The AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT Review, Feat. Sapphire Pulse: Navi For 1080p
by Ryan Smith on December 12, 2019 9:00 AM ESTClosing Thoughts
While the launch of the Radeon RX 5700 series and the underlying Navi 10 GPU was not a slam dunk for AMD’s GPU division, it was none the less an important achievement. The combination of the new RDNA core architecture as well as TSMC’s 7nm process gave AMD a significant kick in both performance efficiency and power efficiency. And in the process, it set a template for all the Radeon RX 5000 series cards to follow.
So it shouldn’t be too surprising then that the new Radeon RX 5500 XT gets to enjoy much the same situation. Compared to AMD’s previous generation Polaris-based RX 500 series cards, the 1080p-focused RX 5500 XT delivers better performance, and it does so while drawing noticeably less power. Even compared to their NVIDIA rivals, AMD is generally competitive on power efficiency in a class of cards where they were well behind in the previous generation.
Competitive performance, meanwhile, is a bit of a trickier subject. As the replacements to the RX 570/580/590 within AMD’s stack, the RX 5500 XT almost always beats AMD’s older cards, the one odd exception to this being Metro Exodus. As a result, AMD’s cheaper 4GB RX 5500 XT looks especially good here, reaching performance parity with NVIDIA’s recently launched and similarly priced GeForce GTX 1650 Super. As is usually the case, the cards are anything but equal on a game-by-game basis, constantly trading wins and losses, but at the end of the day they’re fighting over the same market with the same performance.
The 8GB RX 5500 XT, on the other hand, faces tougher competition. The extra VRAM helps to boost its performance and its price, putting it in competition with NVIDIA’s somewhat awkwardly placed GTX 1660. The GTX 1660 is an odd man out as the only current-generation GDDR5 card among the contenders, and yet it’s still fast enough to remain several percent ahead of the 8GB RX 5500 XT. To be sure, AMD’s new card puts up a great fight, coming closer to meeting NVIDIA in both performance and power efficiency than any previous AMD card; but at the end of the day it’s not enough to completely close the gap with NVIDIA’s closest competitor. Which is not to say that the RX 5500 XT is entirely outclassed here, but the GTX 1660 leads by just enough that it can’t be entirely ignored.
| Performance Summary (1080p) | ||||
| Relative Performance | Relative Price |
|||
| RX 5500 XT 4GB vs GTX 1650S | 0% | +6% | ||
| RX 5500 XT 8GB vs GTX 1660 | -8% | -5% | ||
| RX 5500 XT 8GB vs RX 580 8GB | +8% | +11% | ||
| RX 5700 vs. RX 5500 XT 8GB | +60% | +60% | ||
Throwing a wrench into all of this however – for both AMD and NVIDIA – is VRAM capacity. VRAM isn’t cheap, and GDDR6 even less so, so both vendors are using VRAM capacity as product differentiators and to upsell their better cards. But as VRAM capacity in the $150-$200 price range has been pretty stagnant for the last couple of years now, I do have some concerns about the long-term implications for the 4GB RX 5500 XT, especially with the next-generation consoles set to launch in a year’s time. With the consoles setting the baseline for most multiplatform games, it’s a reasonable bet that VRAM requirements aren’t going to stay put at 4GB much longer. So while the 4GB RX 5500 XT is a great value now, I suspect it’s going to run out of VRAM well before its compute performance gets to be a bottleneck. And while NVIDIA’s GTX 1660 fares better here with its 6GB of VRAM, 6GB is still not 8GB.
Overall then, the VRAM situation adds an extra wrinkle to any kind of product recommendations, as it’s one more variable that deserves consideration.
At the end of the day, I don’t think any 4GB cards are a great choice right now. For buyers who absolutely cannot afford to spend more than $169, then the 4GB RX 5500 XT or NVIDIA’s GeForce GTX 1650 Super counterpart are both going to be the best choices you can make right now, at least among the current-generation cards. However, spending another $30 to get a better card is going to get you a card with at least 6GB of VRAM and 6% more perforamnce, and that’s going to remain relevant for a lot longer than a 4GB card will in 2020.
Choosing between the 8GB RX 5500 XT and GTX 1660, on the other hand, is a bit harder. AMD has a 2GB VRAM advantage, which is likely to be helpful in the future; but right now they can’t match NVIDIA’s performance or feature advantage. Ultimately I’m not sure there’s a clearly correct answer here – at least, not one that can be backed entirely with hard data. In the meantime however, as the second to market it's up to AMD to make a convincing showing if they want to dislodge NVIDIA's existing GTX 1660.
As for Sapphire’s Pulse RX 5500 XT in particular, it’s hard to envision a better card to show off the Radeon RX 5500 XT. If you can look past the card’s somewhat ridiculous size for its class, the product as a whole is just about everything you could want out of a reference clocked card. The build quality is solid, the included TriXX software is handy, and the acoustics are incredible. It may not be a silent card, but with two giant fans to push plenty of air with ease, it may just as well be.
And with that, AMD is set to wrap up their GPU lineup for 2019. At only 3 Navi cards in, AMD is far from done in fleshing out a complete, top-to-bottom family of video cards. But for now, AMD is able to hit the mainstream and performance segments, which is a good place to stop for a bit and reflect as we go into the holidays.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
97 Comments
View All Comments
pcgpus - Friday, February 14, 2020 - link
Realy good comparasion of 5500XT and oponents is here:https://warmbit.blogspot.com/2020/01/rx5500xt-vs-g...
Smell This - Thursday, December 12, 2019 - link
{ snicker }
So ...
A cut-down GTX 1660 (TU116 - 284 mm2) with 6GB GDDR5 turns into a GTX 1650 (TU117 - 200 mm2) **Super** TU116 - 284 mm2 with 6GB GDDR6 ??
1) You've been "Played"; and
2) nVidia is going the wrong way.
Good luck with that.
silverblue - Thursday, December 12, 2019 - link
"Compared to AMD’s previous generation Polaris-based RX 500 series cards, the 1080p-focused RX 5500 XT delivers better performance""Competitive performance, meanwhile, is a bit of a trickier subject. As the replacements to the RX 570/580/590 within AMD’s stack, the RX 5500 XT almost always beats AMD’s older cards"
The elephant in the room here is the RX 590, at least in terms of gaming. In most titles, aside of those on page 6 as well as Total War in Ultra at 1080p, there doesn't appear to be enough of a gap between the 580 and 5500 XT to really set the latter apart. If we assume a somewhat standard RX 580 clocked at 1,340MHz/1,411MHz boost, the RX 590 could be 10% faster than this and would most likely beat the 5500 XT in a good number of cases. Additionally, Polaris looks like it has better 99 percentile performance.
drexnx - Thursday, December 12, 2019 - link
the 590 does look like it'll perform better, but it comes at a cost of about 100w more power - for some people this might not be an issue, for others it might be.PeachNCream - Thursday, December 12, 2019 - link
If you're building a new PC from scratch or have a lower wattage PSU in a system that is potentially getting an upgrade and the choise is between the RX 590 and the 5500 XT, the additional money spent on power delivery may tilt the cost versus benefit situation in favor of the 5500 XT. That 100W difference is significant enough to possibly cause that sort of problem.silverblue - Thursday, December 12, 2019 - link
Agreed with both of you.RSAUser - Friday, December 13, 2019 - link
Wattage isn't really an issue, a normal 450W will support the entire system. I'd still take the lower wattage part as less heat in the case so less fan spin.FreckledTrout - Friday, December 13, 2019 - link
A typical white box 300 watt PSU though and then you are left with one choice.HarryVoyager - Thursday, December 12, 2019 - link
Honestly, right now the real elephant are the used 580 8gb cards currently flooding the market. At $100, they're about equivalent to the 5500 XT, and have the 8Gb video memory the author is worried about. At this performance range, it's very hard to recommend someone spend 70-100+ more for pretty much the same real performance.The 5500 XT replaces the 580 at the low end, but doesn't really offer much that seems compelling over it.
I am hoping, however, that AMD can flesh out their competition next year with the Navi 2 cards. I'm seeing this as more of a Zen 1 launch. They're back in the game, and have a competitive foundation, and now they need to get it up to fighting trim.
Kangal - Friday, December 20, 2019 - link
Agreed.I'm excited about RDNA, but not completely sold on the new cards. I think the product lineup is what's most disappointing. For instance, if I wanted a Low Profile card, then I would have to go with Nvidia. If I wanted top performance, again Nvidia. And if I wanted mid-high segment, well Nvidia's New-Super range is quite competitive and then there's the older high-end Pascal cards. And if I wanted a low-mid segment, well now it's competing again with Nvidia's Super cards, older midrange Pascal cards, and now even older AMD Polaris cards.
The product line is very important, as well as marketing/sales, and these are both things that Nvidia absolutely gets right and dominates. After a decent 5 years, the new AMD is adapting, but they're not quite there yet. For instance, remember the launch of Pascal? Nvidia launched a high-end and a slight cut-down version, shortly after they released their mid-range version, then their low-power variants. After a year, they introduced their highest-end version, and make slight tweaks to improve the performance and efficiency of the entire product line. If AMD was able to imitate that, they would've released the RX 5800, and cut-down RX 5700. Then a month later it would be the RX 5600 and RX 5500. Then another month later it would be the RX 5400 (Low Profile) release. Then six months later all the cards would've gotten a slight refresh, maybe tag the "T" suffix at the end. And they would've also released the RX 5900T as their highest-end product.
So do NOT I see RDNA like Zen 1 at all, that was market disruptive, and it forced Intel to compete. Whilst Zen 1.1 put Intel on the backfoot. Eventually Zen 2 annihilated them. If anything, the RX 480 was Zen 1, it kept/forced Nvidia to be competitive with their GTX 1060 cards. The RX 5500XT is basically Zen 1.1, but it's still trying to keep up against Nvidia. For a Zen2-like scenario, AMD's next card needs to cost less, AND, perform much faster, AND, use less power.
I don't see that happening, as Nvidia improves their: architecture, drivers, ray-tracing, and moves unto the 7nm node. So when that happens, AMD is going to be on the backfoot again like they have been for a long time. For AMD to remain competitive they really need to release RDNA2 sooner rather than later, and have the entire product line ready to sell. Let's stay optimistic, and assume that is going to happen with more R&D thanks to the extra revenue AMD receives from: consoles, CPU, servers, and stock market : )