Review: AMD Radeon RX 480 (14nm Polaris)

by Tarinder Sandhu on 29 June 2016, 14:00

Tags: AMD (NYSE:AMD)

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qac3xm

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Test Methodology

AMD Radeon RX 480 Specification


GPU Comparisons

 
GPU
Memory
Miscellaneous
Cores
Base
(MHz)
Boost
(MHz)
Size
(MB)
Clock
(MHz)
Bus
(bits)
Power Config
Driver
AMD Radeon RX 480
2,304
1,120
1,266
8,192
8,000
256
6
16.6.2
Sapphire Radeon R9 Fury X
4,096
-
1,050
4,096
1,000
4,096
8+8
16.6.1
Sapphire Radeon R9 390 Nitro
2,560
-
1,010
8,192
6,000
512
8+8
16.6.1
Asus Radeon R9 280X Direct CU II
2,048
-
1,000
3,072
6,000
384
8+6
16.6.1
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 Flex
2,048
-
1,000
2,048
4,800
256
6+6
16.6.1
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 Founders Edition
2,560
1,607
1,734
8,192
10,008
256
8
368.39
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 Founders Edition
1,920
1,506
1,683
8,192
8,008
256
8
368.39
Palit GeForce GTX 980 Ti Super JetStream
2,816
1,152
1,241
6,144
7,012
384
8+6
368.39
MSI GeForce GTX 980 Gaming 4G
2,048
1,216
1,317
4,096
7,012
256
8+8
368.39
Gainward GeForce GTX 970 Phoenix
1,664
1,152
1,304
4,096
7,012
256
6+6
368.39
Asus GeForce GTX 960 Direct CU II
1,024
1,253
1,317
2,048
7,200
128
6
368.39

HEXUS Graphics Test Bench

Hardware Components Product Page
Processor Intel Core i7-6700K (overclocked to 4.4GHz) intel.com
CPU Cooler Noctua NH-D15S noctua.at
Motherboard Asus Z170 Pro asus.com
Memory Crucial Ballistix Sport LT 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4-2400 crucial.com
Power Supply be quiet! Dark Power Pro 11 850W bequiet.com
Primary Storage 256GB Samsung 950 Pro samsung.com
Secondary Storage 512GB SK hynix Canvas SC300 skhynix.com
Chassis Fractal Design Define R5 Windowed fractal-design.com
Monitor Philips Brilliance 4K Ultra HD LED (288P6LJEB/00) philips.co.uk
Operating system Windows 10 (64-bit) microsoft.com

Benchmark Suite

Synthetic Benchmarks
3DMark Fire Strike, Fire Strike Extreme and Fire Strike Ultra
Gaming Benchmarks and Settings
Dirt Rally 4xMSAA, Ultra Quality
Doom TSSAA (8TX), Ultra Quality
Fallout 4 TAA, Ultra Quality
Hitman DX12, SMAA, Maximum Quality
Rise of the Tomb Raider DX12, FXAA, Very High Quality
Tom Clancy's The Division FXAA, Ultra Quality
General Benchmarks
Power Consumption To emulate real-world usage scenarios, we record system-wide mains power draw both when idle and while playing Dirt Rally.
Temperature To emulate real-world usage scenarios, we record GPU core temperature both when idle and while playing Dirt Rally.
Noise A PCE-318 meter is used to record noise levels when idle and while playing Dirt Rally.
Overclocking Maintaining out-the-box voltage, we increase the card's power target and aim for an optimal balance of core and memory overclock. With the heightened frequencies in place, the 3DMark, Dirt Rally and Rise of the Tomb Raider tests are re-run at 4K UHD settings.

Notes

To minimise the impact of any CPU bottlenecks, our test platform is configured with a quad-core Intel Core i7-6700K processor overclocked to 4.4GHz across all cores and 32GB of Crucial Ballistix Sport LT DDR4 memory set to run at 2,400MHz using the built-in XMP profile.

For our high-end benchmark suite, we have an array of games tested at FHD (1,920x1,080), QHD (2,560x1,440) and 4K UHD (3,840x2,160) resolutions. Where applicable, any vendor-specific enhancements such as PhysX and TressFX are disabled to help even the playing field. In-game benchmark results are recorded as minimum and average frames per second.

We have added some older and more relevant card to our test suite so that a better comparison can be made. A Radeon R9 280X is representative of a decent card from a couple of years ago. Going further back we have a Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition whose die size is similar. An Asus GTX 960 represents the next level down from Nvidia.

Understand that all other cards are retail examples which could have been purchased. The GTX 970 is a well-overclocked model from Gainward, mind, and it will provide solid comparison against the slew of retail RX 480s coming into us for evaluation.