AMD has updated its workstation graphics card lineup ahead of the launch of the new Mac Pro, with the Radeon Pro W5700 line using AMD’s high-performance RDNA graphics architecture and offering up to six display outputs, including one over USB-C.
Launched on Tuesday, the Radeon Pro W5700 is declared as the world’s first PC workstation graphics card that uses a 7-nanometer process to make the GPU. The professional counterpart to the consumer-aimed Radeon RX5700 from June, the W5700 continues the momentum of that graphics card launch, but for the professional market.
The Radeon Pro W5700 offers 36 compute units and 8GB of GGDR6 memory, the same as the consumer model, but the performance has been improved so it offers up to 8.89 teraflops at the top end, versus the 7.95 of the RX5700. The card also has 448 gigabytes per second of memory bandwidth, while the switch to the RDNA graphics architecture is said to offer a 25% better performance per compute unit than the previous GCN architecture, and a thermal design point of 205 Watts.
In terms of memory, the card features 8 GB of GDDR6 memory running across a 256-bit interface at speeds of 14 Gbps. The card uses the same GDDR6 memory dies as the consumer variant and delivers a total bandwidth of 448 GB/s. Unlike the more recent Vega based offerings, the Radeon Pro W5700 doesn’t feature ECC memory correction.
The card spoarts a TDP of just 205W via powered by 8+6 pin connectors along with SB Type-C connector for VR HMD’s. This connector does requires 15W.
The Radeon Pro series again uses the blue and silver color scheme on the shroud. The card is cooled by a single blower type fan which circulates air through the internal chassis along with a vapor chamber based heatsink block.
There are six I/O ports on the back of the card which include five mini DisplayPort (DP 1.4) and a USB Type-C port which is aimed at VR based setups.
The card also supports AMD Radeon ReLive for VR which allows wireless professional VR workloads on the Navi architecture. There’s also support for Vive Focus Plus and AMD’s Radeon software is fully utilized by some of the major design engines such as Unreal Studio, Unity Engine, and SolidWorks eDrawings.
Key Capabilities And Features
- High-Performance AMD RDNA Architecture – Features a redesigned geometry engine and compute units, delivering up to 25 percent higher performance-per-clock and up to 41 percent higher average performance-per-watt than the previous-generation Graphics Core Next (GCN) architecture.
- Exceptional Power Efficiency – AMD Radeon Pro Software for Enterprise’s intelligent power optimization, coupled with the power-efficient AMD RDNA architecture and 7nm process technology, enables the Radeon Pro W5700 graphics card to provide up to 18 percent better system efficiency than the competitive product
- Accelerated CPU/GPU Multitasking – Provides outstanding multitasking performance even in the most demanding situations, such as continuing to model while rendering a visualization in the background, providing up to 5.6X the application workflow performance with CPU load than the competition in the SPECviewperf 13 benchmarks.
- Professional-grade Software – AMD Radeon Pro Software for Enterprise delivers professional-grade quality, continuous performance improvements and robust security as well as industry-leading features, including AMD Remote Workstation that allows professionals to work virtually from anywhere with feature and performance parity with the workstation GPU on their desk.
- Innovative VR Software Features – AMD Radeon ReLive for VR enables professionals using AMD Radeon Pro W5700 graphics cards to wirelessly visualize their creations with VR-capable applications and select standalone VR headsets, such as the HTC VIVE Focus Plus.
- High-bandwidth PCIe 4.0 – The AMD Radeon Pro W5700 is the first PC workstation graphics card to support PCIe 4.0, delivering double the bandwidth of PCIe 3.0 to enable smooth performance for GPU-intensive applications.
- Professional Application Certification – Optimized and certified with leading Design and Manufacturing and Architecture, Engineering and Construction applications to deliver the stability and reliability required by workstation professionals.
- High-speed USB-C – The AMD Radeon Pro W5700 is the first PC workstation graphics card to include a USB-C connector, supporting a growing selection of USB-C based monitors and head-mounted displays (HMD).
Price And Availability
The Radeon Pro W5700 is available now for $799 US.
AMD Radeon Pro Workstation Graphics Lineup:
| Graphics Card Name | Radeon Pro WX 7100 | Radeon Pro WX 8200 | Radeon Pro WX 9100 | Radeon Pro W5700 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GPU | Polaris 10 | Vega 10 | Vega 10 | Navi 10 |
| Process Node | 14nm | 14nm | 14nm | 7nm |
| Compute Units | 36 | 56 | 64 | 36 |
| Stream Processors | 2304 | 3584 | 4096 | 2304 |
| ROPs | 32 | 64 | 64 | 64 |
| Clock Speed (Peak) | 1243 MHz | 1500 MHz | 1500 MHz | 1930 MHz |
| Compute Rate (FP32) | 5.7 TFLOPs | 10.8 TFLOPs | 12.3 TFLOPs | 8.89 TFLOPs |
| VRAM | 8 GB GDDR5 | 8 GB HBM2 | 16 GB HBM2 | 8 GB GDDR6 |
| Memory Bus | 256-bit | 2048-bit | 2048-bit | 256-bit |
| Memory Bandwidth | 224 Gbps | 484 Gbps | 512 Gbps | 448 Gbps |
| TDP | 150W | 230W | 250W | 205W |
| Launch | 2016 | 2018 | 2017 | 2019 |
| Price | $799 US | $999 US | $2199 US | $799 US |
