Graphics Cards - Page 213

AMD has released their new Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition 17.5.2 drivers, something that includes some performance optimizations for Prey - with up to 4.5% additional performance on the Radeon RX 580 versus the previous 17.5.1 drivers.

The new drivers also fix the random hanging or application crash with NieR: Automata, and the long map and loading times for Forza Horizon 3. AMD also poliished up the sleep/hibernation modes on the Radeon RX 550 series too.

You can grab the Radeon Software Crimson ReLive 17.5.2 drivers right here.

AMD hosted a Reddit AMA earlier today, with Senior Vice President and Chief Architect of RTG Raja Koduri talking to the Radeon fanbase about all things Radeon Vega Frontier Edition, as well as some new details on the consumer Radeon RX Vega graphics cards. We also now know that AMD will detail Radeon RX Vega at its Computex 2017 press conference on May 31, and we will be sitting front and center for it.

First off, the most important part is that Raja will not be shaving his beard until Radeon RX Vega launches, which is music to my ears - Raja's looks like a boss with his beard.

For his introduction, Raja said:

We are so close, so very close - 12 more days until we get the skinny on Radeon RX Vega. AMD confirmed the news through Raja Koduri's Reddit AMA on Radeon Vega Frontier Edition, that AMD will be showcasing Radeon RX Vega at Computex on May 31.

During the AMA, Koduri said: "We'll be showing Radeon RX Vega off at Computex, but it won't be on store shelves that week. We know how eager you are to get your hands-on Radeon RX Vega, and we're working extremely hard to bring you a graphics card that you'll be incredibly proud to own. Developing products with billions of transistors and forward-thinking architecture is extremely difficult - but extremely rewarding - work. [...] We're working as hard as we can to bring you Radeon RX Vega".

Koduri added: "On HBM2, we're effectively putting a technology that's been limited to super expensive, out-of-reach GPUs into a consumer product. Right now only insanely priced graphics cards from our competitors that aren't within reach of any gamer or consumer make use of it. We want to bring all of that goodness to you. And that's not easy! It's not like you can run down to the corner store to get HBM2. The good news is that unlike HBM1, HBM2 is offered from multiple memory vendors - including Samsung and Hynix - and production is ramping to meet the level of demand that we believe Radeon Vega products will see in the market".

AMD will be hosting a Reddit AMA today at 2-3PM PST, where they will talk about all things Radeon Vega Frontier Edition.

This isn't an AMA on Radeon RX Vega, the consumer graphics card based on the Vega architecture, but instead the professional graphics card based on Vega - which fights Tesla/Quadro and Titan X from NVIDIA. Senior VR and Chief Architect at Radeon Technologies Group, Raja Koduri, will be hosting the AMA.

AMD detailed its upcoming Vega GPU architecture during its recent Financial Analyst Day, announcing their new Radeon Vega Frontier Edition graphics card, a new ThreadRipper 16C/32T processor, and the beast 32C/64T chip with Epyc.

But for the gamers, I think that the tease of HBCC (High Bandwidth Cache Controller) running on Rise of the Tomb Raider and seeing HBCC disabled and what I'm sure is the Radeon RX Vega running the game at 4K at 57.9FPS average, with 13.7FPS minimum. This puts the RX Vega at the speeds of the GTX 1080 11Gbps, but when HBCC is enabled - holy crap, there is a huge change.

AMD's upcoming Radeon RX Vega with HBCC enabled was running ROTT at 76FPS average (up from 57.9FPS without HBCC) but it's the minimum FPS that is where the magic happens: 49.1FPS with HBCC enabled, up from the 13.7FPS without HBCC. This is amazing, especially for enthusiast gamers like myself who want much better minimum FPS performance than brute force maximum FPS.

We've been reporting about GDDR6 technology for a while now, but SK Hynix detailed its upcoming memory technology in their recent memory catalog, with GDDR6 scheduled for Q4 2017.

SK Hynix confirms two different variants of GDDR6, with both offerings being 8Gb (1GB) modules with different frequencies: 12Gbps and 14Gbps. Both modules will use 1.35V.

I've got some details on what memory bandwidth numbers to expect, which is exciting:

AMD has just made its Radeon RX 560 graphics card official, powered by the Polaris 21 GPU and its 1024 stream processors, 64 TMUs, 16 ROPs, and 2GB/4GB configurations.

AMD has the base/boost GPU clocks at 1175/1275MHz, respectively, while the 2GB or 4GB of GDDR5 is clocked at 7Gbps on a 128-bit memory bus, and 80W TDP. Comparing this to the Polaris 11-based Radeon RX 460, with its 896 stream processors, 48 TMUs, and same 16 ROPs.

The Radeon RX 460 had its GPU clocks at 1090/1200MHz, and the same 7Gbps GDDR5 on the 128-bit memory bus and 75W TDP.

AMD has unleashed a bunch of new products today at their Financial Analyst Day, with a tease of ThreadRipper with 16C/32T, their new Naples platform and the Epyc CPU with 32C/64T, and the exciting new Radeon Vega Frontier Edition graphics card.

AMD also detailed their GPU roadmap through to 2020, with Vega arriving on 14nm - but a 14nm+ respin that I think we'll see in early 2018. The bigger tease is Navi on 7nm for 2018-2019, and a brief glimpse of 'Next Gen' sometime in 2019-2020.

AMD just announced its new Radeon Vega Frontier Edition graphics card, with 4096 stream processors, 16GB of HBM2 and 480GB/sec of memory bandwidth with an estimated 12.5 TFLOPs of single precision compute performance - enough to beat the new NVIDIA TITAN Xp graphics card and its 12 TFLOPs.

AMD also announced a watercooled version of its professional Radeon Vega Frontier Edition, and its goooooold in color, too. AMD requires 8+8-pin PCIe power connectors, but other than that, we have no idea what to expect in terms of performance/clock differences between the air-cooled and watercooled Radeon Vega Frontier Edition graphics cards. More to come as it happens.

AMD has announced its new Radeon Vega Frontier Edition graphics card, which isn't part of the consumer graphics card family, but instead the Radeon Pro line.

Radeon Vega Frontier Edition rocks 16GB of next-gen HBM2 memory, an estimated 12.5 TFLOPs of performance (NVIDIA's new TITAN Xp has 12 TFLOPs) of single precision compute performance, while we have the Vega GPU clocked at 1586MHz.

AMD detailed its Radeon Vega Frontier Edition specs with 64 next-gen compute units (nCU - 4096 stream processors), 12.5 TFLOPs of single precision compute performance (FP32), 25 TFLOPs of single precision compute (FP16), 16GB of HBM2 alongside HBC, and 8K display support.

Radeon Technologies Group boss Raja Koduri has posted something a little cryptic on his Twitter account, where he tweeted a tease on Radeon RX Vega just over 20 minutes ago.

Koduri tweeted: "Ok..complete the sentence..we stand today on the edge of a ...... (first 10 people who get this right will get something special) @radeon". I was the first to answer, saying "new frontier" by JFK, and plenty of others followed with the same answer.

He had a follow up tweet that read "Bonus points to those who can cite the author and my favorite science and space section", so I don't know if that's another tease of the space-themed Vega architecture. AMD using a political giant like JFK for their Radeon RX Vega graphics card pre-launch marketing ramp up is interesting, as it continues their award-winning 'The Uprising' marketing campaign based around politics.

SK Hynix has released its new Q2 2017 product databook, and inside we get some more details on their current and next-gen graphics memory products, with the company listing 12Gbps and 14Gbps modules of GDDR6, as well as 1.6Gbps HBM2 memory.

AMD's upcoming Radeon RX Vega is powered by HBM2 memory provided by SK Hynix, while NVIDIA is tapping Samsung made HBM2 memory. Radeon RX Vega should rock SK Hynix's current 1.6Gbps HBM2 that would provide up to 409.6GB/sec of memory, unless AMD were to use more HBM2 stacks, then the bandwidth and HBM2 would double. The memory bandwidth would reach a pretty damn high peak of 817GB/sec, easily beating out any graphics card in its path - and getting close to NVIDIA's new HBM2-based Tesla V100 and its memory bandwidth numbers of 900GB/sec.

Remember that AMD also has its HBCC (High Bandwidth Cache Controller) working alongside the Vega NCU, which will be able to greatly improve minimum FPS performance, and has up to 512TB of virtual address space - insanity.

UploadVR is in some serious trouble with the SF-based VR startup being sued by a former employee who alleges the company engaged in sexual discrimination and sex/gender harassment.

TechCrunch reports that the lawsuit was filed today with the Superior Court of California, claiming that UploadVR is plagued by "rampant sexual behavior and focus, creating an unbearable environment for Plaintiff and other female employees". The suit continues, adding: "Defendants purposefully and expressly created a 'boy's club' environment at work, focused on sex and degrading women, including female employees".

UploadVR co-founders Will Mason and Taylor Freeman "would frequently talk about much sex they were going to have at each party and how many girls they were going to have sex with". It gets worse, as the VR startup reportedly has a "kink room" that has a bed in its office, where people can have sex during parties - and I guess, whenever the hell they feel like it.

Some more information on next-gen graphics cards has arrived thanks to a press release from SK Hynix about their new HBM2 tech, with SK Hynix also shipping GDDR6 memory in Q1 2018.

SK Hynix was also at NVIDIA's recent GPU Technology Conference showing off their 8Gb GDDR6 module with 16Gbps of bandwidth, up from the 11Gbps of bandwidth available on the fastest GDDR5X on GTX 1080 Ti. GDDR6 is listed as a Q4 2017 product, meaning it will enter mass production in Q4 2017 for a huge Volta launch in Q1 2018 - at least according to WCCFTech.

I think we'll see a Pascal refresh based on GDDR6 at first, and then a full Volta line up with a blend of GDDR6 and HBM2 technologies - GDDR6 for the GTX 2080/2070, and HBM2 for the Volta-based TITAN Xv, and what I'm hoping for: a dual-GPU Volta graphics card.

AMD is in the headlines all over the place right now, with our tease of the Radeon RX Vega Nova/Eclipse/Core graphics card, and now a new report on Vega with 16GB of HBM2 and a 1600MHz GPU clock.

VideoCardz does note that they don't know if this part of the Radeon RX Vega family, as it could be a new dual-GPU graphics card in the Radeon Pro or Radeon Pro Duo series. AMD has confirmed it will have two stack HBM2 for Radeon RX Vega, but it could be in 8GB form (2 x 4GB) or a 16GB card (2 x 8GB).

Inside of the new CompuBench result, we have the maximum GPU clock of 1600MHz with 64 compute units (CUs), and what should hopefully be 4096 stream processors.

This is the hottest rumor that I've read about AMD's upcoming Radeon RX Vega graphics card, so I'll preface it with a this is a hot rumor and could be totally #fakenews so take it with a salt factory in your possession.

The latest rumor names the three different Radeon RX Vega graphics cards: RX Vega Nova, RX Vega Eclipse, and RX Vega Core. Radeon RX Vega Nova will be the GTX 1080 Ti competitor priced at $599, while the RX Vega Eclipse will handle the GTX 1080 at $499. AMD will reportedly price its Radeon RX Vega Core at $399, and will be capable of GTX 1070/1080 performance.

Remember that this is just a rumor, from a site that is providing its own sources from "very reliable sources within AMD's headquarters", which I'm very doubtful of. Anyway, the naming scheme is what I'm looking at - and if Nova, Eclipse and Core are what AMD use for their Radeon RX Vega family - I'm happy with that.

NVIDIA CEO and founder Jen-Hsun Huang has compared GeForce graphics cards to consoles in a recent post-earnings investor Q&A, when he was probed on a question regarding NVIDIA seeing the numbers of gamers and GeForce products growing, and whether they could continue to push out premium products.

Huang replied with: "The average selling price of the NVIDIA GeForce is about a third of a game console. That's the way to think about it. That's the simple math. People are willing to spend $200, $300, $400, $500 for a new game console, and the NVIDIA GeForce GPU PC gaming card is on average far less".

He continued: "There are people who just absolutely demand the best. And the reason for that is because they're driving a monitor or they're driving multiple monitors at a refresh rate well beyond a TV. So if you have a 4K or you want 120 hertz or some people are even driving it to 200 hertz, those kind of displays demand a lot more horsepower to drive than an average television, whether it's 1080p or 4K at 60 frames a second or 30 frames a second. And so the amount of horsepower they need is great. But that's just because they just really love their rig, and they're surrounded in it, and they just want the best. But the way to think about that is ultimately that's the opportunity for us. I think GeForce is a game console. And the right way to think about that is at an equivalent ASP of some $200 - $300, that's probably potentially an opportunity ahead for GeForce".

Before the company has released a product, or even shown the general public details on what they'll eventually release in what should be the most amazing leap forward in mixed reality HMD technology, Magic Leap is worth up to $8 billion.

The news is coming from an upcoming D round of financing that will see the Florida-based mixed reality company valued at $6-8 billion. Chinese e-commerce behemoth Alibaba will lead the D round of financing, with some of the largest companies in the world leaping into the mixed reality investment of Magic Leap. It was only 15 months ago that the company raised $793.5 million on a $4.5 billion valuation, adding to the $592 million it had raised earlier.

There have only been a few people outside of the company and its investors and closest partners that have tried the mixed reality tech from Magic Leap, and if you look into the nitty gritty of the next level technology the company is working on, you'll understand why Magic Leap is so secretive. They're wanting to be "the Apple of AR" and with what they're working on, and the billions of dollars they're raising and the talent and help they've got behind them, Magic Leap could very well be a household name in a few years time.

Computex 2017 - AMD is already locking in May 31 for its Computex 2017 press conference, with VideoCardz reporting that AMD are sending out emails for their event.

The email reads: "Computex 2017 is fast approaching so we wanted to share a save-the-date for the AMD press conference, scheduled for May 31st from 10 a.m. - 11 a.m". It continues: "Hosted by AMD CEO, Dr. Lisa Su and other key AMD executives, you will have the opportunity to hear more about the latest products and leading-edge technologies coming from AMD in 2017. The past year has seen AMD bringing innovation and competition back to the high-performance desktop market with the release of Ryzen™ processors and we look forward to providing new details on 2017 products and the ecosystems, both OEM and channel, that will support them".

It looks like we're only weeks from something big being unveiled, and I'm sure we'll hear how well Ryzen has been doing for AMD in the last few months - but it's the "latest products and leading-edge technologies coming from AMD in 2017" that I want to hear more about.

NVIDIA's latest version of GeForce Experience now has built-in support for gameplay recording through ShadowPlay for Vulkan and OpenGL-based games.

Until now, ShadowPlay only worked with DirectX-based games, but now GFE is opening its doors to new APIs. The updated version of GFE also features improved user controls for broadcast, gallery, and upload.

NVIDIA's official news post states: "In other words, you can now stream and record your Minecraft and Doom gameplay with the press of one hotkey, and use the built-in overlay to easily share to Facebook, Google, Twitch, and more. It's powered by our acclaimed ShadowPlay technology, so you can capture up to 4K 60 FPS and never miss a beat while you game".