AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT Has GeForce RTX 3060 In Its Crosshairs With Rumored March Release
AMD and NVIDIA both came out of the next-gen GPU gate with their respective guns blazing, as is typical when launching a new round of graphics cards—they both tend to show off their best stuff first, then release more affordable models as time goes on. Looking ahead, NVIDIA has confirmed its upcoming GeForce RTX 3060 (non-Ti) will land at retail on February 25. How will AMD counter attack the launch? If the latest rumor is true, it will bring out a Radeon RX 6700 XT card in mid-March.
As of right at this moment, AMD still has just three RDNA 2 cards. They include the Radeon RX 6900 XT, Radeon RX 6800 XT, and Radeon RX 6800. NVIDIA, on the other hand, is about to release to retail its fifth Ampere card to the consumer market. Here's how the combined lineups and pricing (MSRP, not street) stack up...
- GeForce RTX 3090: $1,499
- Radeon RX 6900 XT: $999
- GeForce RTX 3080: $699
- Radeon RX 6800 XT: $649
- Radeon RX 6800: $579
- GeForce RTX 3070: $499
- GeForce RTX 3060 Ti: $399
- GeForce RTX 3060: $329
Not that any of these cards are actually readily available, but ignoring the shortage situation, AMD has some catching up to do, in terms of offering a lineup as varied as NVIDIA's. Well, hang tight...
According to Cowcotland, an unannounced (though inevitable) Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card will land on March 18. It's not clear if that date marks a supposed announcement or retail launch, but even if it is the former, the latter would not be far behind (presumably, anyway).
AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT And NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Set For A Showdown
How the specifications, performance, and of course pricing compares between the Radeon RX 6700 XT and GeForce RTX 3060 remains to be seen. However, we do have some concrete details about the GeForce RTX 3060, so let's start there.
NVIDIA's product page confirms the GeForce RTX 3060 sports 3,584 CUDA cores and 12GB of GDDR6 memory, with a 192-bit memory bus. GPU clocks check in at 1.32GHz (base) and 1.78GHz (boost). As a point of reference, the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti wields 4,864 CUDA cores, 8GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit memory bus, and runs at 1.41GHz to 1.67GHz.
Based on past leaks and rumors, the Radeon RX 6700 XT is supposedly primed to handily crush the GeForce RTX 3060, and offer performance more in line with the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti.
As for the specifications, it will be the first RDNA 2 part to feature a Navi 22 GPU, with 40 compute units and 2,560 stream processors running at 2.35GHz to 2.5GHz, if the rumors are true. The card is also said to be lugging around 12GB of GDDR6 memory (16Gbps) and drive a 192-bit memory bus, and have 96MB of Infinity Cache.
A lot of this is academic at the moment, unfortunately. Product shortages of the latest and greatest PC hardware (and game consoles) are ruining the fun, and according to the latest leak, quantities of the Radeon RX 6700 XT will be "very limited" at launch. Bummer.
