2 years ago AMD announced their Radeon RX 6500 XT graphics card on the market and reviewers gave it a bad review as the card is only a 4GB which is lacking as games require a bigger VRAM nowadays. Now we got the 8GB model and its been 2 years when AMD launched this card. Is it worth it now to get a Radeon RX 6500 XT card? In this review we will find out.
Table of Contents
PowerColor Fighter Radeon RX 6500 XT 8GB GDDR6 Specifications
| Graphics Engine | AXRX 6500 XT 8GBD6-DH/OC |
| Video Memory | 8GB GDDR6 |
| Stream Processor | 1024 Units |
| Engine Clock(OC) | up to 2685MHz(Game) up to 2825MHz(Boost) |
| Memory Speed | 18.0 Gbps |
| Memory Interface | 64-bit |
| DirectX Support | 12 |
| Bus Standard | PCIE 4.0 x4 |
| Standard Display Connectors | 1 x HDMI 2.1 , 1 x DisplayPort 1.4 |
About the Radeon RX 6500 XT
The Radeon RX 6500 XT was launched on January 19, 2022. It is built with the 6nm process and was based on the Navi 24 graphics processor, which was made by TSMC. It has 5.4 billion transistors on a die size of 107mm².
The Radeon RX 6500 XT has a boost frequency of up to 2815 MHz and a game frequency of 2650 MHz. It also features 16 ray accelerators. The TBP starts at 107W.
Checking the Product
The PowerColor Fighter Radeon RX 6500 XT 8GB GDDR6 comes in a box that is identical to the 4GB model, with the only difference noted on the front lower left side of the box indicating the 8GB memory.
Upon opening the box, you will find the graphics card and nothing else.
The graphics card itself features a simple design with a dual-fan cooler and no RGB lighting. It occupies two slots, but it is thinner compared to others. There is a single 6-pin PCIe power connector required to power up the graphics card.
In terms of display connectors, it is surprising to note that there is only a single DisplayPort and HDMI port on this graphics card.
Test System
Our test system is only my personal computer and here are the specs.
- CPU: Intel i5-12400
- Motherboard: Gigabyte B660M DS3H AX DDR4
- CPU Cooler: Deepcool LS720
- RAM: Silicon Power Value Gaming DDR4 RAM 32GB (16GBx2) 3200MHz
- SSD: Samsung SSD 980
- PSU: Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 650W Gold
- Case: Deepcool CH510
- OS: Microsoft Windows 11 Professional x64
My personal GPU that I am using is a PNY RTX 3060, which cost around Php 21K, which is over half the cost of the PowerColor Fighter Radeon RX 6500 XT. Right now, we can only compare these two, even if it is a far comparison.
Benchmarks – Synthetic
We mostly ran our synthetic benchmarks on 3DMark as they offer a plethora of different types of workloads for testing the GPU but we also added Unigine Superposition.
3DMark Speed Way
3DMark Speed Way is a DirectX 12 Ultimate benchmark. It demonstrates the performance optimizations DirectX 12 Ultimate brings to ray-traced gaming.
3DMark Port Royal
3DMark Port Royal is a real-time ray tracing benchmark. It also includes the DirectX Raytracing feature test, the NVIDIA DLSS feature test, and the Intel XeSS feature test.
3DMark Time Spy Extreme
Time Spy is a DirectX 12 GPU and CPU benchmark test, and Time Spy Extreme raises the rendering resolution to 3840 x 2160 (4K UHD).
3DMark Time Spy
3DMark Fire Strike Extreme
3DMark Fire Strike is built using the DirectX 11 API. It tests DirectX 11 gaming performance at 1080p and 2K resolution for Fire Strike Extreme.
3DMark Fire Strike
Unigine Superposition
1080p Game Benchmark
Running games with the PowerColor Fighter Radeon RX 6500 XT, we can see that it is capable of handling 1080p games, particularly esports titles, on the maximum graphic settings. You can also play AAA games but don’t expect to have them at maximum graphic settings if it is a new title.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Red Dead Redemption 2
Rainbow 6 Siege
Ray Tracing Game Benchmark
We tested Bright Memory: Infinite Ray Tracing Benchmark to assess its capability of running games with ray tracing. It was a stuttering experience when we ran the benchmark.
- High: 17.33 FPS
- Low: 21.94 FPS
The Verdict
The PowerColor Fighter Radeon RX 6500 XT is a capable GPU if you are looking to game on a 1080p resolution it is a fine graphics card option especially if you have a tight budget. It can run at 60FPS for AAA games and esports games at a high refresh rate. However, as it has a ray-tracing feature on its specs it is too underpowered for this feature.
