A leaked benchmark result for a “generic” graphics card that seems likely to be the rumored RX 590 AMD has been working on has appeared on the 3DMark database. Although a brand-new card from AMD in over a year is exciting in its own right, the fact that it achieved a score of over 5,000 in Time Spy suggests it could be much more powerful than the GTX 1060 6GB, potentially making the RX 590 the best midrange GPU in the world.
It’s not available yet, or even officially announced, which does put a bit of a dampener on its plans for world domination. Still, the benchmark entry seems legitimate and backed up by earlier rumors of a supposed minor refresh of AMD’s RX 500-series cards, the evidence is mounting of a new AMD graphics card or cards showing up before Navi in 2019.
On top of the driver name outing this card as an RX 590, it seems more likely to be an enhanced version of the RX 580, rather than a new-generation with a designation like RX 680 or similar. It features the same 8GB of GDDR5 and the same memory bus clock of 2,000MHz. Where it does differ though, is on the core clock, which is 1,545MHz, compared to the RX 580’s typical clock of around 1,340MHz.
According to rumors, this clock speed bump is possible thanks to the new GPU being built upon a Polaris 30 design that uses a 12nm fabrication process, as per TechRadar. RX 500-series and Vega cards are built on a 14nm Polaris 20 process. The core clock increase is likely to be what’s most responsible for the new, higher score in 3DMark.
The new entry has a combined score of 5,028, with a graphics score of 4,759. A near-stock-clocked RX 580 paired with the same CPU achieved a combined score of 4,661, and a graphics score of 4,364. A GTX 1060 at near-stock-clocks and paired with the same CPU achieved a score of 4,248, with a graphics score of 3,954. There are better GTX 1060s that achieved higher clocks and scores, but even the most overclocked ones don’t reach the RX 590’s scores.
That’s the big takeaway from this news. That the RX 590 could become a true middle ground between the GTX 1060 and GTX 1070, something that Nvidia has yet to offer anything for. Although 1070 prices have come down a lot in recent months, with no comparably priced alternative for either in the RTX-series of cards, AMD’s RX 590 could plug an important hole in the GPU lineup — if it’s priced competitively, that is. But midrange products at competitive pricing is AMD’s bread and butter in the graphics market.
Look out for an update to our best graphics cards roundup if and when this card debuts.
