Release Date and Pricing
If you have a very limited budget and are looking for a new GPU, AMD might have the perfect deal for you. Coming in at 100$ less than the 7900 XTX, the 7900 XT offers an excellent performance/price ratio.
It will be launched on December 13. We have to wait for 2023 until they announce the rest of their lineup, namely their middle and low-end variants.
Specifications
Like the 7900 XTX, the XT is built on the new RDNA 3 architecture with a 5nm process size, boasting the same number of 58 billion transistors.
Its base clock will be limited to 1500 MHz when running stock and up to 2400 MHz when overclocked.
Both the shader and game clocks will both be running at 2000 MHz. It will have 20 GB of DDR6 with a 320-bit bus and a bandwidth of 800 GB/s.
As far as power consumption goes, the XT is less hungry than the XTX, with a TDP of 300 W. AMD suggests that you run it with a PSU of at least 700 W, but depending on the rest of your setup, you might need more. This is still a good improvement when compared directly to the NVIDIA 4080 and 4090, which are very power-hungry.
Like the 7900 XTX, the XT is lauded as offering better performance in 4K when compared to the 6950 XT. Both will be capable of doing this with FSR on or off, but until we can get our hands on some third-party benchmarks, take this information with a grain of salt.
If you’re interested in 4K and 8K monitors running at high refresh rates, you’ll be happy to know that the 7900 XT comes equipped with two DisplayPort 2.1 ports, which will offer up to 165Hz@8K and 480Hz@4K.
Performance
The real competition for this GPU will be the NVIDIA 4080 since they both fill the same role in the new generation of graphics cards. When placed side by side, the 4080 has 16 GB of DDR6X VRAM with a 256-bit bus and 717 GB/s memory bandwidth, meaning that the XT wins in everything except for the older DDR6 VRAM. How this will affect performance is yet to be seen. We should also note that there will be a 300$ price difference between the two, making the XT a more budget-friendly solution.
When it comes to Ray Tracing performance, just like its bigger cousin, the XT still struggles to offer the same performance as the 4080 or the 4090. By launching FSR 2.1, AMD is heading in the right direction. But catching up to the performance that NVIDIA offers might still take some time.
All in all, the 7900 XT is a good GPU at a decent price point, especially when compared to the NVIDIA offering. But given that you only have to pay 100$ more for the XTX, we are a bit confused about AMD’s decision to price them so close together.
