Radeon RX 480 "Polaris" Launched at $199

spikerules · 23 Jun 2016 at 18:59

melmac said:
Just a quick note about the drivers and why AMD wouldn't release drivers with their cards.

Why would they? If they wanted to stop leaks the only way they can do that is to control the drivers. People not under NDA seem to be able to get cards no problem but getting proper drivers is trickier.

Besides this is something that AMD have done before, I remember before the 6xxx series cards Kyle over on HardOcp was complaining because they were rushing to do the review because AMD only sent over proper drivers a few days before the cards launch.

Somebody said not sending out proper drivers from the start would be a foolish move because it would mean people would get the wrong idea about the cards performance and think they were worse than they actually are. Sorry, but that's rubbish. Before the NDA expires for any card, there are benchmarks and information been leaked all the time. Which are real and which are fake? Nobody knows.

And look at the last few days on this site, there were leaks showing that 480 to be nearly as fast as the 980ti. So people having under performing drivers with their cards certainly hasn't stopped leaks coming out showing amazing performance.

So regardless of what drivers people have before the NDA, any leaks that come out are probably best to be taken with a large dose of salt.

You DO realise your theory also supports the card being exactly as stated in recent leaks? Basically what you're saying is it could well be 970 performance... Or 980ti performance (which is complete and utter rubbish I might add)?

Seanspeed · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:00

RedGoose said:
I ran through that area. The frames are comparable to my 390x.

Considering I did so with my 970(non-overclocked) at equal settings, your 390X is either performing poorly, or you didn't actually match settings properly.

humbug · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:00

RedGoose said:
I ran through that area. The frames are comparable to my 390x.

At least that appears better than a 390. Thanks

Seanspeed · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:01

humbug said:
At least that appears better than a 390. Thanks

It's not. It was performing about 10fps worse than my stock MSI 970.

BluD · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:03

docsonic said:

Haha, good find.

GizF1 · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:05

It doesn't matter about poor performance on old drivers, it won't put anyone off because anyone who cares that much to be reading forums and researching it this soon before release will also be reading forums and researching it when the reviews are officially out on the 29th

Giz

RedGoose · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:05

Seanspeed said:
Considering I did so with my 970(non-overclocked) at equal settings, your 390X is either performing poorly, or you didn't actually match settings properly.

Nvidia does better with hairworks than AMD.

melmac · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:07

Seanspeed said:
Because they obviously cant stop leaks. They've shown that they've got very little ability to control leakages given everything we've seen so far. So in that situation, you dont deny everybody the proper drivers and have everybody leak out disappointing information, you take control of the leaks by at least dripping out reasons for people to get excited.

Are you for real? Look at any forums before the release of highly anticipated cards. There are good rumours, bad rumours, amazing rumours. How do you pick what leak is true or what leak is false? This very thread disproves your statement, there was talk of 980ti and higher levels of performance despite the bad drivers. Excitement was fever pitch.

You are wrong about AMD not been able to stop leaks, AMD are extremely good at stopping leaks.

h4rm0ny · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:11

INFYN said:

The thing that leaps out at me there is the 32ROPS. ROPS are important for higher resolutions. For VR, presumably you would want more. AdoredTV (the Scottish man) knows his stuff very well and says in his last video that he didn't think AMD would be silly enough to launch with 32ROPs.

Mayh3M · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:13

The idea this is only slightly better than a 970 at a marginally lower price is literally unbelievable. I won't believe that until I see it on the 29th. It's been almost two years since the 970's release and that was on 28nm.

No, just no.

melmac · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:15

spikerules said:
You DO realise your theory also supports the card being exactly as stated in recent leaks? Basically what you're saying is it could well be 970 performance... Or 980ti performance (which is complete and utter rubbish I might add)?

My theory? Telling people that they shouldn't believe any rumour or leak before the NDA lifts is rubbish?

Whether the leaks were with good drivers, bad drivers, made up etc. It doesn't matter, we won't know what the cards are like until the reviews come out.

There have been so many leaks in the last few weeks that one of them is bound to be right.

And right or wrong, AMD have held back full drivers until the last possible moment before, so what's stopping them doing it again?

Jono8 · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:15

Mayh3M said:
The idea this is only slightly better than a 970 at a marginally lower price is literally unbelievable. I won't believe that until I see it on the 29th. It's been almost two years since the 970's release and that was on 28nm.

No, just no.

Indeed. I think it will be at least as fast as a 390x. If not and it is £230 for a cheap plastic blower reference one then I will be very surprised/disappointed.

BluD · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:16

Seanspeed said:
Sure, just ran it.

Everything on/max except

Hairworks AA - 0
Hairworks level - low
Water Quality - high
Grass Density - high
Shadow Quality - high
Blur - off
Ambient Occlusion - SSAO
Chromatic Aberration and Vignette - off

I'm running:

MSI GTX970 Gaming at stock clock
i5 3570k @ 4.2Ghz
8GB of 1600Mhz DDR3
And I have the exact same 1TB WD Blue harddrive he's using.

Running around Velen like in the video I'm getting between 65-70fps, with occasional drops to the low 60's. Couldn't get it below 60fps no matter what I tried.

So I'd say the 480 is definitely not performing very well here at the moment. Dont know where people are getting that it's 980 level performance going by that vid, it's not even matching my 970.

970 seems to be similar to that card he was using then, with the 290x falling about 10fps behind in witcher and a little ahead in GTA, did you give GTA a go also? When i tested them earlier i was just doing them side by side in window so i could compare but it isnt a very scientific way of doing it, luckily i had a save at the same point in the game as him so i could fight the same monster in the same place etc.

Its all just guess work and could be pointless since he might have just been running a 970 to wind people up

fastboy · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:16

when the card comes out and the real benchmarks are seen..theres gonna be some furious post editings on here lol.

cant wait for my new 480

RedGoose · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:19

Seanspeed said:
Considering I did so with my 970(non-overclocked) at equal settings, your 390X is either performing poorly, or you didn't actually match settings properly.

Lol, you were right. My 390x was downclocked when I was messing with that yesterday.

My framerate is actually about 10fps higher than the supposed 480.

tavtavtav · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:28

The war continues.

h4rm0ny · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:29

docsonic said:

Well that was surreal. But funny. I feel like we just got a live stream from the inside of Floppers head!

I'm not a big fan of CF/SLi, but who knows - maybe mGPU will improve with DX12. They nailed the other comparisons, at least!

fs123 · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:29

Jono8 said:
Indeed. I think it will be at least as fast as a 390x. If not and it is £230 for a cheap plastic blower reference one then I will be very surprised/disappointed.

Theoretically it should be at least 390X so claims of 970 level performance cannot be true. If it is only 970 level then that is seriously disappointing. Just 6 days to go to find out.

spikerules · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:30

melmac said:
My theory? Telling people that they shouldn't believe any rumour or leak before the NDA lifts is rubbish?

Whether the leaks were with good drivers, bad drivers, made up etc. It doesn't matter, we won't know what the cards are like until the reviews come out.

There have been so many leaks in the last few weeks that one of them is bound to be right.

And right or wrong, AMD have held back full drivers until the last possible moment before, so what's stopping them doing it again?

Oh no I agree. You just seem to be thinking it will be more towards the positive rumour leaks than the negative. That could be called wishful thinking...

Seanspeed · 23 Jun 2016 at 19:32

RedGoose said:
Nvidia does better with hairworks than AMD.

At full settings, yes. This had no AA and low quality setting, though. So it shouldn't affect anything much.

Besides, it was much in line with the poor Doom 4 results posted.

melmac said:
Are you for real? Look at any forums before the release of highly anticipated cards. There are good rumours, bad rumours, amazing rumours. How do you pick what leak is true or what leak is false? This very thread disproves your statement, there was talk of 980ti and higher levels of performance despite the bad drivers. Excitement was fever pitch.

You are wrong about AMD not been able to stop leaks, AMD are extremely good at stopping leaks.

Ya know, you might have had some resemblance of a point had had you not concluded that AMD are 'extremely good' at stopping leaks.

And yes, there were a few overhyped fanboys talking about 980Ti levels of performance, but only through extrapolating figures through unsafe assumptions on theoretical over clocking abilities and whatnot.

Either way, we've got tons of pictures, breakdowns and demonstrations of the card in use, so actual visual proof that AMD have not contained things well at all.