Today, AMD are bringing out the big guns with the formal release of their next generation desktop GPUs with the AMD Radeon RX 6800 and the RX 6800 XT. Announced back in late October, these cards are AMD's first to come with hardware accelerated Ray Tracing support. Although for Linux, we're still waiting on The Khronos Group to formalise the cross-vendor Ray Tracing Vulkan extensions for that.
Here's a reminder of the specifications:
| RX 6900 XT | RX 6800 XT | RX 6800 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Compute Units | 80 | 72 | 60 |
| Process | TSMC 7nm | TSMC 7nm | TSMC 7nm |
| Game clock (MHz) | 2,015 | 2,015 | 1,815 |
| Boost clock (MHz) | 2,250 | 2,250 | 2,105 |
| Infinity Cache (MB) | 128 | 128 | 128 |
| Memory | 16GB GDDR6 | 16GB GDDR6 | 16GB GDDR6 |
| TDP (Watt) | 300 | 300 | 250 |
| Price (USD) | $999 | $649 | $579 |
| Available | 08/12/2020 | 18/11/2020 | 18/11/2020 |
For running them on Linux, the driver situation isn't the best. AMD have put out the Radeon Software for Linux version 20.45, which adds support for the Radeon RX 6800 Series but that driver only officially supports Ubuntu 20.04, RHEL/CentOS 7.9 and RHEL/CentOS 8.2. For Mesa drivers, you're going to need Linux Kernel 5.9, Mesa 20.2 (or newer) and also LLVM 11.0 which means most normal distributions will be missing out unless you're prepared to do major manual upgrades. So, unless you really know what you're doing with everything, you will likely want to hold off.
If you do manage to find one because, as expected, most places are sold out and you get everything it needs setup - expect to see some incredible performance. We don't get sent any hardware from AMD, so we're going by what others have been cooking up. It seems Level1Linux on YouTube are very happy with it, and the Phoronix benchmarks show them doing well too. From a price point of view, the performance does seem pretty amazing considering how close it appears to be with the NVIDIA 3080 and if you prefer the open source side of things it doesn't get better than this.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Quoting: AnzaNot really. nVidia bundles the API libraries with the driver, so I don't think Mesa really plays big role at all. I remember that there used to be bit trouble with that as driver would overwrite Mesa libraries. I don't know if these days things are less hassle as distro packaging has gotten better or drivers integrate with the system bit nicer way.
AMDGPU-PRO does the same as well (you get proprietary and open source stack). The difference is related on how rigid are the correlations between kernel modules versions and libraries are. My point is that there isn't much difference in the driver installation for the latest hardware between one and another.
Last edited by x_wing on 18 November 2020 at 9:11 pm UTC
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Here on Fedora 33, Mesa, LLVM and the kernel are up-to-date, and I just noticed the updated firmware package is built and in testing, so we can consider it to be compatible from day one.
Well done AMD!
Now I'm just dreaming of a Ryzen 5800X + Radeon RX 6800 rig, but I need to save some money first...
Well done AMD!
Now I'm just dreaming of a Ryzen 5800X + Radeon RX 6800 rig, but I need to save some money first...
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Looking good on the performance side. Hoping for good availability now, 500 Euros is my threshold this time.
Edit: Also very happy about the driver situation this time.
Last edited by iskaputt on 18 November 2020 at 10:21 pm UTC
Edit: Also very happy about the driver situation this time.
Last edited by iskaputt on 18 November 2020 at 10:21 pm UTC
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Koopacabras Nov 19, 2020
TheRiddick Nov 19, 2020
Have a 6800XT on pre-order (was only option). Who knows if it will be for-filled... They took my money non the less.
I would also like to point out that the reported clock rates are not correct when people saying they can overclock to the moon.
This same issue happened a fair while back with older AMD cards where they would say whatever high clock but perform the same or worse then stock.
Last edited by TheRiddick on 19 November 2020 at 2:53 am UTC
I would also like to point out that the reported clock rates are not correct when people saying they can overclock to the moon.
This same issue happened a fair while back with older AMD cards where they would say whatever high clock but perform the same or worse then stock.
Last edited by TheRiddick on 19 November 2020 at 2:53 am UTC
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Quoting: MohandevirFrom what I heard from another user, couldn't Debian testing be considered a rolling release? Might give it a shot, eventually.
Stayed on Debian a few years, I think testing is just the next version (currently "bulls-eyes" future 11.0) than stable.
I considered unstable (sid) to be the true Debian rolling but I've never been so happy moving to manjaro, rolling release + easiest experience I've ever had!
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Debian testing is close to Debian unstable, with only difference that packages go through some consistency process first (so unstable can be broken more often). So both are semi-rolling.
Last edited by Shmerl on 19 November 2020 at 2:57 am UTC
Last edited by Shmerl on 19 November 2020 at 2:57 am UTC
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slaapliedje Nov 19, 2020
Quoting: ShmerlDebian testing is close to Debian unstable, with only difference that packages go through some consistency process first (so unstable can be broken more often). So both are semi-rolling.Yeah, from my understanding it goes like this.
Package enters Unstable, stays for 10 days, if no bug reports are created, and dependencies all work, it is moved to testing. Once it enters Freeze, new versions of packages don't get pushed down to Testing and only bug fixes get applied until the release team is happy that there aren't release critical bugs, then a release happens and Testing becomes the next release and a new Testing branch is created and Unstable gets a bunch of broken stuff. It has varied a bit over the many years, but that is usually the only time dependencies become funky in Unstable.
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slaapliedje Nov 19, 2020
Quoting: x_wingYou don't have to use a third party repo with Debian. Literally just have non-free repo enabled. Sure if you run Fedora/rhel/cent you enable rpmfusion and you can get the packages. Most *buntu distros have nvidia packaged for them as well.Quoting: slaapliedjeYes, I know what all of that is. I've been using Linux for 20+ years at this point. I also vividly remember the hassle I had of trying to get the one AMD system I ever owned to work. Either the fglrx wouldn't compile with newer kernels, or the open source driver had shit performance. I was hoping this situation had improved, but it doesn't seem that way.
1) official repos don't have it (debian sid)
2) I try to avoid third party repositories because they tend to break shit
3) AMDGPU-PRO linux package is not available for any Debian system.
4) Compiling myself is what I try to avoid.
So yeah, there are pros and cons to how AMD does it and how nvidia does it. Most distributions seem to favor the nvidia method, otherwise they'd take the AMDGPU Pro drivers and put them in the repos.
Most distros doesn't favor Nvidia method, they just add their drivers because is the only way to make that hardware work (the "easiness" of Nvidia drivers is 100% thanks to the work the community does). And if you buy the latest Nvidia hardware, you are forced to use a third party repository, just like with AMD if you get their latest GPU. In the end, both delivers the same but AMD gives more options and more freedom.
It has been years since I bothered downloading the nvidia driver from them or any other repo.
And as stated by others, nvidia has their own OpenGL/Vulkan drivers so I haven't needed to mess with mesa for a long time. Nvidia also supports their older cards for much longer than AMD/ATI has in general.
So I really WANT to support AMD as I believe that the hardware should all have open source drivers. I just want it to be easier to do so without compromising convenience and stability by adding third party repos or compiling custom libraries.
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Quoting: slaapliedjeNvidia also supports their older cards for much longer than AMD/ATI has in general.I think you'll find that the oldest AMD GPU drivers still included in upstream Mesa are for the R100-series from year 2000, whereas Nvidia current "legacy" driver series includes support for HW based on the Fermi architecture (2009) and later. But maybe you're comparing proprietary drivers only?
Nvidia's drivers used to be objectively better on Linux, but I don't think that's the case any more. My last Nvidia GPU was a GTX 960 and I was happy with it, but I've been even happier with the two AMD GPUs I've owned since.
These discussions tend to end up full of partisan hyperbole (often mostly based on hearsay), but in the end, both vendors are easy to live with these days for someone who just wants to play some games. No game requires the latest kernel or Wayland—so Nvidia's reluctance to play ball is almost irrelevant—but new kernels and Mesa packages are readily available on any mainstream distro for those who need them so us AMD/Mesa users are fine too.
That said, in my opinion and experience AMD currently has an edge on Linux even if you ignore the ethical and technical implications of Open Source vs proprietary. Personally I don't like to ignore these implications, so that's another reason I'm happier on AMD.
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