Radeon Vega Frontier Released

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Elixer

Lifer
May 7, 2002
10,376
762
126
You are choosing to ignore where they said if you are a gamer don't buy the FE but wait for the RX version. For it's intended use it should have a gaming mode, and it does.
No I'm not.
Where on that page do they say that?

They are the ones putting out these messages.
On one hand, they told some sites, people shouldn't buy the FE if you are a gamer.
On the other hand, that web sites clearly says, if you just want to game, just go into gaming mode, and game.

AMD's PR department keeps moving the goalposts, as if nobody would notice, they say one thing to one certain group of people, and another thing is written down on their own site.
Either change the site and make it clear, or AMD should stop saying it isn't a gaming card.

Pretty simple.
 
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3DVagabond

Lifer
Aug 10, 2009
11,951
204
106
No I'm not.
Where on that page do they say that?

They are the ones putting out these messages.
On one hand, they told some sites, people shouldn't buy the FE if you are a gamer.
On the other hand, that web sites clearly says, if you just want to game, just go into gaming mode, and game.

AMD's PR department keeps moving the goalposts, as if nobody would notice, they say one thing to one certain group of people, and another thing is written down on their own site.
Either change the site and make it clear, or AMD should stop saying it isn't a gaming card.

Pretty simple.
You are claiming that because they say it can game that they are promoting it that way. They tell you in that slide why there's a gaming mode. It's for game devs. They are not promoting it as a gaming card.
 

Bacon1

Diamond Member
Feb 14, 2016
3,430
1,018
91
They are the ones putting out these messages.
On one hand, they told some sites, people shouldn't buy the FE if you are a gamer.
On the other hand, that web sites clearly says, if you just want to game, just go into gaming mode, and game.

Pop quiz: What is the url?

https://pro.radeon.com/en-us/vega-frontier-edition/

PRO not RX which is the gaming brand

Lets try the title of the page?

Radeon™ Vega Frontier Edition: Empowering the New Generation of Data Scientists, Visualization Professionals, and Digital Pioneers

Hmm I don't see gamers in that list...

Now lets try the product page:

https://pro.radeon.com/en-us/product/radeon-vega-frontier-edition/

Once again "PRO"

What are all the first things mentioned?

BE FIRST. BE THE PIONEER.
The Radeon™ Vega Frontier Edition Story
Who are the pioneers? They are the ones who have cured diseases and strengthened our bodies. They work to heal our planet and explore new ones. They work to undo mankind’s mistakes and protect the next generation from making them again. Harnessing science to fuel creativity, and employing creativity to drive science. They pursue an unerring, unwavering path towards their goals. There are no barriers, no compromises. They are people who see boundaries as starting lines, and who risk everything in pursuit of innovation. They are the early adopters, the people whose passion is to pursue what is new and different. Their achievements won’t be measured in days, weeks or even years. They’ll be measured in centuries.



  • Empower Scientists to Explore New Frontiers
Training techniques used today on neural networks in machine intelligence and deep learning applications have become very complex and require the handling of massive amounts of data when training those networks to recognize patterns within that data. This requires lots of floating point computation spread across many cores, and traditional CPUs can’t handle this type of computation as efficiently as GPUs handle it. The Radeon™ Vega Frontier Edition, combined with our ROCm open software platform, paves the way for pioneers to continue pushing boundaries in fields like AI. Developers can now leverage the power of “Vega” architecture to do machine learning algorithm development on the Radeon Vega Frontier Edition graphics card before deploying it out to massive servers equipped with Radeon Instinct accelerators.

RADEON INSTINCT™ ACCELERATORS
  • Harness Vega to Fuel Creativity
Design visualization is playing an increasingly important role in helping manufacturers streamline design to manufacture workflows. Advanced technologies, including real-time visualization, physically-based rendering and virtual reality (VR), give design and manufacturing firms a powerful arsenal of visualization tools that can be used at all stages of product development. The Radeon™ Vega Frontier Edition graphics card provides the necessary performance required to drive these increasingly large and complex models through the design phase as well as rendering phase of product development. In the media and entertainment market, tasks like video editing, animation, post-production, and virtual reality (VR), require high-end graphics to support these workloads. They depend on compute speed and driver reliability more than ever for shorter load and rendering times. Closer partnerships with top software makers helps pair reliability with the raw power offered by our new Vega GPU architecture.

“VEGA” ARCHITECTURE
  • No Barriers. No Compromises.
Game development is a creatively demanding, time-intensive process and any solution that can streamline game design workflows is an extremely valuable benefit for developers. The Radeon™ Vega Frontier Edition graphics card will simplify and accelerate game creation by providing a single GPU that is optimized for every stage of their workflow, from asset production, to playtesting, to performance optimization. With AMD graphics technology found in many of today’s game consoles and PCs, developers can build and optimize next generation games for a large install base on the latest graphics technologies from AMD.

Hmm I don't see "GAMERS" listed. I see game developers, but mostly its aimed for more "Pro" tasks.

And there is a ton on that page all stating things other than gaming for what its used for. The only time gaming is mentioned is a link to a gaming driver (which right now is just the same single driver) and says to use "Game mode".

Its not marketed towards gamers at all.
 

thehoj

Member
Mar 28, 2006
87
3
71
Yep.. I'd love to have a FE to test out. I'm sad that all the tech reviewers aren't doing much in depth testing on it to see what makes it tick.

* Underclocking to 1050 to match Fury X
* Undervolting testing (since AMD often overvolts out of the box) @ 1600mhz
* DX11 vs DX12 / Async compute testing - See if its closer to Hawaii, Fiji or Polaris gains in games

It takes a little time for reviewers to gather this data and release it in a organized way.
Gamers Nexus has been going to town with these cards, looks like they just released one on comparing to Fury X

https://youtu.be/0l6Uc5kBrxY
 
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Bacon1

Diamond Member
Feb 14, 2016
3,430
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It takes a little time for reviewers to gather this data and release it in a organized way.
Gamers Nexus has been going to town with these cards, looks like they just released one on comparing to Fury X

https://youtu.be/0l6Uc5kBrxY

Yep been reading it this morning :)

Written version: http://www.gamersnexus.net/guides/2977-vega-fe-vs-fury-x-at-same-clocks-ipc

It does appear to be memory bandwidth bottlenecked (~5-6% lower 484 vs 512) and otherwise is acting just like Fury with no signs of any of the new architectural changes working.
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
16,029
4,798
136

Bacon1

Diamond Member
Feb 14, 2016
3,430
1,018
91
I saw that too not to mention that the fury x is clocked much lower yet produces the same or higher output.

I don't think you read the charts properly then, as the Fury X was actually slightly higher clocks than Vega FE since Vega FE was downclocked to same core and slightly under memory bandwidth. So Fury X wasn't clocked much lower...
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
16,029
4,798
136
I don't think you read the charts properly then, as the Fury X was actually slightly higher clocks than Vega FE since Vega FE was downclocked to same core and slightly under memory bandwidth. So Fury X wasn't clocked much lower...
I see that test shows the FE winning against the FE but the one I looked at clearly showed how at stock clocks the fury x was either matching or beating the FE in many games and it runs 600mhz slower. Personally I am not impressed with the FE at its price point.
 

Bacon1

Diamond Member
Feb 14, 2016
3,430
1,018
91
I see that test shows the FE winning against the FE but the one I looked at clearly showed how at stock clocks the fury x was either matching or beating the FE in many games and it runs 600mhz slower. Personally I am not impressed with the FE at its price point.

Relook at the data. Vega @ stock clocks (1400+) is always faster than Fury X.

Fury X @ 1050 / 512gbps and Vega FE @ 1050 / 484gbps is slightly slower.
 

Elixer

Lifer
May 7, 2002
10,376
762
126
<snip>
...
Its not marketed towards gamers at all.
So, you agree that
game.png

shouldn't have been there?

It doesn't say you want to TEST your game, it says I JUST WANT TO GAME!
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
16,029
4,798
136
So, you agree that
game.png

shouldn't have been there?

It doesn't say you want to TEST your game, it says I JUST WANT TO GAME!
Yes indeedy not to mention that they wouldn't hand out press samples forcing everyone to buy one in order to test it driving up early sales. I really want to support AMD again but they just aren't providing me with any reason to do so. If RX Vega is similarly priced compared to Nvidia another green team card will go into my next build as well.
 

turtile

Senior member
Aug 19, 2014
614
294
136
So, you agree that

It doesn't say you want to TEST your game, it says I JUST WANT TO GAME!

Please explain how one sentence explaining how to use the best driver for gaming is marketing for gaming.

That's like saying a DSLR camera designed for still images is no good because its video function isn't as good as a dedicated video camera.
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
16,029
4,798
136
Please explain how one sentence explaining how to use the best driver for gaming is marketing for gaming.

That's like saying a DSLR camera designed for still images is no good because its video function isn't as good as a dedicated video camera.
AMD is the one who planted the idea that this card is capable of gaming when you want to use it that way. Taking that sentence in context AMD implies that this card can function as a purely gaming capable device, however, it does so at previous generation levels and not at all in keeping with the consumer expectations they themselves have insinuated with their many presentations.
 

turtile

Senior member
Aug 19, 2014
614
294
136
AMD is the one who planted the idea that this card is capable of gaming when you want to use it that way. Taking that sentence in context AMD implies that this card can function as a purely gaming capable device, however, it does so at previous generation levels and not at all in keeping with the consumer expectations they themselves have insinuated with their many presentations.

It is capable of gaming which is why it has the option.

And it's a professional card, not a consumer card. Your average consumer doesn't have $1000 to blow on a graphics card along with the capabilities of building a computer.
 
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kawi6rr

Senior member
Oct 17, 2013
567
156
116
AMD is the one who planted the idea that this card is capable of gaming when you want to use it that way. Taking that sentence in context AMD implies that this card can function as a purely gaming capable device, however, it does so at previous generation levels and not at all in keeping with the consumer expectations they themselves have insinuated with their many presentations.

The card can play games, I don't see anywhere that it was unable to play a game. Clearly from above you can see it's not labeled a gaming card but it's capable of playing games. I don't understand why some people can't understand that.
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
16,029
4,798
136
More proof that the FE's capabilities (pro and gaming modes) are pure marketing BS.
 

zuzu

Junior Member
Jul 1, 2017
20
0
6
so that is pro card ,,and in reviews it make rly good vs quadro/titanxp ..but cant reach normal 1080 in games is wierd for me
 

Soulkeeper

Diamond Member
Nov 23, 2001
6,712
142
106
I don't think i'm going to be able to keep this card.
It just runs too hot/loud.
It gets over 90c at 5000rpm then apparently overheats and shuts down the system. I just can't keep this thing cool in southern california.

My only hope would be modified bios with lower voltages/clocks
 
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Fox5

Diamond Member
Jan 31, 2005
5,957
7
81
I don't think i'm going to be able to keep this card.
It just runs too hot/loud.
It gets over 90c at 5000rpm then apparently overheats and shuts down the system. I just can't keep this thing cool in southern california.

My only hope would be modified bios with lower voltages/clocks

Same issue for me, but I don't think it's overheating, rather the thing draws way more power than it should with it's boost speeds and my power supply cant keep up. Previous cards maxed at 250w but this is really like a 375w card, even the air cooled version.

However in gaming mode you can use AMD wattman to lower the clock speeds and voltages on the boost states. I'm keeping mine at 1267mhz and 1.0v and it runs cool and quiet now, granted I'm giving up some performance. The top 1 or 2 boost speeds aren't realistic for the card to maintain anyway without some serious airflow.
 

Soulkeeper

Diamond Member
Nov 23, 2001
6,712
142
106
As a linux user my only option is to force it into it's lowest dpm state 0: 852Mhz *
I can't manually set or even read any voltages/clocks
I can change the fan speed or force highest or lowest dpm on the core only.
 

3DVagabond

Lifer
Aug 10, 2009
11,951
204
106
No I'm not.
Where on that page do they say that?

They are the ones putting out these messages.
On one hand, they told some sites, people shouldn't buy the FE if you are a gamer.
On the other hand, that web sites clearly says, if you just want to game, just go into gaming mode, and game.

AMD's PR department keeps moving the goalposts, as if nobody would notice, they say one thing to one certain group of people, and another thing is written down on their own site.
Either change the site and make it clear, or AMD should stop saying it isn't a gaming card.

Pretty simple.
Stop playing dumb. We all know Raja said that.
 

Soulkeeper

Diamond Member
Nov 23, 2001
6,712
142
106
2 system crashes at the hottest point of the day with it forced in dpm low state, while I was trying to work.

I feel like I just got ripped off for $1000+

This card is worthless to me.
"not for gaming" or work ...
Back to using my 7870, I guess i'll have to pay a 20% restocking fee at newegg ?
 

Elixer

Lifer
May 7, 2002
10,376
762
126
2 system crashes at the hottest point of the day with it forced in dpm low state, while I was trying to work.

I feel like I just got ripped off for $1000+

This card is worthless to me.
"not for gaming" or work ...
Back to using my 7870, I guess i'll have to pay a 20% restocking fee at newegg ?
You recall what the crashes were?
We talking BSOD/reboot system, or did you see a crash dialog?
 

Soulkeeper

Diamond Member
Nov 23, 2001
6,712
142
106
Basically just a system lockup. Sound and the mouse were still working for awhile, then those stopped too and I had to press the power button.
Since i'm using linux and there is no official support for this card in the kernel/llvm/mesa it's my own fault I guess ... (i'm forced to use dev versions of everything).
It'll take atleast another month or two before official versions start supporting it from what I gather.
and since I don't use ubuntu/fedora the proprietary amdgpu-pro isn't an option (I prefer the open amdgpu).

It's entirely possible the instability is software related of course, but I suspect not.
The crashes only happen during the hot times of day. Maybe some of the power saving or clock gating features aren't yet implemented or something.
 
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