AMD Radeon RX 6600 review: Finally, a true 1080p graphics card

It’s lastly occurred. Well over a 12 months after this generation of graphics cards kicked off, AMD is releasing the primary true 1080p GPU of the lot with the Radeon RX 6600, which is being each introduced and launched right now.

Sure, the step-up Radeon RX 6600 XT ostensibly targets high-refresh charge 1080p gaming, nevertheless it’s massively overkill for gaming on a regular 60Hz monitor. And the rival GeForce RTX 3060 doesn’t provide sufficient GPU grunt for no-compromises 1440p, however Nvidia ladened it with a daft 12GB of VRAM, which contributes to its sky-high road value.

The Radeon RX 6600 presents superb Ultra-quality 1080p gaming paired with 8GB of GDDR6 reminiscence, a remarkably sane mixture. Its $329 instructed value may elevate an eyebrow at first blush; that matches the MSRP of the RTX 3060, and AMD’s card is each slower and packs 4GB much less VRAM. But you’ll discover the RTX 3060 going for $675 to $850 on Ebay, method above its official $330 MSRP. In truth, the Radeon RX 6600 XT sells for lower than the RTX 3060 on-line regardless of being quicker throughout the board—you could find it for $575 to $675 on Ebay.

Still, count on the Radeon RX 6600 to command a markup on the streets. But given all these pricing intricacies and the ongoing GPU shortage, AMD’s road value feels cheap for the {hardware} on provide—even when being pressured to pay effectively over $300 for nice 1080p efficiency stays very unreasonable until you have got deep pockets or little endurance.

Radeon RX 6600 specs, options, and design

The Radeon RX 6600 sports activities a cut-down model of the “Navi 23” GPU that debuted within the Radeon RX 6600 XT.

The new GPU options 28 compute items, in comparison with 32 within the Radeon RX 6600 XT (and 36 in last-generation’s Radeon RX 5600 XT). More considerably, AMD neutered this lower-end GPU by drastically lowering the quantity of energy supplied—132 watts, versus 160W within the XT mannequin—and cranking again Game Clock speeds by a whopping 300MHz plus. The Radeon RX 6600 is rated for 2044MHz Game Clock speeds, in comparison with 2359MHz within the 6600 XT. That, paired with key enhancements in how AMD made its RDNA 2 architecture, makes the Radeon RX 6600 very energy environment friendly.

Part of that energy effectivity comes from its distinctive reminiscence configuration. Well, not completely distinctive—the Radeon RX 6600 copies the reminiscence loadout of its pricier XT brethren. Here’s what we stated in regards to the reminiscence throughout that evaluation, which additionally applies to this non-XT mannequin:

Part of the rationale AMD’s new playing cards are so energy environment friendly is the addition of “Infinity Cache,” a big blob of L3 reminiscence embedded proper throughout the GPU die. Games faucet into it for lots of reminiscence duties, which implies the GPU doesn’t must ship requests “all” the way in which out to the graphics card’s GDDR6 reminiscence. That in flip lets AMD construct Radeon RX 6000-series GPUs with smaller reminiscence buses, which helps save energy. The [Radeon RX 6600] incorporates a slender 128-bit reminiscence bus (consider it because the freeway for reminiscence knowledge—extra lanes lets site visitors transfer quicker) versus a 192-bit bus on the older 5600 XT, and a 256-bit bus on the 5700 XT. 

It’s not all roses although. AMD tuned the [Radeon RX 6600] Infinity Cache for 1080p gaming, giving it considerably much less capability than its brethren—32MB, versus 96MB on the 1440p-focused Radeon RX 6700 XT and 128GB on AMD’s higher-end 4K choices. Radeon product supervisor Nish Neelalojanan instructed me that the “hit rate” that determines the Infinity Cache’s effectiveness is “very similar” within the 6600 XT at 1080p to what the opposite playing cards obtain at their focused resolutions.

AMD

But as you’ll see in our benchmarks, when you attempt to step the decision as much as 1440p, the Infinity Cache’s hit charge decreases considerably, that means the Radeon RX 6600 must as an alternative depend on the standard reminiscence system rather more. When that occurs, the Radeon RX 6600’s relative efficiency plummets in comparison with graphics playing cards that characteristic extra conventional bigger reminiscence buses and better total reminiscence bandwidth (although the decrease reminiscence bandwidth additionally makes trendy Radeon GPUs much less enticing to crypto-miners). Bottom line? This graphics card actually was constructed for 1080p gaming, although you may nonetheless get an honest 1440p expertise when you don’t thoughts dipping barely under 60 frames per second, or dialing your graphics choices down a bit.

Speaking of “this card,” there isn’t a reference model of the Radeon RX 6600. All the playing cards you’ll discover on the market come from third-party graphics card distributors like Asus, Sapphire, MSI, and the star of this evaluation, XFX.

Brad Chacos/IDG

AMD despatched us the XFX Radeon RX 6600 Swft 210 for evaluation. It’s cool and quiet, with a pretty design paying homage to XFX’s blacked-out model this technology, albeit in a smaller and extra constrained package deal. It makes use of a pair of bigger 100mm followers with 11 blades apiece (reasonably than the triple-fan configuration of costlier XFX options) sitting atop a heatsink with a pair of 6mm heatpipes snaking via it. While most higher-end GPUs wield monstrous triple-slot coolers, usually paired with triple-pin energy necessities, the XFX Swft 210 sticks to a regular 2-slot peak. Between that and the one 8-pin energy connector required, it ought to slip into nearly any gaming PC as a no-hassle improve. It comes with a single HDMI 2.1 port and three ShowPorts.

This extra modestly priced card lacks a few of the further options discovered in additional luxurious fashions. You received’t discover built-in fan headers and even RGB lighting on provide right here, although the XFX Swft 210 does embrace a dual-BIOS change. That’s useful in any troubleshooting endeavors and particularly useful throughout overclocking makes an attempt. It’s a welcome addition certainly, together with a metallic backplate that can look good and clear in your system.

The Swft 210 runs on the Radeon RX 6600’s reference speeds, and XFX says it ought to debut for “about” the instructed $329 value through the preliminary launch window for AMD’s new GPU.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Like different RX 6000-series GPUs, the Radeon RX 6600 helps all of RDNA 2’s numerous options, together with FidelityFX Super Resolution and Smart Access Memory to spice up efficiency, real-time ray tracing capabilities, AV1 video decoding, DirectX 12 Ultimate goodies, an improved version of Radeon Boost that wraps in Variable Rate Shading, Radeon Anti-Lag throughout all main DX APIs, FreeSync show assist, AMD Link streaming to different gadgets, and rather more. AMD’s sturdy Radeon Settings app consists of each guide and computerized efficiency tuning controls so you may tweak the cardboard to your coronary heart’s extent.

Let’s get benchmarking.

Our check system

We consider graphics playing cards on our devoted AMD Ryzen 5000-series check rig to be able to benchmark the impact of PCIe 4.0 assist on trendy GPUs, in addition to the performance-boosting AMD Smart Access Memory and Nvidia Resizable BAR options (that are each based mostly on the identical underlying PCIe customary). Currently, we’re testing on an open bench with AMD’s Wraith Max air cooler; sooner or later, we’ll be transferring the setup right into a case and including an NZXT Kraken liquid cooler to the combo. Most of the {hardware} was supplied by the producers, however we bought the storage ourselves.

• AMD Ryzen 5900X, inventory settings
• AMD Wraith Max cooler
• MSI Godlike X570 motherboard
• 32GB G.Skill Trident Z Neo DDR4 3800 reminiscence
• EVGA 1200W SuperNova P2 energy provide ($352 on Amazon)
• 1TB SK Hynix Gold S31 SSD

We’re evaluating the $330 XFX Radeon RX 6600 Swft 210 towards the $550 Asus ROG Strix Radeon RX 6600 XT, $330 EVGA GeForce RTX 3060 XC Black, and final technology’s $350 Radeon RX 5700 (non-XT) and $350 GeForce RTX 2060. That ought to present a well-rounded view of the $300 value bracket in current instances, although it’s value noting that all of those graphics playing cards promote for considerably larger on the streets lately. Yes, even the older ones. 

Brad Chacos/IDG

We check quite a lot of video games spanning numerous engines, genres, vendor sponsorships (Nvidia, AMD, and Intel), and graphics APIs (DirectX 11, DX12, and Vulkan). Each sport is examined utilizing its in-game benchmark on the highest doable graphics presets until in any other case famous, with VSync, body charge caps, real-time ray tracing or DLSS results, and FreeSync/G-Sync disabled, together with some other vendor-specific applied sciences like FidelityFX instruments or Nvidia Reflex. We’ve additionally enabled temporal anti-aliasing (TAA) to push these playing cards to their limits. We run every benchmark at the very least thrice and checklist the common consequence for every check.

AMD instructed testing this card towards the RTX 3060 with Smart Access Memory and PCIe Resizable BAR on, respectively; we didn’t. Those newer capabilities can indeed increase performance, usually in AMD’s favor, however they’re not enabled on most gaming PCs on the market. If your rig supports Smart Access Memory, count on to see barely quicker efficiency in some trendy video games, although some uncommon video games (like Assassin’s Creed Valhalla) run a lot quicker with these options lively.

We’re merely going to supply the charts throughout this sport benchmarking portion, saving most commentary for our abstract on the finish of the evaluation.

Gaming efficiency benchmarks

Watch Dogs: Legion

Watch Dogs: Legion is among the first video games to debut on next-gen consoles. Ubisoft upgraded its Disrupt engine to incorporate cutting-edge options like real-time ray tracing and Nvidia’s DLSS. We disable these results for this testing, however Legion stays a strenuous sport even on high-end {hardware} with its elective high-resolution texture pack put in.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Horizon Zero Dawn

Yep, PlayStation exclusives are coming to the PC now. Horizon Zero Dawn runs on Guerrilla Games’ Decima engine, the identical engine that powers Death Stranding.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Gears Tactics

Gears Tactics places it personal brutal, fast-paced spin on the XCOM-like style. This Unreal Engine 4-powered sport was constructed from the bottom up for DirectX 12, and we love with the ability to work a tactics-style sport into our benchmarking suite. Better but, the sport comes with a plethora of graphics choices for PC snobs. More video games ought to dedicate such loving care to explaining what flipping all these visible knobs imply.

You can’t use the presets to benchmark Gears Tactics, because it intelligently scales to work finest in your put in {hardware}, that means that “Ultra” on one graphics card can load completely different settings than “Ultra” on a weaker card. We manually set all choices to their highest doable settings.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Wolfenstein: Youngblood

Wolfenstein: Youngblood is extra enjoyable when you may play cooperatively with a buddy, however it’s a fearless experiment—and an absolute technical showcase. Running on the Vulkan API, Youngblood achieves blistering body charges, and it helps all types of cutting-edge applied sciences like ray tracing, DLSS 2.0, HDR, GPU culling, asynchronous computing, and Nvidia’s Content Adaptive Shading. The sport features a built-in benchmark with two completely different scenes; we examined Riverside.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Metro Exodus

One of one of the best video games of 2019, Metro Exodus stays one of many best-looking video games round, too. The newest model of the 4A Engine gives extremely luscious, ultra-detailed visuals, with one of the crucial gorgeous real-time ray tracing implementations launched but. The Extreme graphics preset we benchmark can soften even probably the most highly effective trendy {hardware}, as you’ll see under, although the sport’s Ultra and High presets nonetheless look good at a lot larger body charges.

We check in DirectX 12 mode with ray tracing, Hairworks, and DLSS disabled.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Borderlands 3

Borderlands is again! Gearbox’s sport defaults to DX12, so we do as effectively. It provides us a glimpse on the ultra-popular Unreal Engine 4’s efficiency in a conventional shooter. This sport tends to favor AMD {hardware}.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Strange Brigade

Strange Brigade is a cooperative third-person shooter the place a group of adventurers blasts via hordes of mythological enemies. It’s a technological showcase, constructed across the next-gen Vulkan and DirectX 12 applied sciences and infused with options like HDR assist and the power to toggle asynchronous compute on and off. It makes use of Rebellion’s customized Azure engine. We check utilizing the Vulkan renderer, which is quicker than DX12.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Total War: Troy

The newest sport within the standard Total War saga, Troy was given away free for its first 24 hours on the Epic Games Store, transferring over 7.5 million copies earlier than it went on correct sale. Total War: Troy is constructed utilizing a modified model of the Total War: Warhammer 2 engine, and this DX11 title appears to be like gorgeous for a turn-based technique sport. We check the extra intensive battle benchmark.

Brad Chacos/IDG

F1 2020

F1 2020 is a gem to check, supplying a big selection of each graphical and benchmarking choices, making it a way more dependable (and enjoyable) possibility that the Forza collection. It’s constructed on the newest model of Codemasters’ buttery-smooth Ego sport engine, full with assist for DX12 and Nvidia’s DLSS know-how. We check two laps on the Australia course, with clear skies on and DLSS off.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Shadow of the Tomb Raider concludes the reboot trilogy, and it’s nonetheless completely beautiful a few years after its debut. Square Enix optimized this sport for DX12 and recommends DX11 provided that you’re utilizing older {hardware} or Windows 7, so we check with DX12. Shadow of the Tomb Raider makes use of an enhanced model of the Foundation engine that additionally powered Rise of the Tomb Raider and consists of elective real-time ray tracing and DLSS options.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Rainbow Six Siege

Rainbow Six Siege nonetheless dominates the Steam charts years after its launch, and Ubisoft helps it with frequent updates and occasions. The builders have poured a ton of labor into the sport’s AnvilNext engine over time, finally rolling out a Vulkan model of the sport that we use to check. By default, the sport lowers the render scaling to extend body charges, however we set it to 100 % to benchmark native rendering efficiency on graphics playing cards. Even nonetheless, body charges soar.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Ray tracing efficiency

We briefly examined ray tracing efficiency utilizing Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Metro Exodus, two video games in our suite that assist the cutting-edge know-how. The checks have been performed at 1080p decision with out Nvidia’s AI-enhance DLSS know-how enabled, which each early ray tracing titles assist. Image upsampling applied sciences like DLSS and AMD’s FidelityFX Super Resolution are key to clawing again frames misplaced to cutting-edge ray tracing results, rising efficiency by rendering visuals internally at a decrease decision earlier than utilizing numerous methods to extend the ultimate decision. The software program strategies work in very other ways, nonetheless, so testing with them disabled is the one method for an apples-to-apples benchmark besides within the ultra-rare video games that assist each DLSS and FSR, like Marvel’s Avengers.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Brad Chacos/IDG

This largely confirms what we already knew from higher-end Radeon and GeForce GPUs. (AMD’s last-gen Radeon RX 5700 doesn’t assist ray tracing, therefore the zero rating in RT benchmarks above.) Nvidia’s second-generation implementation of ray tracing {hardware} performs higher than AMD’s first stab on the know-how, although each allow you to play ray traced video games after making some graphics possibility tweaks (or enabling DLSS/FSR).

Power draw, thermals, and noise

We check energy draw by looping the F1 2020 benchmark at 4K for about 20 minutes after we’ve benchmarked all the things else and noting the very best studying on our Watts Up Pro meter, which measures the ability consumption of our whole check system. The preliminary a part of the race, the place all competing automobiles are onscreen concurrently, tends to be probably the most demanding portion. 

This isn’t a worst-case check; it is a GPU-bound sport working at a GPU-bound decision to gauge efficiency when the graphics card is sweating arduous. If you’re taking part in a sport that additionally hammers the CPU, you may see larger total system energy attracts. Consider your self warned.

Brad Chacos/IDG

The Radeon RX 6600 is by far probably the most energy environment friendly GPU of this bunch, drawing a staggering 73 fewer watts than the RTX 3060. RDNA 2’s effectivity has been an enormous win for AMD this technology, and pairing that with the decrease energy necessities and clock speeds within the Radeon RX 6600 (to create extra differentiation versus the XT mannequin, little doubt) means this GPU barely sips any juice.

We check thermals by leaving GPU-Z open through the F1 2020 energy draw check, noting the very best most temperature on the finish.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Even with its smaller design, the XFX Swft 210 delivers excellent cooling. Of course, loads of that has to do with the RX 6600’s extra humble clock speeds and energy draw, as effectively. You don’t want a large customized cooler to maintain a small, power-sipping chip chilly.

Should you purchase the Radeon RX 6600?

You in all probability shouldn’t purchase any graphics card proper now, as I’ve stated to shut each graphics card evaluation in 2021. Prices stay outrageous even all these months later. I’d advocate most individuals sit on the sidelines and stream their PC video games by way of Nvidia’s GeForce Now service—or possibly even take into account shopping for a console—till the mud settles.

The Radeon RX 6600 is the primary true 1080p graphics card of this technology, and it shines in that function—you may crank up a sport’s eye sweet to the max and the power-sipping nature of this GPU means your rig will nonetheless run cool and quiet. (Though you may nonetheless get an honest 1440p expertise when you don’t thoughts presumably dipping under 60 frames per second, or dialing your graphics choices down a bit.) You received’t be spending further on extreme VRAM for this decision, not like on the RTX 3060. And with miners preferring the reminiscence configuration of GeForce GPUs, paired with the small die measurement of the Radeon RX 6600, we’re hopeful that we’ll see a (considerably) extra respectable provide of this AMD GPU on retailer cabinets within the early days. The current 6600 XT launch supplied inventory ranges that made the concept of shopping for one laughable, for instance, however not not possible.

In a sane world we’d spend extra time raging on the concept of spending $330-plus on a strong 1080p graphics card in 2021, half a decade after AMD’s own Radeon RX 480 supplied no-compromises 1080p and strong 1440p gaming for $200. The Radeon RX 6600 additionally typically (although not often) loses to Nvidia’s older RTX 2060 over two-and-a-half years after that card’s debut. In a vacuum, this card’s price-to-performance ought to be disappointing. And deep down, it truly is. I’d reasonably spend $300 on an Xbox Series S to be frank. (You know, when you might discover one.)

But on this wild 12 months stuffed with pandemics and crippling provide shortages, $330 looks like an affordable ask for the Radeon RX 6600. You’ll presently pay greater than that for an historic Radeon RX 580 on the streets. If provides of the Radeon RX 6600 impress within the early days, and costs keep considerably shut to the cardboard’s MSRP, this can be your finest shot at an improve in a very long time, even when the fee does make it arduous to get enthusiastic about. It is what it’s proper now. Pay up when you should, however sit on the sidelines for now when you can.

If you do resolve to chunk the bullet, worry not: The Radeon RX 6600 is a superb GPU for 1080p gaming, though it struggles towards Nvidia’s extra mature implementation in ray-traced video games. And the XFX Swft 210 particularly stays cool whereas trying good; it’s strongly value contemplating when you don’t want a model of the RX 6600 with extra elaborate options or RGB lighting.