In the second half of 2022, NVIDIA officially released the RTX 40 series graphics cards. However, the reception and reputation within the digital community were generally poor, with criticisms of underwhelming performance and high prices, resulting in low value for money and discouraging purchases.
To make matters worse, the RTX 40 series graphics cards have recently increased in price, with most models experiencing a price hike of several hundred yuan. This includes the RTX 4060 series, often referred to as the “IQ cards.”
In this scenario, the RTX 40 SUPER series graphics cards have gained popularity among mid to high-end users. This article will compare the gaming performance of the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER and the Radeon RX 7900 XT for reference.
Despite the significant difference in the initial release prices of these two graphics cards, their actual market prices are currently quite close, ranging from approximately 5000 to 5500 Chinese yuan. Surprisingly, the Radeon XT is even slightly cheaper. Therefore, they are comparable options.
01
Parameter Comparison between RTX 4070 SUPER and RX 7900 XT
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER was released on January 8, 2024. It features the AD104-350 GPU based on the Ada Lovelace architecture, manufactured using TSMC’s 5-nanometer process. It boasts 7168 CUDA cores, 224 texture units, 80 rasterization units, 56 ray tracing cores, 56 multi-unit stream processors, 224 tensor cores, and a 48MB L2 cache.
The standard operating frequency is 1980 MHz, with a maximum boost frequency of 2475 MHz. It comes with 12GB of GDDR6X memory with a 192-bit memory interface, operating at 21Gbps, delivering a memory bandwidth of 504.2GB/s. The FP32 floating-point performance is rated at 35.48 TFLOPS, with a power consumption of 220W, and a suggested retail price of $599.
Radeon RX 7900 XT was released on November 3, 2022, based on the RDNA3 architecture, featuring the Navi31 GPU manufactured on TSMC’s 5-nanometer process. It has 5376 stream processors, 192 rasterization units, 336 texture units, 84 compute units, a 6MB L2 cache, and an 80MB L3 cache, along with 84 ray tracing cores.
The standard operating frequency is 1500 MHz, with a maximum boost frequency of 2394 MHz. It is equipped with 20GB of GDDR6 memory with a 320-bit memory interface, operating at 20 Gbps, providing a memory bandwidth of 800 GB/s. The FP32 floating-point performance is rated at 51.48 TFLOPS, with a power consumption of 300W, and a suggested retail price of $899.
02
Test Platform Configuration
The main configuration is as follows:
Processor: Ryzen 7 7800X3D Motherboard: MSI MPG X670E CARBON Memory: 32GB DDR5 6000MHz Storage: Two Samsung 970 SSDs Operating System: Windows 11
03
Game Performance Testing
Below are the results of testing seven games, all running at 1440P resolution with the highest graphics settings and ray tracing enabled. In the following series of images, the left side represents the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform, while the right side represents the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform.
① The first game tested is “Psychonauts 2”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 53 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 45 FPS
- Frame Time: 18.5ms
- CPU usage: 12%
- CPU power consumption: 43W
- CPU temperature: 50 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 9.6GB
- GPU usage: 97%
- VRAM usage: 9.2GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 64 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 53 FPS
- Frame Time: 15.5ms
- CPU usage: 13%
- CPU power consumption: 45W
- CPU temperature: 50 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 10.5GB
- GPU usage: 100%
- VRAM usage: 9.3GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits slightly higher CPU usage, memory usage, GPU usage, and VRAM usage compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. However, it achieves a notably higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, albeit with higher power consumption and temperature.
② The second game tested is “Avatar: Pandora Frontier”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 59 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 48 FPS
- Frame Time: 16.7ms
- CPU usage: 22%
- CPU power consumption: 52W
- CPU temperature: 50 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 16.6GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 11.5GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 63 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 54 FPS
- Frame Time: 16.3ms
- CPU usage: 24%
- CPU power consumption: 54W
- CPU temperature: 51 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 16.1GB
- GPU usage: 100%
- VRAM usage: 13.8GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits slightly higher CPU usage and lower memory usage compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. It achieves a slightly higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, with similar GPU usage, albeit with higher power consumption and temperature.
③ The third game tested is “Red Dead Redemption 2”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 97 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 84 FPS
- Frame Time: 8.1ms
- CPU usage: 37%
- CPU power consumption: 58W
- CPU temperature: 54 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 13.7GB
- GPU usage: 94%
- VRAM usage: 5.8GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 110 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 95 FPS
- Frame Time: 8.2ms
- CPU usage: 33%
- CPU power consumption: 57W
- CPU temperature: 55 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 12.6GB
- GPU usage: 100%
- VRAM usage: 6.6GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits slightly lower CPU usage and memory usage, but higher GPU usage and VRAM usage compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. It achieves a higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, with similar frame time, albeit with higher power consumption and temperature.
④ The fourth game tested is “Ghostwire: Tokyo”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 87 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 70 FPS
- Frame Time: 11.4ms
- CPU usage: 15%
- CPU power consumption: 67W
- CPU temperature: 49 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 11.9GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 7.3GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 113 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 88 FPS
- Frame Time: 9.0ms
- CPU usage: 18%
- CPU power consumption: 49W
- CPU temperature: 51 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 11.7GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 8.7GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits slightly higher CPU usage and VRAM usage, but similar GPU usage compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. It achieves a significantly higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, with lower frame time, albeit with higher power consumption and temperature.
⑤ The fifth game tested is “Microsoft Flight Simulator”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 90 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 81 FPS
- Frame Time: 11.2ms
- CPU usage: 25%
- CPU power consumption: 55W
- CPU temperature: 56 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 11.7GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 6.2GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 95 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 84 FPS
- Frame Time: 10.5ms
- CPU usage: 28%
- CPU power consumption: 57W
- CPU temperature: 59 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 11.6GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 6.6GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits slightly higher CPU usage, while memory and GPU usage are comparable to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. It achieves a slightly higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, with similar frame time and VRAM usage, albeit with slightly higher power consumption and temperature.
⑥ The sixth game tested is “Hogwarts Legacy”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 99 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 75 FPS
- Frame Time: 9.1ms
- CPU usage: 29%
- CPU power consumption: 56W
- CPU temperature: 64 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 19.8GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 9.5GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 122 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 86 FPS
- Frame Time: 7.1ms
- CPU usage: 33%
- CPU power consumption: 59W
- CPU temperature: 66 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 20.0GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 10.5GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits slightly higher CPU usage and VRAM usage, but similar GPU usage compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. It achieves a significantly higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, with lower frame time, albeit with slightly higher power consumption and temperature.
⑦ The seventh game tested is “Stellaris”
GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER
- Average Framerate: 74 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 56 FPS
- Frame Time: 12.1ms
- CPU usage: 50%
- CPU power consumption: 64W
- CPU temperature: 57 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 14.5GB
- GPU usage: 98%
- VRAM usage: 6.4GB
Radeon RX 7900 XT
- Average Framerate: 94 FPS
- Minimum Instantaneous Framerate: 70 FPS
- Frame Time: 10.5ms
- CPU usage: 60%
- CPU power consumption: 69W
- CPU temperature: 59 degrees Celsius
- Memory usage: 13.2GB
- GPU usage: 99%
- VRAM usage: 7.2GB
In this game, the Radeon RX 7900 XT platform exhibits significantly higher CPU usage, slightly lower memory usage, and comparable GPU and VRAM usage compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER platform. It achieves a noticeably higher average framerate and minimum instantaneous framerate, with lower frame time, albeit with higher power consumption and temperature.
04
Conclusion
The results are quite clear. While the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER boasts strong performance, it still falls slightly short compared to AMD’s flagship Radeon RX 7900 XT. Objectively speaking, the difference between the two is significant, but not insurmountable.
Based on the data collected, it can be roughly estimated that at 1440P resolution, with maximum graphics settings and ray tracing enabled, the gaming performance of the Radeon RX 7900 XT is at least 20% higher than that of the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER.
On the other hand, the weaknesses of the Radeon RX 7900 XT are also apparent, primarily its high power consumption. While AMD processors have seen notable improvements in power efficiency in recent years, the issue of high power consumption in their graphics cards remains.
In conclusion, if one prioritizes gaming performance and is willing to overlook the high power consumption, the Radeon RX 7900 XT offers better value for pure gaming enthusiasts. Conversely, if factors like productivity performance and power efficiency are important, then the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER is a more suitable choice. However, it’s worth noting that there is a significant performance gap between the two, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses overall.
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