Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 vs. AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT: battle of the flagships

Nvidia and AMD have been competing for years for the best GPU of the year. Nvidia is often named the winner of these wars, but in recent years AMD has caught up with its RDNA 2 cards. Now, with the RTX 4090 taking the performance crown, it’s time to compare the top offerings from Nvidia and AMD and see how they compare.

Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 4090 is the crown jewel of the all-new Ada Lovelace RTX 40 series. AMD has yet to announce its new graphics cards, although RDNA 3 is on the way. Nvidia’s flagship is thus a generation ahead of AMD’s Radeon RX 6950 XT, but the latter can certainly hold its own. Let’s see how these two beastly GPUs compare to each other.

Glasses

Jacob Roach / Digital Trends

Although both the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 and AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT are at the top of the line, they differ greatly in terms of specifications. Just looking at the specs, this wouldn’t be a fair comparison.

Although the RX 6950 It marks a very minor upgrade over the Radeon RX 6900 XT.

However, the RTX 4090 will dominate the next-gen line and will easily be the most powerful consumer GPU on the market – until Nvidia releases the RTX 4090 Ti, of course, or until AMD comes in strong. with the next generation Radeon RX 7000 line.

The clock speeds are somewhat similar, but the RTX 4090 completely beats the RX 6950 XT in terms of core count, bus width, and bandwidth. It also offers GDDR6X memory instead of GDDR6.

GeForce RTX 4090 Radeon RX 6950 XT
Architecture industry Short film RDNA 2
Processing button TSMC 5nm TSMC 7nm
core 16,384 5.120
Basic class 2.235 MHz 1.925 MHz
Maximum hours 2,520 MHz 2.324 MHz
Memory 24GB GDDR6X 16GB GDDR6
Memory bus 384-bit 256-bit
Band width 1018 Gb/s 576 Gb/s
TDP 450 watts 335 watts

Efficiency

RTX 4090 geo performance at 4K.

Images used with permission of the copyright holder

We’ve had the chance to review both the RTX 4090 and RX 6950 XT, so we have a detailed look at how these two cards stack up in terms of performance.

While the RX 6950 Overall, based on our 4K testing, the RX 6950 XT delivered about half the performance of the RTX 4090. In our gaming benchmarks, the RTX 4090 averaged 108.3 frames per second (fps) at 4K, while the RX 6950 XT peaked at 55.3.

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RTX 4090 performance in Forza Horizon 5 at 4K.

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However, these results vary by title. IN Forza Horizon 5, The RX 6950 XT outperformed every other GPU, averaging 119 fps. On the other hand, the RTX 4090 still dominates with 176.3 fps. Meanwhile, in Gear tacticsThe RTX 4090 averaged 171 fps, while the RX 6950 XT lagged behind the RTX 3080 Ti, only managing 73.1 fps.

Even in titles promoted by AMD such as Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, RTX 4090 won by a wide margin. AMD’s flagship can beat every other GPU, but is decimated by Nvidia’s latest and greatest; Nvidia scored 122.4 fps compared to AMD’s 75.1.

RTX 4090 geo performance at 1440p.

Images used with permission of the copyright holder

This kind of performance continued in our 1440p tests, although we wouldn’t recommend buying the RTX 4090 if you only plan to game at 1440p – the card has more potential. On average, at 1440p, the RTX 4090 maintains a 68% lead over the RX 6950 XT.

The Ada Lovelace generation, of which the RTX 4090 is currently the champion, also brings an upgrade to DLSS, bringing the technology to its third version. DLSS 3 predicts entire frames instead of just pixels, and while it’s not perfect, it certainly gives Nvidia another advantage over AMD.

Nvidia’s new flagship is a powerful GPU, no question. Comparing it to the AMD Radeon RX 6950

The RTX 4090 is a card for enthusiasts, with seemingly no limits. Set up to create the highest quality content, 4K gaming at ultra settings, and more, the GPU should be able to power most tasks for several years. The AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT is powerful on its own, but it doesn’t impress us as a slight upgrade over the RX 6900 XT. This is currently AMD’s best graphics card, but that’s about to change with the arrival of the Radeon RX 7000 series.

Air monitoring

Chart showing RTX 4090 performance with ray tracing enabled at 1440p in Cyberpunk 2077.

Images used with permission of the copyright holder

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With ray tracing enabled, Nvidia’s RTX 4090 has such a huge advantage over all other cards that it’s not even funny. It was vastly superior to the RTX 3090 Ti and unfortunately for AMD, it destroyed every card created by Team Red. Historically, this has been true: Nvidia does a lot better when it comes to ray tracing.

We took out two ray tracing cards Cyberpunk 2077. As you can see in the image above, at 1440p, ultra settings, the RTX 4090 left the RX 6950 XT in the dust, averaging 88.7 fps compared to AMD’s 36.7. The Nvidia GPU is 152% faster than AMD’s flagship offering, demonstrating how much better the RTX 4090 is when it comes to ray tracing.

Withdrawal of energy

Nvidia GeForce RTX graphics card viewed from the side.

Kiklas/Shutterstock

The power requirements of Nvidia’s new flagship were the subject of much discussion before release, and it’s no surprise – this card is a power-hungry monster. Nvidia’s Founders Edition model comes with a base TDP of 450 watts, similar to the previous generation RTX 3090 Ti.

Nvidia’s RTX 4090 also comes in many custom versions prepared by Nvidia’s board partners. These GPUs will likely achieve higher TDPs – around 550 to 600 watts is possible. The thing to note here is that the RTX 4090 is huge, so you’ll need a really spacious case if you want to use it.

Some of Nvidia’s add-in board (AIB) partners recommend power supplies up to 1200W to support the card, which is, let’s face it, a pretty outrageous expectation. Nvidia itself is much more conservative, recommending an 850W power supply. However, if you do end up getting a new flagship, keep in mind that you should buy an 850W Gold power supply or higher because when combined with other components, it can still run pretty close to its limits.

Compared to Nvidia, AMD keeps things more economical when it comes to power consumption. The three-slot RX 6950 XT has a maximum TDP of 335 watts, and AMD suggests that the card will need an 850-watt PSU to run. This makes him much more conservative in terms of power; it even offers small power savings compared to the RTX 3090, which has a TDP of 350 W.

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Price and availability

CEOs of Nvidia and AMD side by side.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and AMD CEO Lisa Su. AMD/Nvidia

While the RTX 4090 is still new, the RX 6950 XT has been around for a while. It launches on May 10, 2022 and is available for sale at most major retailers, including Amazon. It launched at a price of $1,099, but it can now be had for as little as $900 at select retailers.

Nvidia is more expensive than AMD, so it’s no surprise to see the GeForce RTX 4090 at a fairly high price – but honestly, it’s not as bad as some of us expected. Nvidia has priced its own Founders Edition at $1,599, and we can only expect custom versions to cost more as they also typically increase performance. The GPU will be available from October 12, 2022.

Price per frame for RTX 4090.

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Oddly, because the RX 6950 XT is more expensive than the RX 6900 XT, the GPU didn’t perform as well in our cost-per-frame tests. Although the RTX 4090 is a very expensive GPU, its performance means it’s more cost-effective than the RX 6950 XT in this test. However, this assumes you have an unlimited GPU budget and don’t mind spending $1600 instead of $1100.

The winner is clear

Nvidia logo made of microchips.

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In terms of performance, it’s hardly a contest. The RTX 4090 blew the AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT out of the water, which it should have done since it belongs to the newer generation of RDNA 2 GPUs.

On the other hand, there’s also the matter of price and power consumption, and in both cases the RX 6950 XT is the clear winner. However, if you stick with that generation of GPU, there are plenty of other options to choose from, like the RTX 3090 or the RX 6900 XT, which is slightly less powerful than the RX 6950 XT, but a lot cheaper.

The answer is clear – Nvidia’s RTX 4090 is much better but also more expensive. Make a call based on what you need and what your wallet can handle right now.

Editor’s recommendation

Category: GAMINGSource: newstars.edu.vn

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