AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT 8GB Review

The Radeon RX 5500 XT is AMD's reply to Nvidia's recently released GeForce GTX 1650 Super. Codenamed Navi xiv, nosotros finally have the new budget-oriented Radeon on hand. While this is technically a day-one review, it'southward not the showtime 5500 XT review to hitting the spider web. Some lucky members of the press were able to get their hands on OEM versions, assuasive them to test ahead of release. Results didn't look amazing, merely of course, without confirmed pricing information it was hard to estimate just how practiced or bad Navi 14 would be.

To evaluate only how good the Radeon RX 5500 XT is, we have one card from MSI and one from Gigabyte. From MSI we have their 'Gaming X' model and Gigabyte sent their 'Gaming OC' version, both await very good.

The RX 5500 XT GPU uses a tiny 158mm2 die packing just 1408 cores and 88 texture units, nigh 40% fewer than the RX 5700. There's likewise half as many ROPs, which has reduced the memory passenger vehicle from 256-bit down to 128-bit broad. This sees retentivity bandwidth halved to 224 GB/s.

AMD has kept the GDDR6 retentiveness and yous tin can purchase the 5500 XT with either iv or 8GB of VRAM. We also take a 5500 XT 4GB carte on hand and we'll provide a detailed 4GB vs 8GB comparison shortly, but for this review our focus volition be on the 8GB version.

Getting back to the cores, they're clocked at 1670 MHz for the base with a boost of 1845 MHz, which means they're clocked vii% college than the 5700. However, because there are a lot less, the TDP has been reduced from 180 watts downwardly to 150 watts.

The 8GB version of the 5500 XT comes in at $200 MSRP and frankly that seems a tad as well ambitious for the hardware specs. The 4GB model will price $170, and again that seems like a lot of money for a 4GB graphics card in 2022. Either style, we'll review the toll to operation offered by the 5500 XT towards the end of this review, for now let'southward bank check out those benchmark figures.

Our GPU test system is powered by a Core i9-9900K clocked at 5 GHz with 16GB of DDR4-3400 retentivity. We exclusively used the Gigabyte RX 5500 XT Gaming OC for testing the 5500 XT in this review. We have 12 games to await at, all tested at 1080p and 1440p using medium to loftier quality presets or settings.

Benchmarks

First upwardly we have Shadow of the Tomb Raider and with the loftier quality preset enabled at 1080p, the 5500 XT was expert for 77 fps on average. Not bad operation, but not groovy, given the RX 590 was a niggling faster and the 1660 Super most twenty% faster.

Even at 1440p we encounter much the same and despite the actress VRAM, the 5500 XT tin't gain on the 1660 Super.

We encounter that the 5500 XT does manage to edge out the RX 590 in Assassin's Creed Odyssey with an average of 71 fps, making it 4% faster, or a mere three fps. The GTX 1660 Super was 11% faster, though the 5500 XT was 8% faster than the GTX 1650 Super.

At 1440p we see like margins, the 5500 XT is still on par with the GTX 1660 which also puts it on par with the RX 590 and GTX 1650 Super, so not a great result for AMD's new $200 offering.

Using the high quality preset in Red Dead Redemption 2 might have been a mistake with these lower-end GPUs every bit frame rates are quite low, also the 3GB 1060 didn't work as the texture setting was besides high and you can't override memory restrictions in this title. Then rather than give the 3GB 1060 an advantage with the medium texture setting, we opted to skip it for this one.

Performance at 1080p from the 5500 XT is disappointing, information technology only matched the RX 580 and GTX 1650 Super.

Things weren't much ameliorate at 1440p and using the loftier quality settings the game wasn't really playable, and so yous'll need to drop down to medium if you promise to play at this resolution with anything less than an RX 5700 or RTX 2060.

The 5500 XT delivered a smoothen 106 fps average at 1080p in Globe of Tanks, merely that was only enough to come across it positioned every bit a mid-field runner in our testing, matching the 3GB 1060 and putting it on par with the RX 590. Still a pretty unexciting consequence.

The 1440p result for the 5500 XT isn't much meliorate, here information technology'southward a fraction slower than the RX 590 and no better than the much cheaper GTX 1650 Super.

Performance in Far Cry New Dawn is typical of what nosotros've seen and so far, the 5500 XT is a smidgen quicker than the 590 and ~half dozen% faster than the 1650 Super which frankly is a pretty miserable result given they want to charge $200 for this thing.

Not much different at 1440p: the 5500 XT and 590 are cervix and neck while the $230 GTX 1660 Super is well out in front delivering nearly xx% more performance. This isn't nifty for AMD given Nvidia is charging but 15% more.

Frame rates in Rainbow Six Siege are strong at 1080p using the very high quality preset, ane notch down from 'ultra', though we are manually cranking the render scale support to 100%. The GPU delivers skilful functioning overall, though the 5500 XT was still slower than the RX 590 and non a great deal faster than the cheaper ($160) GTX 1650 Super.

Much the same is seen when testing at 1440p, the 5500 XT just manages to keep pace with the GTX 1650 Super and RX 580.

The Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Social club performance at 1080p is boilerplate. Hither the 5500 XT is slower than the GTX 1650 Super and the one-time GTX 1060 6GB. Basically it finds itself situated between the 590 and 580.

Moving to 1440p allows the 5500 XT to friction match the 1650 Super and 3GB 1060, and then not keen.

Using the loftier quality preset at 1080p in Battlefield Five allowed the 5500 XT to average 83 fps in our test which sadly meant it was only able to match the RX 580 and render 3fps more than the 1650 Super on average.

The more limited 4GB VRAM buffer appears to injure the 1650 Super at 1440p and now the 5500 XT is able to evangelize 13% more performance, with 62 fps on average, but the Radeon does cost ~25% more than.

The Call of Duty: Modern Warfare results are very like to what we've seen so far, the 5500 XT is basically on par with the RX 590 and GTX 1650 Super. Even at 1440p the 5500 XT can't get away from the 1650 Super, though it does slip behind the RX 590.

Metro Exodus was tested with the ultra quality preset as the 5500 XT and equivalent Nvidia GPUs averaged over 60 fps at 1080p. The 5500 XT came in behind the RX 580 and it was besides ten% slower than the 590.

Moving to 1440p saw the 5500 XT drop down to an boilerplate of 51 fps which meant it was a few frames slower than the RX 580, though at least in this title it was quite a flake faster than the GTX 1650 Super, especially when looking at ane% low performance.

Here we run across that the 5500 XT one time once more trails the RX 580, this time in F1 2022 at 1080p using the high quality preset. While 121 fps on boilerplate is bang-up gaming operation, it'southward nonetheless less than you'd get with the 580, 590, GTX 1660 and 1660 Super.

The 5500 XT does lucifer the 580 at 1440p, making information technology 5-6 fps slower than the 590 and eleven% slower than the GTX 1660 Super.

Last up we have Gears 5 and here the 5500 XT is able to match the RX 590 with 75 fps on average at 1080p using the loftier quality preset.

The 1660 Super is 14% faster and given it costs 15% more, it looks like AMD has just slotted into Nvidia's electric current pricing scheme, rather than compete with information technology.

Ability Consumption

Here'southward a quick look at full system ability consumption in Gears 5 and F1 2022, As you lot can encounter on the graph below, the 5500 XT is a big improvement on the RX 580 and RX 590, reducing total system consumption by around 30%.

The GTX 1660 Super used slightly less power simply at this point information technology'southward a not-outcome and they're more evenly matched. Overall ability consumption is expert, non amazing for a 7nm GPU, merely it's comparable to where Nvidia are at right now.

Performance Summary

Given the cost, nosotros've got to say the 8GB 5500 XT didn't look also hot in most of those benchmarks.

Before we leap into the cost per frame assay, let'southward just look at the average operation across the dozen games tested at 1080p and 1440p.

On average the 5500 XT was slower than the RX 590 and only ~3.five% faster than the RX 580. Moreover, information technology was merely 5% faster than the GTX 1650 Super and xiii% slower than the GTX 1660 Super.

Gaming at 1440p brings about the same conclusion, it's a whisker faster than the old RX 580 and slightly slower than the RX 590. Allow's move on to check out the toll per frame data...

Basically the Radeon RX 5500 XT 8GB comes in offering the aforementioned level of value as the GTX 1660 Super, at $2.27 per frame based on our 12 game sample. That means you lot'll be paying a ~4% premium per frame over the RX 590 at electric current prices. Information technology'southward not a bad value in general, but coming from other Navi-based GPU offerings where AMD has been ambitious and pushed the envelope, here it's merely slotted in between current GeForce offerings, or worse.

The 5500 XT comes in at near 20% more per frame than the GTX 1650 Super, which seems to be very aggressively priced and works out great for Nvidia since we're talking about a like level of performance overall compared to the new Radeon. Granted, the 8GB 5500 XT packs twice every bit much VRAM, only information technology's yet not a good result for AMD and those seeking a budget graphics menu.

It's also worth noting that the 8GB 5500 XT costs ~14% more per frame when compared to existing 8GB RX 580'south.

Misses the Marking

If yous were expecting AMD to come in and rock the boat y'all volition exist dissapointed, every bit we were. The Radeon RX 5500 XT was never meant to blow your socks off from a performance perspective, merely nosotros do have issue with pricing. AMD'due south fabricated no attempt to undercut Nvidia, rather they've slotted the 5500 XT into Nvidia's existing pricing structure. In other words, they've rocked up to the party late, and offered usa nothing new.

It's kind of crazy, they were selling u.s. a 232mm2 dice for $200 or less and take been doing and then for over a year now. We finally go an update that's considerably smaller at 158mm2, a 32% smaller die that offers a similar level of performance, and it costs simply as much. No doubt 7nm supply is playing a big role here, but we doubt many of yous care near that, that's more of an AMD problem to solve.

For a while, AMD has been very aggressive on pricing their mainstream GPUs in lodge to remain competitive using 3 twelvemonth onetime Polaris GPUs. This started with the RX 480 back in June 2022, at $240 for the 8GB model. A year afterwards it was refreshed equally the RX 580 at a $10 disbelieve, and by belatedly 2022 the same GPU was retailing for well under $200.

Putting AMD's own products bated for a moment, the 5500 XT struggles to compete with what Nvidia's already offering in the GTX 1650 Super and 1660 Super. You could too debate, Nvidia made all the right moves to secure the mainstream segment ahead of AMD's release since the Super cards are both Q4 releases. Therefore we encounter no reason to look for RX 5500 stock to go far and so try and chase 1 down at the MSRP. There are plenty of 1650 Super and 1660 Super graphics cards selling at or very near to the MSRP, so we'd just grab one of those or alternatively snag a cheap RX 580.

Power consumption of the 5500 XT has been greatly improved over the RX 580, but do gamers really intendance about that? It's not similar you tin can't hands power the 580 or 590 with a cheap 400 watt power supply. Remember the ability results in this review were recorded in our overclocked Core i9-9900K test system, so expect full system power usage to be considerably lower with a Cadre i5 or Ryzen 5 processor.

Then while lower power consumption is certainly a nice bonus and should result in cooler and quieter graphics cards, nosotros feel most gamers looking to spend $200 or less on a graphics carte du jour, more often than not care almost price to functioning and here the 5500 XT offers cypher new. Ultimately, we'll accept to wait and encounter if retail pricing moves anywhere in the coming weeks and months to make the 5500 XT a more than attractive selection.

Finally, a quick side note regarding AMD'south new Radeon software features constitute in the Adrenaline 2022 Edition drivers, they're impressive and AMD should be commended for their work. Calculation features such as Integer Scaling for all Radeon GPUs is great and Radeon Boost looks interesting, though we doubt we'd use it, but yet a nice option to have and we're certain some gamers will find information technology useful.