AMD’s new graphics cards are a hot commodity, but the latest leak is sure to leave PC gamers with mixed feelings. It all depends on how much money you’re willing to invest in your own PC build.
Now that Nvidia still dominates the high-end in the battle for the best graphics cardsAMD senior vice president Jack Huynh recently revealed in an interview with Tom’s Hardware that Team Red plans to scale back its ambitions for flagship gaming GPUs, saying that “my top priority right now is to create scale” – meaning the focus will be more on the mid-range and affordable market when it comes to gaming graphics cards.
Immediately after Huynh’s statements, new leaks from Chinese tech site Bank life have indicated that we will see at least four new GPUs featuring AMD’s new RDNA 4 graphics architecture, split across two ‘Navi 44’ and two ‘Navi 48’ cards.
For the uninitiated, ‘Navi’ is the codename for subsections of AMD’s GPU microarchitecture; for example, last year Radeon RX 7600 XT is built on the Navi 33 architecture. These new Navi 44 and 48 cards will likely be sold under the Radeon RX 8000 family branding, marking AMD’s first foray into an entirely new generation of desktop GPUs.
While there isn’t a ton of information available on these four cards at this time, we do know that they’ll all feature GDDR6 VRAM. And based on Huynh’s new goals for AMD’s graphics department, it’d be fair to assume that none of them will be directly competing with the RTX 5090 rumors from Nvidia. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s likely we’ll get an RX 8700 XT and XTX, along with a more affordable RX 8600 XT and XTX, since Some previous leaks have hinted at.
Opinion: AMD’s reorientation is a smart move right now
While some Team Red fans will undoubtedly lament the lack of a flagship GPU in the upcoming RDNA 4 generation (which probably (like the Radeon RX 8900 XTX), it’s fair to say that this could be a smart move by AMD. Nvidia has absolutely dominated the high-end space with its current RTX-4090 – to the point where it effectively canceled a potential RTX 4090 Ti because let’s face it, it would have been over the top.
Huynh rightly analyses that AMD needs to grow its market share in PC graphics, and the right way to do that is to attack the midrange and budget arenas hard. Nvidia is no slouch in that area – the RTX-4060 is a fantastic GPU, but AMD has a much better chance of winning this battle than the battle with Team Green at the top of the list.
AMD already has some areas of the graphics market effectively under its belt: the growing popularity of gaming handhelds has undoubtedly been a boon for the company, as it has allowed it to leverage the processors used in handheld PCs, such as the excellent Asus ROG Ally X, Lenovo Legion Goand of course Vavle’s Steam deckAMD is also working with Sony and Microsoft to produce custom chips for current-generation home consoles.
But when it comes to desktop and laptop GPUs, Team Red has been playing second fiddle to Nvidia for too long. With its rival fully committed to AI At this point AMD needs to establish itself as the real choice for PC gamers everywhere. I hope this new strategy will be successful.