Gameplay Performance at 4K
We have selected a suite of games to test the SAPPHIRE PULSE AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT at 4K. All our selections were set at the maximum in-game graphic settings or custom combinations. We will run the video card with and without Ray Tracing enabled in-game. DLSS and/or FSR are utilized in games that support the technology. Our video card will be compared to the ASUS TUF GeForce RTX 4070 Ti O12G-GAMING. The price of the RTX 4070 Ti places it in direct competition with the SAPPHIRE PULSE RX 7900 XT at $849.99 at the time of writing.
Call of Duty Modern Warfare II
Call of Duty Modern Warfare II was released on October 27, 2022, on the PC and uses the IW 9.0 gaming engine. The game supports all upscaling methods, including NVIDIA DLSS, NVIDIA Image Scaling, AMD FSR 1.0, AMD Fidelity FX CAS, and Intel XeSS. We use the highest quality option of each. We customize every graphics setting to the maximum value for the best image quality and enable everything. We use the built-in benchmark.
The SAPPHIRE PULSE AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT shows how well it handles plain rasterized games right off the bat. The gain over the ASUS RTX 4070 Ti is 19%, 25% with upscaling enabled. The overclock gained about 6%. Both video cards allow fast smooth gameplay, a big boost is seen with FSR enabled.
F1 2002
F1 2022 was released on June 28th, 2022 on the PC and uses Codemasters Ego engine. The game supports Ray Tracing, DLSS, AMD FidelityFX, and FSR. We ran the game with the highest quality settings of “Ultra High” and TAA+FidelityFX. DLSS and FSR were enabled as needed at the Quality setting for both. The built-in benchmark was used at the Imola track, in dry conditions with a far-chasing cam.
In this game once again we see the SAPPHIRE PULSE RX 7900 XT take the lead, but the margin is somewhat smaller, around 6%. Overclock did little here. Interestingly the default card ran away with things when FSR was enabled. 17% over the overclocked card and 26% over the ASUS RTX 4070 Ti.
Dying Light 2
Dying Light 2 was released in February 2022 on the PC. It uses Techland’s C-Engine and supports Ray Tracing for various environmental effects including Ray Traced Soft Shadows, Ray Traced Ambient Occlusion, Ray Traced Global Illumination, and Ray Traced Reflections. It also supports both DLSS and FSR 2.0 upscaling technologies. We are using the built-in benchmark.
Dying Light 2 is a very demanding game. As such, the result here is very close. Just 5% separate our SAPPHIRE PULSE RX 7900 XT video card from the ASUS card. Once again, overclock was not very significant, even with upscaling, which provided a 10% boost over the ASUS 4070 Ti. While our out-of-the-box card gained 25% with FSR 2.0 enabled. What is good to see here is the frame rate overall. Both cards have smooth playable results without any upscaling needed at the game’s highest settings.
Far Cry 6
Far Cry 6 was released in October of 2021 and uses the Dunia Engine. We utilize the built-in benchmark for testing. We have the HD Texture pack installed and turned on. We utilize the “Ultra” graphics preset which sets all options to the highest game settings. We also use the game’s support of AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution 1.0 to improve performance on both GPUs.
Far Cry is a beautiful game, but also fairly gentle on the graphics card. We see a dead heat between the overclocked and the default SAPPHIRE PULSE RX 7900 XT. This leaves the RTX 4070 Ti over 30% behind her. No rescue with FSR either. The PULSE RX 7900 XT is in a run-a-way.
Cyberpunk 2077
Cyberpunk 2077 was released in December 2020 and uses the REDengine 4. We have the game patched to version 1.61 for our testing and we are using the game’s built-in benchmark. We test using the Preset options for Ultra quality. This game also supports DLSS and AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution FSR 2.1. We test DLSS Quality on NVIDIA GPUs and FSR 2.1 Ultra Quality on AMD GPUs. Testing on our AMD video card shows no frame rate advantage FSR 1.0 versus FSR 2.1.
Cyberpunk remains a very graphically intense game. The patches over time have greatly improved the game in many ways but still takes muscle to run it well. Our out-of-the-box PULSE RX 7900 XT does well and beats the overclocked card by 7%. Pretty much a dead heat with FSR enabled. Again, the RTX 4070 Ti is unable to draw even. The margin is 18%.
Watch Dogs Legion
Watch Dogs Legion was released on the PC in October of 2020 and uses the Disrupt game engine. We utilize the built-in benchmark for testing. We have the HD Texture pack installed and enabled for testing. We use the built-in graphics preset of “Ultra” for testing. Only DLSS is available in this game as an upscaling option.
This is another graphically challenging game. The results are very close, but again the SAPPHIRE PULSE RX 7900 XT wins the day. The margin is 4%. Without FSR in the game, the ASUS RTX 4070 Ti wins that portion by default. Again, it is nice to see smooth playable framerates in a tough game without upscaling needed.