AMD unveiled its highly anticipated Radeon RX 6000 Series graphics cards during its RDNA 2 showcase on October 28, but while the event blew the minds of both Radeon and GeForce fans with its surprising performance gains, big questions still remain.
Two of the biggest relate to NVIDIA’s premier technologies, ray tracing and DLSS. Does the Radeon RX 6000 Series hold a candle to the GeForce RTX 30 Series when it comes to ray-traced graphics? And does red team really have an upscaling solution that can compete with NVIDIA’s Deep Learning Super Sampling?
According to a tweet by AMD’s Frank Azor (Chief Architect of Gaming Solutions & Marketing), Radeon fans will definitely be getting some answers soon, as the company plans to discuss those very topics before the release of the Radeon RX 6900 XT, Radeon RX 6800 XT, and Radeon RX 6800.
“Those answers will come between now and our availability dates,” Azor tweeted. “Please stay tuned. Thank you for your support and interest.”
Those answers will come between now and our availability dates. Please stay tuned. Thank you for your support and interest.
— Frank Azor (@AzorFrank) October 29, 2020
We’re not sure why AMD didn’t just elaborate on ray tracing and its DLSS alternative during its RDNA 2 event, but this is good news for users who are on the market for a new graphics card and can’t decide whether they want to go with a Radeon or GeForce GPU this time around.
While AMD seems like a real winner based on performance, price, and efficiency, NVIDIA’s RTX and DLSS features make the choice a bit more complicated for gamers who are seeking the most cutting-edge technologies.
We previously shared early benchmarks for AMD’s Radeon RX 6800, which suggested that it could best a GeForce RTX 3070 and GeForce RTX 2080 Ti in Shadow of the Tomb Raider in 4K/WQHD, even with ray tracing enabled (DLSS off).
Assuming that those metrics hold true, ray tracing should be a lock for red team, but the upsampling technology that AMD has teased remains a mystery. What we do know is that red team’s DLSS alternative is being developed in cooperation with Microsoft and can be applied to any game, which gives it a big advantage over NVIDIA’s offering.
AMD’s Radeon RX 6800 XT ($649) and Radeon RX 6800 ($579) will be released on November 18, while the flagship Radeon RX 6900 XT ($999) will be released on December 8.