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Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ test: RTX 3060 falls even further behind

Total War Saga: Troy

The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

The embargo on Radeon RX 6650 XT, RX 6750 XT and RX 6950 XT tests has expired and we can now fully devote ourselves to them, including in detailed analyses. Although the number of computing units hasn’t increased and even the older RX 6600 XT, RX 6700 XT and RX 6900 XT graphics have had their graphics cores completely unlocked, the boost frequencies are guaranteed to be higher and the memory is also faster.

For the tested Sapphire model, the RX 6650 XT Nitro+ has an official GPU boost speedup (over the RX 6600 XT Nitro+) of 87 MHz (to a final 2694 MHz) and a 9.4 % increase in memory bandwidth as well. The memory bus width is the same (128 bits), but the memory modules themselves are faster, 17.5 GHz are used instead of the effective 16 GHz. These are the weapons with which AMD wants to significantly distance itself from the competing GeForce RTX 3060. The intended use remains unchanged – with the RX 6650 XT to be primarily for gaming in Full HD resolution.

The Radeon RX 6650 XT is built on the Navi 23 GPU, has 2048 shaders and 8GB of GDDR6 memory. The interface used is PCI Express 4.0, but only eight lanes of it. A detailed listing of all parameters can be found in the chart in the second chapter of the article.

Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ in detail

For how short this graphics card is (270 mm), it has a high weight. At 850 grams, it outweighs even some three-fan models. Compared to the previous design (for the RX 6600 XT Nitro+), the heatsink is both longer and taller. The total fin area seems to have increased disproportionately to the small increase in power draw. But that’s a good thing, as it makes room for more efficient cooling. The heatsink even added one heatpipe, now there are an even number of them, four in total.

The shape of the fan rotor has also changed. Although Sapphire still relies on narrow and distinctly curved blades, in this case they added a sharp bend in the middle. This has interfered with the smooth curvature, which will also affect the airflow trajectory. Hopefully in a positive way and that will make these fans more efficient per unit of acoustic pressure. To achieve higher pressure, the blade ends are recessed into the solid frame that lines the rotor. The edges of heatsink fins, which break up the fan air, are in turn serrated. This is in order to reduce mechanical resistance and thus the overall noise level. It may be cosmetic, but when such subtleties add up, they are crucial to the quality of the cooler.

   

The backplate is metal, made of aluminum and is also involved in the cooling of the VRM. However, it is no longer in contact with the thermal pad in the areas behind the memory. But maybe this is because the memory modules would be heated by the voltage regulators rather than cooled. Furthermore, the backplate shroud has quite a lot of holes in it, so the warm air has an escape route. The biggest one is in the back, where there is a large window through which the fan blows through the heatsink. This is in the part that extends beyond the PCB of the graphics card. At the end of it is a 3-pin connector for connecting accessories with ARGB LEDs. The lighting control is possible via the company’s TriXX app.

There is also a three-position BIOS switch on the side of the graphics card. The far left position is the “performance” mode with the highest frequencies, in the middle is the slightly slower “silent” and the far right position is for software switching.

   

All our results are measured in “performance” mode (abbreviated as “P” in the graph descriptions). This is because the difference in noise and temperatures is really negligible, and “performance” does not mean that the cooler is noisy. On the contrary, regardless of the BIOS choice, it is always quiet.

   

The video outputs are in a 3+1 configuration with a majority of DisplayPort (1.4a) and a HDMI (2.1) connector. All four outputs can be used simultaneously.

Let’s take another look at the height of the graphics card. Count on the fact that at 58 mm it will block two more slots below its own, one more than the RX 6600 XT Nitro+.

The graphics card is tested without the TriXX boost function. Sapphire always urges to use it, but this is probably to achieve higher fps in tests, albeit at the expense of (lower) visual quality, which you don’t see in the charts. So if you saw significantly better results from Sapphire graphics cards in some of the other tests, such an uneven setup may be behind them.

Note: We will release tests with AMD SAM later. It was not possible to do it in one article. We got to the drivers too late. However, you will not be deprived of the results. And why do the measurements with Resizable BAR turned off take priority? Because they are consistent, while the conditions with ReBAR are quite volatile and what was true a month ago may no longer be true, so it’s not a surprise if the RX 6650 XT results are above the RX 6700 XT or, conversely, below the RX 6600 XT as time passes (this can’t be ruled out either, ReBAR sometimes, typically in non-gaming environments, even reduces performance).



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

ParametersSapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+
ArchitectureAMD RDNA 2
DieNavi 23
Manufacturing node7 nm TSMC
Die size237 mm²
Transistor count11,06 mld.
Compute units32 CU
Shaders/CUDA cores2048
Base Clock2192 MHz
Game Clock (AMD)2523 MHz
Boost Clock2694 MHz
RT units32
AI/tensor cores
ROPs64
TMUs128
L2 Cache2 MB
Infinity Cache32 MB
InterfacePCIe 4.0 ×8
Multi-GPU interconnect
Memory8 GB GDDR6
Memory clock (effective)17.5 GHz
Memory bus128 bit
Memory bandwidth280.1 GB/s
Pixel fillrate172.4 Gpx/s
Texture fillrate344.8 Gtx/s
FLOPS (FP32)11.4 TFLOPS
FLOPS (FP64)689.6 GFLOPS
FLOPS (FP16)22.07 TFLOPS
AI/tensor TOPS (INT8)
AI/tensor FLOPS (FP16)
TDP176 W
Power connectors8-pin
Card lenght270 mm
Card slots used58 mm
Shader Model6.5
DirectX/Feature LevelDX 12 Ultimate (12_2)
OpenGL4.6
Vulkan1.2
OpenCL2.1
CUDA
Video encoder engineVCN 3.0
Encoding formatsHEVC, H.264
Encoding resolution4K
Video decoder engineVCN 3.0
Decoding formatsHEVC,H.264,VP9, AV1
Decoding resolution8K
Max. Monitor resolution7680 × 4320 px
HDMI1× 2.1
DisplayPort3× 1.4a
USB-C
MSRP539 eur/13 483 Kč
/* Here you can add custom CSS for the current table */ /* Lean more about CSS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascading_Style_Sheets */ /* To prevent the use of styles to other tables use "#supsystic-table-1439" as a base selector for example: #supsystic-table-1439 { ... } #supsystic-table-1439 tbody { ... } #supsystic-table-1439 tbody tr { ... } */




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Gaming tests

The largest sample of tests is from games. This is quite natural given that GeForce and Radeons, i.e. cards primarily intended for gaming use, will mostly be tested.

We chose the test games primarily to ensure the balance between the titles better optimized for the GPU of one manufacturer (AMD) or the other one (Nvidia). But we also took into account the popularity of the titles so that you could find your own results in the charts. Emphasis was also placed on genre diversity. Games such as RTS, FPS, TPS, car racing as well as a flight simulator, traditional RPG and sports games are represented by the most played football game. You can find a list of test games in the library of chapters (9–32), with each game having its own chapter, sometimes even two (chapters) for the best possible clarity, but this has its good reason, which we will share with you in the following text.

Before we start the gaming tests, each graphics card will pass the tests in 3D Mark to warm up to operating temperature. That’s good synthetics to start with.

We’re testing performance in games across three resolutions with an aspect ratio of 16:9 – FHD (1920 × 1080 px), QHD (2560 × 1440 px) and UHD (3840 × 2160 px) and always with the highest graphic settings, which can be set the same on all current GeForce and Radeon graphics cards. We turned off proprietary settings for the objectivity of the conclusions, and the settings with ray-tracing graphics are tested separately, as lower class GPUs do not support them. You will find their results in the complementary chapters. In addition to native ray-tracing, also after deploying Nvidia DLSS (2.0) and AMD FidelityFX CAS.

If the game has a built-in benchmark, we use that one (the only exception is Forza Horizon 4, where due to its instability – it used to crash here and there – we drive on our track), in other cases the measurements take place on the games’ own scenes. From those we capture the times of consecutive frames in tables (CSV) via OCAT, which FLAT interprets into intelligible fps speech. Both of these applications are from the workshop of colleagues from the gpureport.cz magazine. In addition to the average frame rate, we also write the minimum in the graphs. That contributes significantly to the overall gaming experience. For the highest possible accuracy, all measurements are repeated three times and the final results form their average value.

Computational tests

Testing the graphics card comprehensively, even in terms of computing power, is more difficult than drawing conclusions from the gaming environment. Just because such tests are usually associated with expensive software that you don’t just buy for the editorial office. On the other hand, we’ve found ways to bring the available computing performance to you. On the one hand, thanks to well-built benchmarks, on the other hand, there are also some freely available and at the same time relevant applications, and thirdly, we have invested something in the paid ones.

The tests begin with ComputeBench, which computes various simulations (including game graphics). Then we move on to the popular SPECviewperf benchmark (2020), which integrates partial operations from popular 2D and 3D applications, including 3Ds max and SolidWorks. Details on this test package can be found at spec.org. From the same team also comes SPECworkstation 3, where GPU acceleration is in the Caffe and Folding@Home tests. You can also find the results of the LuxMark 3.1 3D render in the graphs, and the remarkable GPGPU theoretical test also includes AIDA64 with FLOPS, IOPS and memory speed measurements.

For obvious reasons, 3D rendering makes the largest portion of the tests. This is also the case, for example, in the Blender practical tests (2.91). In addition to Cycles, we will also test the cards in Eevee and radeon ProRender renderers (let AMD have a related test, as most are optimized for Nvidia cards with proprietary CUDA and OptiX frameworks). Of course, an add-on for V-ray would also be interesting, but at the moment the editorial office can’t afford it, we may manage to get a “press” license in time, though, we’ll see. We want to expand application tests in the future. Definitely with some advanced AI testing (we haven’t come up with a reasonable way yet), including noise reduction (there would be some ideas already, but we haven’t incorporated those due to time constraints).

Graphics cards can also be tested well in photo editing. To get an idea of the performance in the popular Photoshop, we’re using a script in PugetBench, which simulates real work with various filters. Among them are those that use GPU acceleration. A comprehensive benchmark suggesting the performance of raster and vector graphics is then also used in alternative Affinity Photo. In Lightroom, there are remarkable color corrections (Enhance Details) of raw uncompressed photos. We apply these in batches to a 1 GB archive. All of these tasks can be accelerated by both GeForce and Radeon.

From another perspective, there are decryption tests in Hashcat with a selection of AES, MD5, NTLMv2, SHA1, SHA2-256/512 and WPA-EAPOL-PBKDF2 ciphers. Finally, in the OBS and XSplit broadcast applications, we measure how much the game performance will be reduced while recording. It is no longer provided by shaders, but by coders (AMD VCE and Nvidia Nvenc). These tests show how much spare performance each card has for typical online streaming.

There are, of course, more hardware acceleration options, typically for video editing and conversion. However, this is purely in the hands of encoders, which are always the same within one generation of cards from one manufacturer, so there is no point in testing them on every graphics card. It is different across generations and tests of this type will sooner or later appear. Just fine-tuning the metric is left, where the output will always have the same bitrate and pixel match. This is important for objective comparisons, because the encoder of one company/card may be faster in a particular profile with the same settings, but at the expense of the lower quality that another encoder has (but may not have, it’s just an example).



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Methodology: how we measure power draw

We have been tuning the method of measuring power draw for quite a long time and we will also be tuning it for some time. But we already have gimmicks that we can work with happily.

To get the exact value of the total power draw of the graphics card, it is necessary to map the internal power draw on the PCI Express slot and the external one on the additional power supply. For the analysis of the PCIe slot, it was necessary to construct an in-between card on which the power draw measurement takes place. Its basis is resistors calibrated to the exact value (0.1 Ω) and according to the amount of their voltage drop we can calculate the current. We then substitute it into the formula for the corresponding value of the output voltage ~ 12 V and ~ 3.3 V. The voltage drop is so low that it doesn’t make the VRM of the graphics card unstable and the output is still more than 12/3.3 V.

We measure power consumption on the card between the graphics card and the PCI Express slot. Rado Kopera took care of the design and implementation (thank you!)

We are also working on a similar device for external power supply. However, significantly higher currents are achieved there, longer cabling and more passages between connectors are necessary, which means that the voltage drop will have to be read on an even smaller resistance of 0.01 Ω, the current state (with 0.1 Ω) is unstable for now. Until we fine-tune it, we will use Prova 15 current clamp for cable measurements, which also measures with good accuracy, they just have a range of up to 30 A. But that is also enough for the OC version of the RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio. If a card is over the range, it is always possible to split the consumption measurement (first into one half and then into the other half of the 12 V conductors).

And why bother with such devices at all when Nvidia has a PCAT power draw analyzer? For complete control over the measurements. While our devices are transparent, the Nvidia’s tool uses the processor that can (but of course does not have to) affect the measurements. After testing the AMD graphics card on the Nvidia’s tool, we probably wouldn’t sleep well.

To read and record measurements, we use a properly calibrated multimeter Keysight U1231A, which exports samples to XLS. From it we obtain the average value and by substituting into the formula with the exact value of the subcircuit output voltages we obtain the data for the graphs.

   

We will analyze the line graphs with the waveforms for each part of the power supply separately. Although the 3.3 V value is usually negligible, it needs to be monitored. It is difficult to say what exactly this subcircuit powers, but usually the consumption on it is constant and when it changes only with regard to whether a static or dynamic image is rendered. We measure consumption in two sort of demanding games (F1 2020 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider) and one less demanding one (CS:GO) with the highest graphic details preset and UHD resolution (3840 × 2560 px). Then in 3D rendering in Blender using the Cycles renderer on the famous Classroom scene. However, in addition to high-load tests, it’s important to know your web browser consumption (which, in our case, is accelerated Google Chrome), where we also spend a lot of time watching videos or browsing the web. The usual average load of this type is represented by the FishIE Tank (HTML5) website with 20 fish and the web video in our power draw tests is represented by a sample with the VP9 codec, data rate of 17.4 mb/s and 60 fps. In contrast, we also test offline video consumption, in VLC player on a 45 HEVC sample (45.7 mb/s, 50 fps). Finally, we also record the power consumption of the graphics card on the desktop of idle Windows 10 with one or two active UHD@60 Hz monitors.


The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Noise measurement…

Noise, as well as other operating characteristics, which we will focus on, we’re measuring in the same modes as consumption, so that the individual values overlap nicely. In addition to the level of noise produced, we also record the frequency response of the sound, the course of the GPU clock speed and its temperature.

In this part of the methodology description, we will present something about the method of noise measurement. We use a Reed R8080 sound level meter, which we continuously calibrate with a calibrated Voltcraft SLC-100 digital sound level meter. A small addition to the sound level meter is a parabola-shaped collar, which has two functions. Increases the sensitivity to distinguish the sound produced even at very low speeds. It is thus possible to better compare even very quiet cards with the largest possible ratio difference. Otherwise (without this adjustment) it could simply happen that we measured the same noise level across several graphics cards, even though it would actually be a little different. This parabolic shield also makes sense because, from the outer convex side (from the back), it reflects all the parasitic sounds that everyone who really aims for accuracy of the measurements struggles with during the test. These are various cracks of the body or objects in the room during normal human activity.

To ensure the same conditions when measuring the noise level (and later also the sound), we use acoustic panels with a foam surface around the bench-wall. This is so that the sound is always reflected to the sound level meter sensor in the same way, regardless of the current situation of the objects in the test room. These panels are from three sides (top, right and left) and their purpose is to soundproof the space in which we measure the noise of graphics cards. Soundproofing means preventing different reflections of sound and oscillations of waves between flat walls. Don’t confuse it with sound-absorbing, we’ve had that solved well in the test lab for a long time.

During the measurements, the sound level meter sensor is always placed on a tripod at the same angle and at the same distance (35 cm) from the PCI Express slot in which the graphics card is installed. Of course, it’s always closer to the card itself, depending on its depth. The indicated reference point and the sensor angles are fixed. In addition to the “aerodynamic noise” of the coolers, we also measure the noise level of whining coils. Then we stop the fans for a moment. And for the sake of completeness, it should be added that during sound measurements, we also switch off the power supply fan as well as the CPU cooler fan. Thus, purely the graphics card is always measured without any distortion by other components.

…and the sound frequency response

From the same place, we also measure the frequency of the sound produced. One thing is the noise level (or sound pressure level in decibels) and the other thing is its frequency response.

According to the data on the noise level, you can quickly find out whether the graphics card is quieter or noisier, or where it is on the scale, but it is still a mix of different frequencies. Thus, it does not say whether the sound produced is more booming (with a lower frequency) or squeaking (with a high frequency). The same 35 dBA can be pleasant but also unpleasant for you under certain circumstances – it depends on each individual how they perceive different frequencies. For this reason, we will also measure the frequency response of the sound graphics card in addition to the noise level, via the TrueRTA application. The results will be interpreted in the form of a spectrograph with a resolution of 1/24 octave and for better comparison with other graphics cards we will include the dominant frequency of lower (20–200 Hz), medium (201–2,000 Hz) and higher (2,001–20,000 Hz) sound spectrum into standard bar graphs. For measurements, we’re using a calibrated miniDSP UMIK-1 microphone, which accurately copies the position of the sound level meter, but also has a collar, even with the same focal length.

At the end of this chapter, it should be noted that measurements of noise and frequency response of sound will be performed on most cards only in load tests, as out of load and at lower load (including video decoding) operation is usually passive with fans turned off. On the other hand, we must also be prepared for exceptions with active operation in idle or graphics cards with dual BIOS setup, from which the more powerful one never turns off the fans and they run at least at minimum speed. Finally, as with measuring the noise level in one of the tests, we also record the frequency response of whining coils. But don’t expect any dramatic differences here. It will usually be one frequency, and the goal is rather to detect any potential anomalies. The sound of the whining coils is of course variable, depending on the scene, but we always measure in the same scene (in CS:GO@1080p).



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Methodology: temperature tests

We’re also bringing you temperature tests. You are at HWCooling after all. However, in order to make it sensible at all to monitor temperatures on critical components not only of the graphics card, but anything in the computer, it is important to simulate a real computer case environment with healthy air circulation. The overall behavior of the graphics card as such then follows from this. In many cases, an open bench-table is inappropriate and results can be distorted. Therefore, during all, not only heat tests, but also measurement of consumption or course of graphics core frequencies, we use a wind tunnel with equilibrium flow.

Two Noctua NF-S12A fans are at the inlet and the same number is on the exhaust.When testing various system cooling configurations, this proved to be the most effective solution. The fans are always set to 5 V and the speed corresponds to approx. 550 rpm. The stability of the inlet air is properly controlled during the tests, the temperature being between 21 and 21.3 °C at a humidity of ±40 %.

We read the temperature from the internal sensors via GPU-Z. This small, single-purpose application also allows you to record samples from sensors in a table. From the table, it is then easy to create line graphs with waveforms or the average value into bar graphs. We will not use the thermal camera very much here, as most graphics cards have a backplate, which makes it impossible to measure the PCB heating. The key for the heating graphs will be the temperature reading by internal sensors, according to which, after all, the GPU frequency control also takes place. It will always be the heating of the graphics core, and if the sensors are also on VRAM and VRM, we will extract these values into the article as well.



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Test rig

CPU AMD Ryzen 9 5900X
Cooler Noctua NH-U14S
Motherboard MSI MEG X570 Ace
Memory Patriot Blackout (4× 8 GB, 3600 MHz/CL18)
2× SSD Patriot Viper VPN100 (512 GB + 2 TB)
PSU BeQuiet! Dark Power Pro 12 1200 W

Test configuration
ProcessorAMD Ryzen 9 5900X
CPU CoolerNoctua NH-U14S@12 V s NT-H2
MotherboardMSI MEG X570 Ace
Memory (RAM)Patriot Blackout, 4× 8 GB, 3600 MHz/CL18
SSD2× Patriot Viper VPN100 (512 GB + 2 TB)
PSUBeQuiet! Dark Power Pro 12 (1200 W)
/* Here you can add custom CSS for the current table */ /* Lean more about CSS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascading_Style_Sheets */ /* To prevent the use of styles to other tables use "#supsystic-table-979" as a base selector for example: #supsystic-table-979 { ... } #supsystic-table-979 tbody { ... } #supsystic-table-979 tbody tr { ... } */

Note.: At the time of testing, graphics drivers AMD Adrenalin 22.10.01.02, and the OS Windows 10 Enterprise build is 19042.



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

3DMark

For the tests we’re using 3DMark Professional and the Night Raid (DirectX12) is suitable for comparing weaker GPUs, for more powerful ones there is Fire Strike (DirectX11) and Time Spy (DirectX12).





The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Age of Empires II: DE

Test platform benchmark, API DirectX 11; graphics setting preset Ultra; no extra settings.








The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12; graphics setting preset Ultra High; no extra settings.






   



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Battlefield V

Test platform custom scene (War stories/Under no flag); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; TAA high; no extra settings.






   



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Battlefield V s DXR

Test platform custom scene (War stories/Under no flag); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; TAA high; extra settings DXR.







Note: The game also supports DLSS, but as it’s an older title and there are many tests, we will not address it in standard tests. However, measurements on request are possible if you ask for it.



The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Borderlands 3

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; TAA; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Control

Test platform custom scene (Polaris chapter); API DirectX 11, graphics setting preset High; no extra settings.









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Control s DXR

Test platform custom scene (Polaris chapter); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset High; extra settings DXR.

   

DXR (native)









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Counter-Strike: GO

Test platform benchmark (Dust 2 map tour); API DirectX 9, graphics setting preset High; 4× MSAA; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Cyberpunk 2077

Test platform custom scene (Little China); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Cyberpunk 2077 with DXR

Disclaimer: Starting with the Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ test, we discarded the old results and started collecting new ones. That’s because as part of a game update, the raytracing graphics options changed and it was no longer possible to continue with the previous settings.

Test platform custom scene (Little China); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; extra settings Ray Tracing on (Ultra), FidelityFX sharpening off.

DXR (native)









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

DOOM Eternal

Test platform custom scene; API Vulkan, graphics setting preset Ultra Nightmare; no extra settings.






      




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

F1 2020

Test platform benchmark (Australia, Clear/Dry, Cycle); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra High; TAA; extra settings Skidmarks blending off*.






   


*on GeForce graphics cards, the Skidmarks blending option is disabled. This option is missing on AMD graphics cards. However, the overall quality of Skidmarks is otherwise set to High on both GeForce and AMD.
Note: The game also supports DLSS 2.0 and FidelityFX for upscaling and sharpening, but due to the relatively low hardware requirements in the native settings, we will not address them in standard tests. However, measurements on request are possible if you ask for it.




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

FIFA 21

Test platform custom scene (Autumn/Fall, Overcast, 9pm, Old Trafford); API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; no extra settings.









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Forza Horizon 4

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; 2× MSAA; no extra settings.






      




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Mafia: DE

Test platform custom scene (from the Salieri’s Bar parking lot to the elevated railway gate); API DirectX 11, graphics setting preset High; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Metro Exodus

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Extreme; no extra settings.









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Metro Exodus s DXR

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Ultra; extra settings DXR.

DXR (native)









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Microsoft Flight Simulator

Disclaimer: We do not use the results from this game to calculate average game performance. This is because updates often change the game’s performance and when they do, we start building the results database from scratch. To check the consistency of the MFS results, we run a test scene with the MSI RTX 3080 Gaming X Trio before testing each new graphics card.

Test platform custom scene (Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Air Traffic: AI, February 14, 9:00) autopilot:from 1000 until hitting the terrain; API DirectX 11, graphics setting preset Ultra; TAA; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Red Dead Redemption 2 (Vulkan)

Test platform custom scene; API Vulkan, graphics setting preset Favor Quality; no extra settings.






      




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Red Dead Redemption 2 (Dx12)

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Favor Quality; no extra settings.









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Highest; TAA; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider s DXR

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics setting preset Highest; extra settings DXR.






Note: This game also supports DLSS and FidelityFX CAS, but since this is an older title and there are more than enough tests, we will not address this setting in standard tests. However, testing on request is possible if you ask for it.




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Total War Saga: Troy

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 11, graphics setting preset Ultra; 4× AA, no extra settings.









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Wasteland 3

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 11, graphics setting preset Ultra; no extra settings.






   




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Overall gaming performance

We calculate the average performance so that each game has an equal weight on the result. You can find out exactly how we arrive at the result in this article





Performance per euro






The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

CompuBench 2.0 (OpenCL)

Test platform benchmark; API OpenCL; no extra settings.

Game Effects



Advanced Compute




High Quality Computer Generated Imagery and Rendering



Computer Vision


The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

SPECviewperf 2020

Test platform benchmark; API OpenGL a DirectX; no extra settings.









SPECworkstation 3





The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

FLOPS, IOPS and memory speed tests

Test platform benchmark; app version 6.32.5600; no extra settings.













The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

LuxMark

Test platform benchmark; API OpenCL; no extra settings.



Blender@Cycles

Test platform render BMW and Classroom; renderer Cycles, 12 tiles; extra settings OpenCL.





The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Blender@Radeon ProRender

Test platform render BMW and Classroom; renderer Radeon ProRender, 1024 samples; extra settings OpenCL.


Blender@Eevee

Test platform animation render Ember Forest; renderer Eevee, 350 images; extra settings OpenCL.

Render Ember Forest in Blender 2.92




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Photo editing

Adobe Photoshop: Test platform PugetBench; no extra settings.







Affinity Photo: Test platform built-in benchmark; no extra settings.


Adobe Lightroom*: Test platform custom 1-gigabyte archive of 42 RAW photos (CR2) from a DSLR; no extra settings.




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Broadcasting

OBS Studio and XSplit: Test platform F1 2020 game benchmark; extra nastavenia enabled encoders AMD VCE/Nvidia Nvenc (AVC/H.264), output resolution 2560 × 1440 px (60 fps), target bitrate 19,700 kbps.







The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Password cracking

Test platform Hashcat; no extra settings. You can easily try the tests yourself. Just download the binary and enter the cipher you are interested in using the numeric code on the command line.











The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

GPU clock speed









The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

GPU temperatures











The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Net graphics card power draw









Performance per watt






The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Analysis of 12 V branch power supply (higher load)








The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Analysis of 12 V branch power supply (lower load)













The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Analysis of 3.3 V branch power supply

A view of the in-between card for power draw measurement from the PCI Express slot. 3.3 V branch












The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Noise level








The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Frequency response of sound

Measurements are performed in the TrueRTA application, which records sound in a range of 240 frequencies in the recorded range of 20–20,000 Hz. For the possibility of comparison across articles, we export the dominant frequency from the low (20–200 Hz), medium (201–2,000 Hz) and high (2,001–20,000 Hz) range to standard bar graphs.

However, for an even more detailed analysis of the sound expression, it is important to perceive the overall shape of the graph and the intensity of all frequencies/tones. If you don’t understand something in the graphs or tables below, you’ll find the answers to all your questions in this article. This explains how to read the measured data below correctly.

The microphone we use to analyze the sound of coolers and coils



Graphics cardDominant sound freq. and noise level in F1 2020@2160pNF-F12 PWMNF-A15 PWM
Low rangeMid rangeHigh range
Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]
Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off184,9-82,31107,9-71,46834,4-82,2
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR onSapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR on100,8-71,81356,1-72,76088,7-80,9
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR offSapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR off100,8-71,8219,8-74,56088,7-81,0
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR on50,4-77,01076,3-56,52031,9-69,4
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR off50,4-75,91076,3-56,72031,9-69,6
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR onSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR on138,5-62,41107,9-56,611166,8-74,7
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR offSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR on138,5-61,91107,9-55,65747,0-74,7
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR on100,8-73,21076,3-71,27034,6-76,5
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off100,8-75,21076,3-73,57034,6-76,5
MSI RTX 3060 Ti Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-70,61107,9-82,87034,6-83,7
Gigabyte RTX 3060 Eagle OC 12G, ReBAR off100,8-71,6213,6-64,32031,9-74,2
MSI RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-72,31076,3-76,04561,4-81,2
MSI RTX 3070 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-73,91076,3-79,76267,2-85,1
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR on100,8-71,01076,3-66,59665,3-81,3
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR off100,8-71,81107,9-67,42091,4-75,3
TUF RTX 3080 O10G Gaming, ReBAR off100,8-76,01107,9-77,97034,6-74,4
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR on100,8-71,61107,9-74,710848,9-76,3
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR off100,8-73,01107,9-74,710848,9-76,5
/* Here you can add custom CSS for the current table */ /* Lean more about CSS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascading_Style_Sheets */ /* To prevent the use of styles to other tables use "#supsystic-table-1433" as a base selector for example: #supsystic-table-1433 { ... } #supsystic-table-1433 tbody { ... } #supsystic-table-1433 tbody tr { ... } */



Graphics cardDominant sound freq. and noise level in SOTTR@2160pNF-F12 PWMNF-A15 PWM
Low rangeMid rangeHigh range
Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]
Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off47,6-84,31107,9-75,96834,4-82,8
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR on100,8-68,81356,1-75,76088,7-82,6
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR off100,8-69,51356,1-74,85915,4-83,1
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR on44,9-73,01045,7-50,32031,9-60,5
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR off41,8-72,61076,3-51,42031,9-60,7
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR onSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR on138,5-63,11140,4-57,95747,0-74,7
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR offSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR off134,5-61,71107,9-58,65747,0-74,2
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR on100,8-73,91140,4-75,45915,4-77,2
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off100,8-75,11107,9-75,25915,4-76,5
MSI RTX 3060 Ti Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-70,81076,3-83,67034,6-81,9
Gigabyte RTX 3060 Eagle OC 12G, ReBAR off100,8-71,9213,6-64,52031,9-73,8
MSI RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off106,8-74,5213,6-71,34561,4-79,3
MSI RTX 3070 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-73,0213,6-72,36267,2-84,9
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR on100,8-71,81140,4-66,19948,5-81,3
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR off100,8-71,61140,4-67,89665,3-80,6
TUF RTX 3080 O10G Gaming, ReBAR off100,8-75,41076,3-72,37240,8-74,2
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR on100,8-73,21107,9-73,910848,9-76,3
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR off100,8-73,21107,9-75,310848,9-75,4
/* Here you can add custom CSS for the current table */ /* Lean more about CSS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascading_Style_Sheets */ /* To prevent the use of styles to other tables use "#supsystic-table-1434" as a base selector for example: #supsystic-table-1434 { ... } #supsystic-table-1434 tbody { ... } #supsystic-table-1434 tbody tr { ... } */



Graphics cardDominant sound freq. and noise level in CS:GO@2160pNF-F12 PWMNF-A15 PWM
Low rangeMid rangeHigh range
Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [-dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [-dBu]
Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off49,0-84,31107,9-80,06834,4-80,2
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR on100,8-68,71356,1-74,76088,7-80,8
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR off100,8-69,31356,1-75,16088,7-79,2
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR on47,6-67,11045,7-49,62031,9-60,1
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR off47,6-70,31140,4-50,82031,9-60,2
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR onSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR on138,5-64,11107,9-60,18610,8-70,9
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR offSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR off134,5-71,61107,9-66,48365,6-72,1
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR on100,8-72,61173,8-74,95915,4-74,6
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off100,8-75,01107,9-73,85747,0-74,2
MSI RTX 3060 Ti Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-71,41107,9-83,16267,2-82,5
Gigabyte RTX 3060 Eagle OC 12G, ReBAR off100,8-72,6213,6-64,82031,9-73,8
MSI RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off106,8-75,7213,6-73,44695,1-77,6
MSI RTX 3070 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off106,8-75,7213,6-73,46267,2-82,7
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR on100,8-71,21107,9-66,29948,5-77,4
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR off100,8-71,11076,3-77,39665,3-77,7
TUF RTX 3080 O10G Gaming, ReBAR off100,8-74,21076,3-70,97240,8-74,4
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR on100,8-73,01107,9-74,37671,3-72,4
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR off100,8-72,31107,9-73,710848,9-72,5
/* Here you can add custom CSS for the current table */ /* Lean more about CSS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascading_Style_Sheets */ /* To prevent the use of styles to other tables use "#supsystic-table-1435" as a base selector for example: #supsystic-table-1435 { ... } #supsystic-table-1435 tbody { ... } #supsystic-table-1435 tbody tr { ... } */



Graphics cardDominant sound freq. and noise level in Blender (Cycles), ClassroomNF-F12 PWMNF-A15 PWM
Low rangeMid rangeHigh range
Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]
Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off50,4-79,11107,9-83,97240,8-87,5
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR on100,8-70,11356,1-73,45583,4-86,1
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR off100,8-69,81356,1-73,75915,4-86,0
Asus GT 1030 SL 2G BRK, ReBAR off50,397-71,71107,9-94,919330,5-90,5
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR on50,4-76,41107,9-57,92031,9-69,7
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR off50,4-78,71076,3-60,95424,5-74,0
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR on116,5-65,01107,9-68,55120,0-77,3
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR off116,5-65,11107,9-68,45120,0-77,1
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR on100,8-72,61173,8-86,65915,4-82,4
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off100,8-75,81076,3-87,25915,4-82,1
MSI RTX 3060 Ti Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-70,4987,0-89,56450,8-89,0
Gigabyte RTX 3060 Eagle OC 12G, ReBAR off100,8-72,6213,6-70,02031,9-79,1
MSI RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-71,21076,3-85,35915,4-92,0
MSI RTX 3070 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-71,21076,3-85,318245,6-90,8
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR on100,8-71,9987,0-89,27452,9-88,3
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR off100,8-71,1987,0-89,07452,9-88,2
TUF RTX 3080 O10G Gaming, ReBAR off106,8-81,51660,0-80,66834,4-78,0
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR on97,9-79,81208,2-89,67671,3-85,2
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR off100,8-73,01243,6-95,27671,3-85,0
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Graphics cardDominant sound freq. and noise level in CS:GO@1080p (coils only*)NF-F12 PWMNF-A15 PWM
Low rangeMid rangeHigh range
Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]Frequency [Hz]Noise level [dBu]
Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off50,4-83,31974,0-90,07034,6-82,4
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR on100,8-72,01107,9-83,72215,8-79,6
Sapphire RX 6600 XT Pulse, ReBAR off100,8-68,41917,8-88,76450,8-81,4
Asus GT 1030 SL 2G BRK, ReBAR off50,4-71,11107,9-91,712534,3-89,8
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR on50,4-80,61660,0-80,37896,1-80,2
Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G (OC), ReBAR off50,4-78,81660,0-82,67671,3-80,4
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR onSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR on100,8-74,9739,4-67,95915,4-78,5
Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR offSapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE (P), ReBAR off50,4-81,4739,4-70,28610,8-73,6
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR on100,8-74,6987,0-84,85747,0-69,6
Sapphire RX 6700 XT Nitro+ (P), ReBAR off100,8-74,71395,9-88,45747,0-70,3
MSI RTX 3060 Ti Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-73,01974,0-88,16267,2-83,6
Gigabyte RTX 3060 Eagle OC 12G, ReBAR off100,8-73,61974,0-90,26088,7-83,1
MSI RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off50,4-76,1987,0-84,85915,4-83,3
MSI RTX 3070 Gaming X Trio, ReBAR off100,8-74,71317,5-81,46088,7-84,6
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR on100,8-71,8987,0-87,77452,9-80,4
AMD Radeon RX 6800, ReBAR off100,8-72,01660,0-90,48863,1-84,5
TUF RTX 3080 O10G Gaming, ReBAR off100,8-75,61140,4-81,79948,5-78,7
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR on100,8-73,61660,0-79,87452,9-74,0
AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT, ReBAR off100,8-73,31660,0-83,37452,9-76,4
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*With the Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE, as with the only tested graphics card, the spectral analysis also includes the sound of the water pump.




The Radeon RX 6650 XT replaces the RX 6600 XT in AMD’s lineup. That one beats the GeForce RTX 3060 in performance under certain circumstances, but always only narrowly. Now, after the GPU’s frequency and memory bandwidth increase, Radeon’s dominance is clear, and yet efficiency is still on AMD’s side. The non-reference Sapphire Nitro+ design is also super-quiet – the cooler is now quite a bit more robust.

Conclusion

In designation, the new Radeon 6650 XT is exactly between the RX 6600 XT and RX 6700 XT, but performance-wise it’s considerably closer to the RX 6600 XT. Depending on resolution, the increase in average gaming performance over the RX 6600 XT is 4–6 % (it’s a 9–19 % loss compared to the RX 6700 XT). That’s admittedly relatively little, but it’s enough to make the competing GeForce RTX 3060 significantly weaker, and the Radeon might even eclipse Nvidia’s advantage in faster raytracing graphics a bit.

At Full HD resolution, which is where this class of graphics card is headed, the RX 6650 XT has a 9 % edge over the RTX 3060.Sure, version to version that difference may vary a bit, but the Radeon always ends up winning. And yet even the RX 6650 XT Nitro+, operating at GPU frequencies up to around 2700 MHz, is in practice a more economical option than the slower GeForce RTX 3060. When comparing the Sapphire Nitro+ (RX 6650 XT) to the Gigabyte Eagle OC (RTX 3060), the Radeon has a 7 % edge in FHD resolution. In QHD it’s already even and in UHD the GeForce is more effective, as with increasing resolution, the RX 6650 XT is losing its lead. It doesn’t matter that much, though, as the RTX 3060 doesn’t have UHD ambitions either. But there are games that you can play smoothly at this high resolution even on this class of graphics card.

For example FIFA, Forza Horizon 4 or F1 2020 in Ultra HD run better on the RX 6650 XT, but Age of Empires II: DE, DOOM Eternal or Wasteland 3 do on the RTX 3060. In Full HD, however, it’s hard to find titles where Radeon has pulled the short end of the stick. You’ll probably come across some, but they’ll certainly be at a numerical disadvantage. Of the eighteen games we tested, the RTX 3060 has the edge only in Total War Saga: Troy. In Borderlands 3, the RX 6650 XT is up to 33 % faster, in Battlefield V by 27 % (not true for running with raytracing, with it the Radeon is weaker, at most/on Ultra by 8 %), in Cyberpunk 2077 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider by 10 % and for example in Mafia DE by 6 %. With raytracing, however, Radon is mostly weaker, one exception being the original Metro Exodus, which achieves equal performance.

In computational tests, GeForce usually has the upper hand, but there are also cases where Radeon is ahead. Compared to the RTX 3060, for example, we also saw a smaller drop in gaming fps during video recording via AMD VCE, both in OBS and in Xsplit.

Of particular note is the significantly higher power draw of the RX 6650 XT compared to the RX 6600 XT when decoding HEVC and VP9 video. However, this may apply exclusively to the Sapphire Nitro+ graphics card tested, and may just be a matter of early drivers. The off-load power draw is pretty much as expected though, it’s only 3W higher than the RX 6600 XT.

With two monitors at the output, power draw may be higher than with the RX 6700 XT as memory speeds rise and the RX 6650 XT has faster, 17.5 GHz modules. The increase in power draw (and high VRAM frequencies) may not happen if you have two lower resolution monitors (something like 2x FHD), but otherwise count on a roughly fivefold increase in power draw. And it’s already been hinted that AMD has hopefully worked on more efficient multi-monitor operation. Anyway, even with the RX 6650 XT it’s still “only” around 37W, which doesn’t require active cooling. And even when the fan does kick in at higher loads, it always stays at low speed and cooling is quiet and GPU temperature is pleasantly low. More demanding users will suffer from the sound of the coils rather than aerodynamic noise. We’re not saying they’re noisy, but alongside the quiet fans, this is a relatively intense noise component. We’ve had more powerful cards with quieter coils before.

The Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+ is an attractive graphics card, as long as the pricing really stays at the RX 6600 XT level and isn’t more expensive than the RTX 3060 in an equivalent design. Although the clearance RX 6600 XT will probably feature a better price/performance ratio in the time before they disappear from the market.

Upcoming new additions to graphics card tests: We’ll be upgrading and expanding our testing methodology a bit during the week to include two more games (God of War and Age of Empires IV) and the Topaz Labs photo and video restoration apps. We will also include AMD FSR tests. Is there anything in particular you’re curious about that you don’t find in the tests?

English translation and edit by Jozef Dudáš

Sapphire RX 6650 XT Nitro+
+ High performance, optimal for 1080p gaming
+ Under normal circumstances a favourable price/performance ratio
+ Relatively low power draw
+ Still decent efficiency, higher than GeForce RTX 3060
+ Effective cooler. Low temperature and at the same time quiet running of the fans
+ First-class structural design...
+ ... robust and most importantly easy to service fans
- Higher power draw during video playback
- Lower performance for raytracing graphics than the RTX 3060
Recommended retail price: 539 EUR
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Games for testing are from Jama levova