AMD RX 7600 XT Review ft. Sapphire

1. Introduction2. Meet the Sapphire RX 7600 XT Pulse3. Testing Methodology4. 3DMark Fire Strike & Time Spy5. 3DMark DirectX Raytracing6. Alan Wake II7. Assassin's Creed Mirage8. Cyberpunk 20779. Forza Horizon 510. The Last of Us Part 111. A Plague Tale: Requiem12. Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart13. Red Dead Redemption 214. Resident Evil 415. Returnal16. Starfield17. Total War: Pharaoh18. Performance Summary (12-Game Average)19. Cost Per Frame Analysis20. Ray Tracing: Alan Wake II21. Ray Tracing: Avatar Frontiers of Pandora22. Ray Tracing: Cyberpunk 207723. Ray Tracing: F1 2324. Ray Tracing: Hitman 325. Ray Tracing: Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart26. Ray Tracing: Returnal27. Ray Tracing: Shadow of the Tomb Raider28. Ray Tracing Performance Summary29. Clock Speed30. GPU Temperatures31. Acoustics32. Power Draw: 1080p33. Power Draw: 1440p34. Power Draw: 2160p (4K)35. Performance per Watt: 1080p36. Performance per Watt: 1440p37. Performance per Watt: 2160p (4K)38. Total System Power Draw39. Closing Thoughts40. View All Pages

2024 feels like it's only just begun and we're already onto our third GPU launch in as many weeks. This time it's AMD's turn in the spotlight, as we put the recently announced RX 7600 XT through its paces. This graphics card is all about the VRAM, offering a 16GB framebuffer at a £310/$329 asking price. Today we find out what sort of performance is on offer, and whether or not it's worth paying extra for over the vanilla RX 7600.

If you missed the initial announcement at CES 2024, the AMD RX 7600 XT is very easy to summarise – it's basically an RX 7600 but with slightly higher clocks and double the VRAM. That means there's no change to the underlying silicon, you get the exact same number of cores, ROPS and so on. As a result, any differences in performance compared to the RX 7600 non-XT are purely as a result of the increased clock speeds and memory.

Still, in a landscape where 8GB GPU launches had a pretty tough ride last year, could the move to double the framebuffer be a welcome one? We put the Sapphire RX 7600 XT Pulse to the test in twelve games, plus another eight with ray tracing, to find out…

If you want to read this review as a single page, click HERE.

	RX 7900 XT	RX 7800 XT	RX 7700 XT	RX 7600 XT	RX 7600
Architecture	RDNA 3	RDNA 3	RDNA 3	RDNA 3	RDNA 3
Manufacturing Process	5nm GCD + 6nm MCD	5nm GCD + 6nm MCD	5nm GCD + 6nm MCD	6nm	6nm
Transistor Count	57.7 billion	28.1 billion	28.1 billion	13.3 billion	13.3 billion
Die Size	300 mm² GCD 220 mm² MCD	200 mm² GCD 150 mm² MCD	200 mm² GCD 150 mm² MCD	204 mm²	204 mm²
Compute Units	84	60	54	32	32
Ray Accelerators	84	60	54	32	32
Stream Processors	5376	3840	3456	2048	2048
Game GPU Clock	Up to 2000 MHz	2124 MHz	2171 MHz	2470 MHz	2250 MHz
Boost GPU Clock	Up to 2400 MHz	Up to 2430 MHz	Up to 2544 MHz	Up to 2755 MHz	Up to 2625 MHz
ROPs	192	96	96	64	64
AMD Infinity Cache	80MB	64MB	48MB	32MB	32MB
Memory	20GB GDDR6	16GB GDDR6	12GB GDDR6	16GB GDDR6	8GB GDDR6
Memory Data Rate	20Gbps	19.5 Gbps	18Gbps	18Gbps	18Gbps
Memory Bandwidth	800 GB/s	624 GB/s	432 GB/s	288 GB/s	288 GB/s
Memory Interface	320-bit	256-bit	192-bit	128-bit	128-bit
Board Power	315W	263W	245W	190W	165W

First, let's take a quick look at the specs. Just like the RX 7600, the 7600 XT uses the monolithic Navi 33 die, fabbed on makes TSMC's 6nm node, with a 204 mm² die size. It's the exact same configuration, too. Navi 33 packs in 32 Compute Units, each of which houses 64 Stream Processors, for a total of 2048 shaders. There's also 32 Ray Accelerators – one per CU – and 64 ROPs.

Clock speed is the first real change compared to the RX 7600, as the 7600 XT sees a roughly 10% higher game clock, rated at 2470 MHz, while there's a boost clock of 2755 MHz. The Sapphire Pulse model I am reviewing today has pushed this slightly higher too, with a rated 2810 MHz boost clock.

Meanwhile, the memory sub-system is almost identical to the previous generation RX 6600. We still find a 128-bit interface, with memory that clocks in at 18Gbps, resulting in memory bandwidth of 288 GB/s, though AMD claims an ‘effective' bandwidth of 476.9 GB/s due to the 32MB of 2nd Gen Infinity cache. The key change is of course that the amount of VRAM has now doubled, with the RX 7600 XT outfitted with 16GB.

As with Navi 23, Navi 33 also features a cut-down PCIe interface, offering a Gen4 x8 connection.

Power draw for the RX 7600 XT is the final change over the RX 7600, as it is now rated at 190W Total Board Power (TBP), an increase from the 165W figure of the RX 7600. We are using our updated GPU power testing methodology in this review, so read on for our most detailed power and efficiency testing yet.

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