Synthetic benchmarks:
Our first series of tests will be dedicated to synthetic benchmarks. These are often used for overclocking competitions but are also very interesting to compare different GPUs. So we will focus on the 3DMark benchmarks.
We will test the following benchmarks:
- Fire Strike (1080p)
- Fire Strike Ultra (2160p)
- Time Spy (1440p)
- Time Spy Extreme (2160p)
- 3DMark Speed Way
- DirectX Raytracing
- Intel XeSS
- Mesh Shader
3DMark Fire Strike and Fire Strike Ultra :
Let’s start with 3DMark Fire Strike, which is one of the most used benchmarks today. It consists of two graphics tests, a CPU test and a fourth test that combines GPU and CPU. Don’t forget to deactivate the demo which doesn’t bring anything in the final score and prolongs the benchmark duration (unnecessarily). The version used for these tests is of course the latest one
First benchmark that we realize with these Radeon RX 7900 XT and RX 7900 XTX, and the least we can say is that it starts rather well! Let’s start with the RX 7900 XTX, which takes the lead over the NVIDIA RTX 4080 by 1230 points.
The RX 7900 XT is slightly behind the former top of the range of the previous generation at AMD, the RX 6950 XT. The increase in definition should reverse the trend. As a reminder, this benchmark is done in 1080p.
The same thing happens with Fire Strike Ultra, where our RX 7900 XTX is still in second place, but this time it’s widening the gap with the NVIDIA RTX 4080. Good news for our RX 7900 XT, which comes close to the green card. The Fire Strike benchmarks have always been good for AMD cards.
3DMark Time Spy and Time Spy Extreme:
The second test is 3DMark Time Spy. Although this one is done in 1440p, it has the particularity of using DirectX 12. It consists of two graphical tests and a CPU test. As for Fire Strike, don’t forget to disable the demo. These two first benchmarks are proposed by UL Benchmark.
The performance we get in Time Spy is often representative of what we will get in games. And here our two samples sandwich the RTX 4080. The first four cards from the new generation stand out against the previous generations. If the performance of two Radeon RX 7900s is confirmed, we may have excellent performance in games.
Under 3DMark Time Spy Extreme, the same is true even if the RX 7900 XT lags behind the RXT 4080. On the other hand, the RX 7900 XTX keeps its second place. As we can also see, the RTX 4090 is untouchable.
3DMark Speed Way
The latest benchmark from Ulbenchmark and it’s nice to be able to say that we’re going to have a good time on this Speed Way. It uses DirectX 12 and is by default in a 1440p definition. We have not modified anything and we use the original benchmark.
Here, both of our samples suffer more and for the first time our Radeon RX 7900 XTX is in third place. The benchmark uses Ray Tracing and seems to make our card suffer. We’ll see what happens in games. The RX 7900 XT is behind the RTX 3080 Ti.
3DMark DirectX Raytracing :
UL Benchmarks has added a new test to its series of benchmarks to measure Ray Tracing performance. The idea will be to use the 3DMark DirectX Raytracing test to compare the performance of Ray Tracing hardware dedicated to AMD and NVIDIA graphics cards but now also to Intel!
The 3DMark DirectX Raytracing test is designed to make Ray Tracing the limiting factor. Instead of relying on traditional rendering, the entire scene is traced and drawn in one pass. The test result will depend entirely on the performance of the Ray Tracing. It will be easy to measure and compare the performance of the different cards between them.
This benchmark has always been dominated by NVIDIA cards and we know that AMD cards will have more difficulties. However, we can see the progress of this new generation since the RX 7900 XTX is at the level of the RTX 3080 Ti but very far from the RTX 4080. We can really judge the impact of Ray Tracing during our gaming benchmarks.
3DMark Intel XeSS
UL Benchmarks in collaboration with Intel will add this new benchmark to the 3DMark suite. We had early access to this new test for our testing. This Intel XeSS test is designed to evaluate and compare the performance and image quality of XeSS(Xe Super Sampling). There are four XeSS modes to choose from: Ultra Quality, Quality, Balanced and Performance. The 3DMark inspection tool helps you compare image quality with a side-by-side view of XeSS rendering and native resolution rendering. You need a graphics card that supports Intel XeSS to run this test.
So we’ll have two scores, a FPS number with XeSS disabled and then on the right with XeSS enabled. The mode chosen is “Ultra Quality” which is actually the default mode for the benchmark.
In this new benchmark, the good news is that the two cards seem to take advantage of the Xe Super Sampling technology which allows to boost the performance. We will be able to judge its effect in the game Hitman 3 on our RX 7900 XT and RX 7900 XTX cards.
As we conclude this first series of synthetic tests, we are pleasantly surprised by the performance. The Radeon RX 7900 XTX seems to be ahead in benchmarks not using Ray Tracing but lags behind when it is active. We should have two performance cards in gaming and we will see how they will perform with Ray Tracing combined with FSR or XeSS.
