XFX Speedster QICK 319 AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT Black Edition Review

Introduction

It has been a while since we last saw our friends from XFX. Some time back I did a review of the XFX Speedster MERC 319 AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT BLACK (YouTube link), and I came away quite impressed. It was one of the largest cards (at the time) that I had ever worked with. It was quiet, ran cool considering the GPU and power draw, and it was quite visually striking. Perhaps most importantly it has been in constant use in the primary test machine at home for these past 3 years without a single issue. It really was an outstanding card and it withstood the test of time. Not only that it survived, but that the RX 6800 XT continued to be a high performing and relevant GPU in the intervening years.

I was given the opportunity to test out one of the latest models from XFX with the release of the RX 7700 XT series of parts. I of course welcomed it with open arms (GPU reviews are hard to come by these days). On September 6 AMD released the last two members of the Radeon RX 7000 series with the 7700 XT and 7800 XT. The 7800 XT is aimed at the higher end of the midrange market, replacing the 6800 and 6900 series of chips. The 7700 XT is designed to be an upgrade to the 6700 XT as well as directly competing with the NVIDIA RTX 4060 and RTX 4060 Ti.

The RX 7700 XT is comprised of chiplets like its bigger siblings, the 7900 series. It may share the memory chiplets with those cards, but the core GPU portion is unique to itself. It is the Navi 32 chip and is approximately 346 mm sq (4 MCD chips and 1 GCD). This gives it in theory a 256 bit memory bus (4 x 64 bit from MCDs), but since it is the 7700 XT it is cut down to 192 bits. The full 7800 XT features 16 GB of memory on the 256 bit bus, but the 7700 XT is taken down to 12 GB on a 192 bit bus. The GCD also has compute units fused off so it does not feature the full 60 that the 7800 XT does. It is down to a still reasonable 54 compute units that total up to 3456 stream processors. Rounding out the chip are 96 ROPS, 216 TMUs, and 54 Ray Accelerators.

Caches are interesting with this design as it does utilize the “Infinity Cache” setup that the 7900 series utilizes. L0 and L1 cache are on the GCD, while the L2/Infinity Cache are split between the GCD and the MCD chips. On the GCD there is 2 MB of L2 local and 48 MB of Infinity on the MCDs (3 x 16 MB per MCD- on the 7700 XT one of the MCDs is disabled). The GDDR6 is running at 18 Gbps, which gives 432 GB/sec of throughput. The combination of large caches and a fast memory bus provides a lot of effective bandwidth for the solution.

The vanilla 7700 XT features a base clock of 1900 MHz, a Game Clock of 2171 MHz, and a boost clock of 2544 MHz. These are around what users should expect from the stock, non-overclocked products that are looking to hit that $449 price point. In overbuilt cards like the XFX QICK 319, we can expect game and boost clocks to hit higher numbers consistently.

The Navi 3x series from AMD also encompass quite a few cutting edge features that are not necessarily shared with the NVIDIA RTX 4000 series. The 319 features four outputs, three of which are DP 2.1 and the other is a HDMI 2.1 unit. AMD has embraced the latest port specs for this series of cards, NVIDIA on the other hand does support HDMI 2.1 but the DisplayPorts are still 1.4a. This is not a deal killer with most displays, but it does give AMD a slight edge with concern to checkboxes. AMD also has hardware encode for the latest video formats, including AV1 and H265/HEVC.

The overall specs of the RX 7700 XT make it an able competitor in that price range. It should in theory be competitive with the last generation RX 6800, but not nearly as quick as the 6800 XT, 6900 XT, and 6950 XT. The primary target is of course the RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB and 16 GB units. For a bit more money than the 8 GB 4060 Ti a user will get better performance and 12 GB of memory. For $50 less the user will still get more performance, but will not have the extra 4 GB of memory that the RTX 4060 Ti 16GGB has. I feel that it is a reasonable tradeoff, especially in terms of overall performance. It is a bit more power hungry than the NVIDIA parts as it sits at a 245 watt TDP instead of the 165W TDP of the 16 GB 4060 Ti.

The XFX Card

Now that we have discussed the technology basis for the aptly named XFX Speedster QICK 319 RX 7700 XT Black Edition, we should take a look at the card itself.

The 319 denotes the number and size of fans on the card. It features 2 x 100 mm fans and a single, centrally located 90 mm fan. 3 fans, 100 mm, and 90 mm. 319. QICK is the lower level of enthusiast cards from XFX, with MERC being the top end. Black Edition simply notes that it is an overclocked version of the RX 7700 XT.

This is an extremely long card, but it is not overly heavy. The older MERC 319 6800 XT that I reviewed last year featured a large metal shroud covering an extensive heatsink with heatpipes snaking throughout. The 7700 XT features a plastic main shroud, a plastic back piece on the other side, and then a metal backplate for the main portion of the PCB. It is about half the weight of the older 6800 XT version, and that is a combination of the plastic shrouds vs. metal as well as a less dense fin construction for the heatsink itself. The larger, older card featured 10 heatpipes attached to the copper heatplate while this newer model has 8 heatpipes and a similar copper heatplate.

The fans are 13 blade units featuring dual ball bearing construction. These are rather plain as compared to other fans I have seen on competing cards, but they seem to be quiet and move air very well.

Power is provided by 2 x 8 pin PCI-E connectors providing a theoretical 375 watts to the card. The card itself will never use that much, but it does give a lot of headroom over the stock 245 watt TDP. It features a 14 phase power design for overall board power and a dedicated 8 phases for the GPU. It also features two BIOS settings for stock performance and then a “Rage” mode for aggressive overclocking.

Hot air is exhausted out of the top and bottom of the card, with a couple of vents on the display header. Very little air will go directly out, so a well ventilated case is a must for these types of cards. Having said that, I do prefer these styles to the blower style fans and heatsinks.

The card itself feels very solid and well built. It features no RGB, which is a plus for the purists out there. It also cuts down on the complexity of the card, so they could focus on the cooling design and performance rather than having to add in RGB and the necessary control solution.

Testing and Performance

The following setup was used for all tests.

• AMD Ryzen 5 5600X processor
• G.Skill 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3600
• ASRock Phantom Gaming X X570 motherboard
• WD SN850 Black 1TB NVMe (Boot Drive)
• Intel 660p 1TB NVMe (Benchmark Drive)
• Hitachi 2 TB 7200 RPM (Bulk Data Drive)
• be quiet! 1200 watt power supply

Tested Cards:

• XFX Speedster QICK RX 7700 XT Black Edition
• XFX Speedster MERC RX 6800 XT Black Edition
• AMD Reference RX 6700 XT
• NVIDIA Reference RTX 2080 Ti
• ASUS RTX 3060 OC
• Intel Arc A770 LE

AMD provided a press driver for the RX 7700XT. The rest of the boards used the latest respective drivers as of September 1, 2023.

Unigine Valley

This DX11 benchmark shows the capabilities of the cards in an older title that was considered stressful when introduced.

The 6800 XT takes the lead and never gives it up. The 7700 XT is only marginally faster in this title than the older 6700 XT. The 3060 and A770 are outclassed by the 7700 XT. It is interesting to see that the 7700 XT at $459 is competing very well with the older high end NVIDIA part. The 2080 Ti was released at $999, but was often sold for more.

Unigine Superposition

This is a much more strenuous benchmark that fully utilizes DX12 and Vulkan to introduce complex shaders and high poly count scenes. The 1080 High preset was used as well as a custom 2560×1440 Extreme setting.

The 6800 XT again has a hefty lead over the competition, but the 7700 XT is now the second fastest card on the list. It barely edges out the 2080 Ti and is much faster than the 6700 XT. Perhaps what is more interesting is the jump in competitiveness for the Intel A770. Modern titles and benchmarks work a whole lot better on that card than a lot of older stuff.

Far Cry 6

A fairly ubiquitous benchmarking title due to Ubisoft throwing in the kitchen sink when it comes to every rendering technology that can be implemented in a somewhat dated engine. Ultra high preset, HD textures, and all DXR options enabled. DLSS/FSR/XeSS all disabled.

At 1920 x 1080 the 6800 XT again takes top spot with the 7700 XT having a few hiccups to lower performance against the 6700 XT. Once we enable 2560×1440 we see those positions switch. The 7700 XT is now right up against the 6800 XT. The Intel A770 is still not close, but it seems to do relatively well when we kick the resolution and complexity of a title up a notch vs. the 3060.

Watchdogs Legion

Another Ubisoft title with a robust built-in benchmark and DXR support. Ultra quality settings enabled with DXR set to max.

Things are not really shook up here with the 6800 XT performing best with the 7700 XT coming in close behind.

Red Dead Redemption 2

This particular title is starting to show its age a bit, but is still a very stunning title with really good effects and art assets. Quality slider was set to full, Ultra preset used, Vulkan renderer selected.

Starting to sound like a broken record here by saying the 6800 XT is still in the lead with the 7700 XT coming in second, but well above the rest of the competing parts. The A770 sorta stretches its legs a bit in this particular scenario.

F1 2023

The latest F1 title from Codemasters/EA features many of the latest technologies from AMD, NVIDIA, and Intel. Extreme settings were used with all DXR features enabled. Image scaling was disabled for all cards. The Brazil track was used in wet weather.

This is a bit of a tougher test for these cards and the 7700 XT matches the 6800 XT in performance. The 2080 Ti still does a good job, but the surprise here is the A770 taking 4th place.

Forza Horizon 5

The latest open world racer from the Forza series takes a colorful romp through Mexico’s varied landscapes. It also features many of the latest rendering technologies, including DXR support. Extreme settings used with no resolution scaling enabled.

In this particular title the 6800 XT reasserts its lead with the 7700 XT coming in second.

3D Mark Time Spy

We have to run this otherwise there could be complaints.

Everything falls out nearly as expected. The 3060 is just not a very strong offering these days.

Temperature

Idle temperatures were a bit all over the place with these cards as some of them shut down the fans when not under significant load. Testing was done in a basement with a constant temperature of 20 C.

The 7700 XT was by far the coolest running solution of the group. It never went above 58C in any of the tested applications. The fans were also quieter than the stock AMD Wraith CPU cooler on the test machine. I never in fact heard them spool up at any time in testing. The worst performer was the AMD branded 6700 XT. That one got a little toasty and I certainly heard those fans.

Power

All results were taken at the wall, so that includes the rather well kitted out testing machine with multiple levels of storage. The GPU limited benchmark Superposition was used to load up the cards and the top/average (eg. non-bursty) watts were recorded.

101 watts separates the RX 6800 XT and the nearly as fast RX 7700 XT. Seems like AMD did do some good things with the overall power/performance ratio. It does pull about 20 watts more than the 6700 XT, but it always outperformed that card in all tests except one.

Clockspeeds

I was never given the official speeds that this particular product was spec’d to run at. It is an overclocked card, so all of those clockspeeds will be boosted over the official AMD reference design. I did monitor clockspeeds though and what I found did actually surprise me. In multiple applications the clock stayed between 2575 MHz and 2633 MHz. Depending on the title, it often would just stay above 2600 MHz. Only in the most demanding of titles would I see that card dip down to 2575 or so.

AMD advertises the game clock (the speed that would be most often scene when running an actual game) as 2171 MHz. XFX could easily pop that up to 2250 MHz in their official specs, but the card just ran above 2500 MHz all the time. I will be interested to see what other publications see with different samples from other manufacturers.

Conclusion

XFX has again designed a card that performs well given the GPU, has a superior cooling solution, and doesn’t charge a serious amount above standard MSRP for these features. The company offers a 2 year warranty if the product is registered within a month of purchase. It may not be as long as other warranties, but it is still significant.

There is certainly an active discussion about the pricing of the 7700 XT vs. the 7800 XT. There is not much space between the two when we consider overclocked cards coming in $10 to $20 more than the standard MSRP. The extra $40 to go to a 7800 XT that offers near 6900 XT performance is a tempting one, even if the user will be getting a more reference style card that will not have the thermals and noise characteristics of the well built XFX Speedster QICK 319 RX 7700 XT Black Edition.

This is not a knock on this particular card. It is an issue with AMD and their pricing. My working theory is that AMD is setting the bar somewhat high for the 7700 XT to give its partners extra leeway once pricing starts to drop. A 7700 XT at $419 or $429 makes a lot more sense given the performance difference between it and the 7800 XT. I have little doubt that the 7800 XT will stay at that $499 base price point for quite some time, especially since it compares well against the RTX 4070 that is $100 more at $599.

I have been impressed by this little number though. It just has everything I could really want in what is now a solidly midrange card. Low noise, low temperatures, and compelling performance across a wide variety of applications. Add in those encoding features and we have a well rounded entertainment and productivity card. Have I mentioned no RGB? I think that is a good choice after seeing too many seemingly Blade Runner-inspired overlit computer cases. A nice change of pace that will surely resonate with a certain amount of traditional enthusiasts.

Sadly I did not have any RTX 4060 on hand to test against, but all indications point to this card being much faster than the 3 iterations of that product currently out and spanning from $299 to $499. AMD has announced that their FSR 3 implementation is going to be out this fall, and they will have their own Frame Generation technology that can run on a variety of AMD cards (not just 7000 series). The appeal of getting a card that performs worse, costs more, but has access to DLSS3 and Frame Generation loses its luster a bit now that AMD is stepping up to the plate with this new technology.

Overall XFX has done a lot with the 7700 XT and its package. It should outperform the standard 7700 XTs on the market, and potentially will lead other models with its constant boost speeds above 2.6 GHz. It does all that in a quiet, understated package that keeps temperatures very, very low.