Azor said in full to PC World: "[Radeon RX 7900 XTX] is designed to go against 4080 and we don't have benchmarks numbers on 4080. That's the primary reason why you didn't see any NVIDIA compares. [...] $999 card is not a 4090 competitor, which costs 60% more, this is a 4080 competitor".

Frank on AMD's upcoming FSR 3 technology: "[AMD FSR3] is not a reaction or a quick thing [to DLSS3], it is absolutely something we have been working on for a while. Why is it taking a little bit longer for it come out, that you'd probably hoped for? The key thing to remember about FSR is the FSR philosophy and FSR until now did not just work on RDNA2 or RDNA1 they work on other generations of AMD graphics cards. They also work on competitors graphics cards. It is exponentioally harder than if we just made it work on RDNA3. [...] We really do want to work on more than just RDNA3".