AMD Radeon RX 9070 benchmarked in Call of Duty, could be a match for Nvidia's RTX 4080 Super

Daniel Sims

Daniel Sims

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Something to look forward to: AMD's paper launch of Radeon RX 9070 GPUs at CES was disappointingly light on details. However, an unsanctioned benchmark for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 provides a brief glimpse into the performance of the vanilla 9070 graphics card model. Granted, we advise everyone to wait for detailed reviews and the cards' full release before drawing any kind of conclusion.

IGN got a chance to benchmark AMD's upcoming Radeon RX 9070 GPU in Call of Duty Black Ops 6 by discreetly running the test on a system equipped with the GPU at the CES show floor. Although the results appear similar to Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4080 Super, like-for-like comparisons in more games will provide a clearer picture when time comes.

The RX 9070 averaged 99fps in native 4K in Black Ops 6's in-game benchmark tool using alpha drivers. For comparison, the RTX 4080 Super can reach roughly 129fps in 4K in DLSS quality mode, which upscales the game from 2560 x 1440 resolution. Based on early this data, the results look promising for Team Red.

Although AMD has yet to disclose detailed specifications for the RX 9000 series, the company's new naming scheme implies they are positioned to compete with Nvidia's upcoming RTX 5070. Preliminary information indicates that the RTX 5070 might slightly outperform the current RTX 4070 Super.

If paper napkin math aligns AMD's competing product with the 4080 Super, a serious fight could ensue this year in the mid-range sector, where the most popular GPUs reside. However, other factors lurk in the background.

First, Black Ops 6 is kinder to AMD cards than other modern gaming titles. Second, the CES RX 9070 benchmark was conducted using AMD's new Ryzen 9950X3D CPU, which has not been widely tested alongside Nvidia GPUs.

Third, the game doesn't use ray tracing, so AMD's claims of substantial RT performance improvements remain untested. Upcoming reviews should also reveal how the company's new AI-based FSR4 upscaling technology compares to Nvidia DLSS and Intel XeSS. It is entirely possible that the upcoming Radeon GPUs will perform exceptionally well in rasterization against the RTX 50 series GPUs. However, Nvidia will likely maintain an advantage in upscaling support, particularly if DLSS 4's transition to transformer-based models enhances graphics quality, as some early previews suggest.

Pricing is yet another crucial detail regarding the RX 9070 that has not been disclosed. With 16 GB of VRAM, it could gain an advantage over Nvidia's mid-range offerings, depending on how AMD counters the RTX 5070's aggressive $549 price tag.

AMD has also yet to confirm the release dates for the RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT, only committing to a Q1 2025 launch window. However, a leak from B&H suggests that pre-orders may open on January 23. Meanwhile, Nvidia's RTX 5080 and RTX 5090 are set to begin shipping on January 30, followed by the RTX 5070 and 5070 Ti in February.

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AMD Radeon RX 9070 benchmarked in Call of Duty, could be a match for Nvidia's RTX 4080 Super

 
This is shaping up to be a good old-fashioned mid-range GPU battle. The RX 9070 seems like it’s positioning itself as a strong contender in the mid-range market, especially with 16GB of VRAM. If AMD can keep pricing competitive while delivering solid raster performance, it could really shake things up against the RTX 5070—especially for gamers not as focused on ray tracing.
 
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"For comparison, the RTX 4080 Super can reach roughly 129fps in 4K in DLSS quality mode"

I'm soooo confused.
Where is this comparison from, and if it was a comparison, why was DLSS enabled if the 9070 was native?
 
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Daniel Owen compared it to his 7900xt and believes the benchmark setting didn't actually apply the setting because the game application needs to be restarted after the settings are applied. He is getting significantly lower performance by as much as 40% lower.


 
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Look, don't get me wrong -I've been 100% AMD on my past 3 builds - so I'm definitely an AMD fan. Of their hardware, that is. I've also never had any real problems with their drivers etc for years now. But let's face it - all AMD management will see is $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ - and price the 9070 series $50 below the nearest relevant Nvidia rival card. They simply can't stop themselves from being f##@#5g stupid. Sadly.......
 
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Just checked, now the 7900 GRE is 600, the 7900XT is 800 and the 7900xtx is 900 Euro (VAT included).
I say that AMD will price their cards like Nvidia counterparts like last gen and do a 50-100 Euro discount 3-5 months later.
 
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scoffer said:
Look, don't get me wrong -I've been 100% AMD on my past 3 builds - so I'm definitely an AMD fan. Of their hardware, that is. I've also never had any real problems with their drivers etc for years now. But let's face it - all AMD management will see is $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ - and price the 9070 series $50 below the nearest relevant Nvidia rival card. They simply can't stop themselves from being f##@#5g stupid. Sadly.......
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As an AMD buyer I can with confidence say that AMD do not care about us. They, like nVidia, only care about the datacentre/AI market and you can be certain that they will release a card specialised for LLM training. They only release these cards because they need to somehow be relevant in the consumer market but they absolutely do not care.

Nobody cares about a market where the margins are 60% at the most when you can release products with margins ranging in the hundreds, if not thousands of percentages.
 
I want this 9700— er, 9070 to be a great card but using any COD title as a general gauge of AMD performance compared to Nvidia (or Intel) is a mistake as CODs run wayyy better on AMD cards. If the 9070 matches a 4080S in COD then it likely matches the 4070 Ti/S in other titles on average.
 
If the N48 die is really ~390mm2 like it's been estimated to be on the N4P process, it would actually be a bit of a fail for AMD not to land at ~4080s performance levels given that card uses the AD203 chip which is 370mm2 and on a slightly worse N4 process.

Either AMD wasn't able to get their performance per area up to Nvidia standards despite a monolithic die and an improved process, or they are being deliberately coy and sandbagging the card's performance as some sort of bizarre marketing stunt.
 
These days consumer GPUs come with generous amounts of everything except VRAM. I think they'd throw in an actual bar of gold or a bottle of Ace of Spades with every GPU purchase before they'd grant us an affordable GPU with sufficient VRAM for the future.
 
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Liranan said:
As an AMD buyer I can with confidence say that AMD do not care about us. They, like nVidia, only care about the datacentre/AI market and you can be certain that they will release a card specialised for LLM training. They only release these cards because they need to somehow be relevant in the consumer market but they absolutely do not care.

Nobody cares about a market where the margins are 60% at the most when you can release products with margins ranging in the hundreds, if not thousands of percentages.
Click to expand...

Do you really believe what you're saying? They do not care? So why are they releasing products? Of course they care. It's a profitable segment of their business and whilst it's not the biggest one, they absolutely do care about it as they are chasing year over year growth across all busines segments.
 
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hahahanoobs said:
"For comparison, the RTX 4080 Super can reach roughly 129fps in 4K in DLSS quality mode"

I'm soooo confused.
Where is this comparison from, and if it was a comparison, why was DLSS enabled if the 9070 was native?
Click to expand...
I read it differently. It's not a comparison between the two cards, but a reference to 4080 Super-data from another benchmark.
 
You can't get any reliable comparison results when one or both sides are using upscaling to make their performance numbers look good.

Get back to us once you have a card to actually review and post none upscaled data.
 
Yippee AMD next Gen GPU will stand up to nvidia last Gen GPUs - Team Green Fan Boys will be all over handing their cash to AMD jumping ship on nvidia with this news — AMDs plan to buy and build market share at work.

Team Red fanboys are going buy 90 series (of course), truthfully though, it’s at the 5070 or 5060 Ti levels and with MSRP of $549 for the RTX 5070, $499 won’t sell or buy market share for AMD. AMD RX 9070 XT is going to need to beat all these performance peaks and then some to impact nvidia market shares.

It's not that AMD must release a GPU that tops nVidia Flagship as much as it is AMD needs to release GPU's that stand ground (and do so very well) with the (new) current Gen nVidia GPU's. Until AMD stops building GPU's that target a Gen back nVidia GPU, they will not outsell (of even get close) to nVidia's market share (or increase their sales much at all).
 
Good news if true, but if I remember correctly the AMD GPUs have an advantage in this game already. Still it sounds promising to have an AMD 'mid-range' GPU trading blows that far up Nvidia's stack, even if last-gen. That'll probably position it somewhere between the 5070 Ti and 5070, being close to the former than the latter. If priced to compete with the 5070, that might be a card worth taking a look at.
 
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n3o127 said:
Yippee AMD next Gen GPU will stand up to nvidia last Gen GPUs - Team Green Fan Boys will be all over handing their cash to AMD jumping ship on nvidia with this news — AMDs plan to buy and build market share at work.

Team Red fanboys are going buy 90 series (of course), truthfully though, it’s at the 5070 or 5060 Ti levels and with MSRP of $549 for the RTX 5070, $499 won’t sell or buy market share for AMD. AMD RX 9070 XT is going to need to beat all these performance peaks and then some to impact nvidia market shares.

It's not that AMD must release a GPU that tops nVidia Flagship as much as it is AMD needs to release GPU's that stand ground (and do so very well) with the (new) current Gen nVidia GPU's. Until AMD stops building GPU's that target a Gen back nVidia GPU, they will not outsell (of even get close) to nVidia's market share (or increase their sales much at all).
Click to expand...
If it really does compete with the 4080 S, then it will be nearer the 5070 Ti ($750) level than the 5070.
 
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EdmondRC said:
Still it sounds promising to have an AMD 'mid-range' GPU trading blows that far up Nvidia's stack, even if last-gen.
Click to expand...

Definitely exciting news if true in other titles. DLSS 4 has made some impressive claims and even if the 9070 XT is more of a 4070 Ti @$500 w/16GB and FSR 4, it'll be my next card. As much as I like the idea of the 5070's alleged 4090 performance in DLSS, the 12GB is holding me back as my target is 4K/120. Making the 5070 Ti my only Nvidia option and I'd rather not spend $750 on a GPU, despite Nvidia's reasonable prices this gen.

On the other hand, maybe a 5070 Ti's not a bad place to park $750. GPUs have actually become reasonable short-term investments and I speculate that the 5080 and 5090 (and possibly the 5070 Ti) will hold their values (and likely appreciate) for awhile, with no alternatives in this class from AMD. This generation they had the 7900 XT/XTX keeping a relative leash on all but the 4090 (rarely found under 2K until Tuesday).
 
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Although AMD has not disclosed detailed specifications for the RX 9000 series, the company's new naming scheme suggests these cards are positioned to compete with Nvidia's upcoming RTX 5070. Preliminary information indicates that the RTX 5070 might slightly outperform the current RTX 4070 Super.

Although AMD has yet to disclose detailed specifications for the RX 9000 series, the company's new naming scheme implies they are positioned to compete with Nvidia's upcoming RTX 5070. Preliminary information indicates that the RTX 5070 might slightly outperform the current RTX 4070 Super.

Just letting the AI write for you guys, now.
 
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Sounds pretty good. My prediction: it outperforms the RTX 5070 by a cross-game average of 2%, is priced at $499 against the 5070's $549 (so about 9% cheaper), and the TechSpot review goes "hurrrrrmmmm, ummmmmmm, welllllllll, it would have to be more like $449 to be worth buying."

Then, nine months later when it actually DOES drop to $449, everybody says "great, now that it's even cheaper, hopefully it will drive down the cost of the 5070 so I can buy one" while simultaneously claiming that the reason AMD cards sell less than nVidia is because they have inferior hardware and don't have aggressive enough prices.
 
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