AMD Radeon RX 6600 Graphics Card Review

A new card on the market, and the crisis continues. Radeon RX 6600 is AMD’s latest 1080p graphics card, welcome to our official review of the card.

Although most gamers have migrated to 2K, new 8th generation home consoles and higher-end RTX and RX cards for Geely Ampere and 2 RDNA made 4K a reality in games, the largest segment of PC gamers around the world is still the venerable 1920×1080 resolution is preferred for a lot of reasons.

Perhaps the most realistic reason for this is the availability of screens that support them in abundance and their appropriate price, as well as providing them with a high frame rate, which makes many players prefer them until the present time. It is an AMD Radeon RX 6600.

AMD entered the 1080p cards market of this generation just two months ago in August with the launch of the RX 6600 XT card, to compete with the green camp for dominance in that display resolution, which remained in the hands of Nvidia after its launch of the RTX 3060 cards, and before that with the RTX 3060 TI.

In the meantime, AMD didn’t do much to be honest to convince me that it really “dominates” in terms of performance over that resolution, because it came more expensive than the competitor despite its superiority in performance, however, the differences were negligible and today the lowest card is released on paper RX 6600 and so on. The main purpose of launching this particular card?

Target: 1080p..your “entrance” for the new generation

The Radeon RX 6600 comes with AMD RDNA’s 2 cutting edge architecture that’s designed to deliver gaming performance, and there’s actually a lot to talk about when it comes to this architecture and we’ve explained that in several reviews before, so we don’t want to talk again, if you like. Find out what architecture has to offer follow this review in its second part.

This card is specifically designed to provide the best 1080p gaming experience with the lowest price in mind. This means that it comes at a lower price than the RX 6600 XT as well as its main competitor, the RTX 3060 (this is obvious and expected, but it was not). It is also clear that the performance It will be lower here than in the XT version, which is also self-evident.

The RX 6600 graphics card is your first, main, and “cheapest” entry point for next-generation gaming with a powerful blend of ray tracing effects, but it still performs as frustratingly as we mentioned before compared to the green giant, and this will be true for the entire generation including this card. This is until AMD brings a new generation that may start competing with the green camp in ray tracing, but then who knows where NVIDIA will reach in this regard.

Regardless, it is mainly oriented to support 1080p or Full HD display resolutions with support for the all-new AMD Infinity cache, and 8GB of GDDR6 memory that enables the ultimate gaming experience with content creation performance for the perfect balance between work and play.

FSR support

One of the main points that AMD is trying to promote with this card is its support for FidelityFX Super Resolution or FSR technology with 50 supported games so far with promises of more in the future, the new technology that is the equivalent of NVIDIA’s deep learning DLSS technology although different in the way it works In full and also in the cards it supports, and appeared for the first time last June.

FidelityFX Super Resolution uses advanced upscaling techniques to help boost frames and deliver high-quality, high-definition gaming experiences. The goal is to get a higher frame rate without losing graphic quality. If you want more information about it, you can read this article: AMD FSR technology under test. Graphical quality or frame rate?

It is strange that the technology helps more with higher resolutions, but AMD still believes that you can take advantage of it on 1080p display resolution to increase the frame rate, and in general it will be really useful for those who like to increase performance in general while maintaining the greatest amount of quality and graphic details.

Software compatibility with Windows 11

The card also comes with AMD Software drivers that support the new Windows 11, which was launched a week ago, so if you are concerned about this point, AMD removes all this trouble from you and assures that your experience of the card or its card in general with the new Microsoft system will be fine, and this in contrast to the poor performance of AMD processors, which got worse with the first update, which happens to be released today for Windows 11, coinciding with writing this review.

GIGABYTE Radeon RX 6600 XT EAGLE

The version of the card we have for review is the Eagle RX 6600 from Gigabyte, and it’s not the first time we’ve reviewed an Eagle series card, and you may know if you follow closely that all Eagle cards come in almost the same shape as well as the same cooling system.

It is also interesting and strange at the same time that you cannot distinguish between any of the EAGLE series cards, whether they are from Nvidia or AMD, by the word Geforce RTX or Readon that appears on the side of the card chassis, also you cannot differentiate between high-end or high-end cards. The medium or even the 1080p category that we are talking about, all the cards come in exactly the same shape and design, even the colors, as well as the famous WINDFORCE 3X cooling system known to Gigabyte.

WINDFORCE 3X COOLING SYSTEM

The WINDFORCE 3X cooling system features unique 2 x 90mm and 1 x 80mm fans, with 7 copper heat pipes installed, the GPU is in direct contact with the copper surface for cooling, and the system includes a 3D active fan that together provide high heat dissipation efficiency.

The cooling system also comes, just like its predecessor, with “Alternate Spinning” technology, where this technology works on one fan opposite to the other so that the direction of air flow between the two fans is the same, which reduces turbulence and enhances the pressure of the air flow, and thus better cooling.

Through a direct connection to the GPU and memory of the VRAM card, the large copper plate combines composite heatpipes to efficiently transfer the heat generated from the internal cores to the heat sink, and the card also comes with a metal back plate where the metal back plate not only provides aesthetics It also enhances the graphics card architecture to provide full protection for it.

We can also find 3D Active Fan technology, which keeps the fans away from running when the GPU is at a low load or temperature and when it reaches a certain temperature, which is often 60, the fans start working and you can customize that as well as you want, as this allows you to By playing and using the device in light games quietly, it also preserves the life span of the fans, as they work only when needed instead of spinning at all times of the device’s operation.

Ports

If we talk about the ports in this card, it contains:

Two HDMI ports.
Two DisplayPort 1.4 ports.

The ports here are traditional and do not offer anything new in fact, which is normal and expected from a card oriented to 1080p display resolution, at least those four ports will play the most important role and will provide you with the flexibility to connect your screen easily. The card also supports multiple screens to be able to install several screens at the same time, so that Four Quad Display screens with a display resolution of up to 7680×4320.

Technical Specifications

The card is overclocked by the manufacturers OC, and that is from the original frequencies of the card where the original frequencies operate at 1792MHz with a boosted frequency in gaming up to 2044MHz and the reason for the overclocking is that Gigabyte uses a better power stage design to allow the MOSFET to operate at a lower temperature and a design that protects Overheating and load balancing plus certified ultra-durable coils and capacitors to provide excellent performance and system life.

In terms of ray tracing, the card offers 28 units of Ray Accelerators, which speed up the ray tracing processes in the card and present it in a way that suits players and games at that accuracy. In fact, the problem is not in the number of units provided by the card, but rather in the technology itself Like a baby compared to Nvidia’s Tensor Core.

This means that nothing new will be mentioned in ray tracing with the card, and before we even go into any ray tracing performance tests, we are sure that the card will not even come close to the performance of the RTX 3060 card with ray tracing and may even match the performance of the RTX 2060 from the last generation, at least.

As for lighting, the Eagle design or series generally doesn’t offer any kind of lighting on the card body, though that’s nothing wrong with the design if you want an opinion.

Card performance tests

Well, the position of the RX 6600 card in terms of its general trend is clear, this is the cheapest card ever in the new generation cards from the red camp, and it is intended for gamers and games as we mentioned who play on 1080p display resolution, let’s enter the stage of results and tests for the card.

Test methodology

First of all, please note that all the tests you will see have been done recently for all the cards in the graph to ensure that the results are correct and accurate with these conditions and criteria:

In this test we measure the performance of the card with games and various graphic applications and see the ability of the card in games to three different display resolutions are 1080p, 2K and 4K, although the AMD RX 6600 card is not intended to work with 2K and 4K resolutions at all but there is no objection Try it out with a higher resolution to see how it performs.

In addition, we use the highest possible graphics settings for games to see the maximum that the card can offer and compare it with a number of other cards to see the performance difference between them for the price.

For this test, tests have been done with AMD 4th generation AMD Ryzen 9 5950X processors and MSI X570 Godlike motherboard with four 8GB Corsair Dominator Platinum memory sticks, each with a total of 32GB and running at 3600MHz via profile. XMP.

In order to standardize the results, we used a fixed test platform in all the tests and also fixed settings with all games with the change of the piece to be tested or reviewed, so the test platform will be as follows:

Processor: AMD Ryzen 9 5950X
Motherboard: MSI X570 Godlike
Memory: Corsair Dominator Platinum 4x8GB 3600MHz
Storage Disk: ADATA XPG SX8200 PRO 512GB / ADATA XPG SX6000 Lite 1TB
Graphics Card: GIGABYTE Radeon RX 6600 EAGLE
Power Supply: DeepCool Gamer Storm DQ850-M
CPU Heat Sink: NZXT Kraken X73

As for the operating conditions for graphics card tests, we use the following:

Operating system: We are using a recent version of Windows 10.
Operating Level Power Plan: Processors are tested in High Performance mode, with BIOS power-saving options set to Auto.
Vertical Sync: All V-Sync, G-Sync, or Freesync options are turned off to ensure card performance is not stifled and unleashed.

We note in the operating system that we continued to use Windows 10 in the tests, but this does not mean at all that Windows 11 is bad at games, it is simply that we can’t get into that at the moment for many reasons, the first of which is that we are using a major test platform from AMD and there are low issues Performance with Ryzen processors is still unresolved with Windows 11.

Also, in case we wanted to change the system, we would need to return all these results in the graph with all the cards and games, which would take a huge amount of time that we don’t have right now or this review would be in vain.

Finally, our return cycle ranges from 9 months to 12 months, so we promise you that soon this graph will be transformed entirely for new tests using Windows 11, which will be a major operating condition in our graphics card tests.

Perform other resolutions

As mentioned earlier, we do not mind trying the card at a higher display resolution, but while the Full HD results hardly achieve the number 60, or revolve around it, of course, the situation will be unpopular if we raise the resolution, and yes the card cannot approach 60 frames as we see In the results on the display resolution of 2K in heavy games, but it can in some games that are less demanding with lower settings, or with the use of FSR technology and activating Smart Access Memory at the same time, so we advise you to throw this matter from your account.

Of course, we won’t talk about the performance of the card with 4K although you can see the results from the graph (if you don’t find the RX 6600 result that means it didn’t work at all on the resolution), and frankly we would be unfair if we talked about this because the card shouldn’t It work on this brutal accuracy from the ground up, but this generation made me a little “greedy” and ambitious in our requirements.

Performance with eSports games

With e-sports games, the card is doing very well, which is another reason to buy it by eSports players as it is one of the cheapest cards that works well to achieve a high frame rate in games that primarily depend on the speed of the frame rate.

If you have a screen with a rate of up to 300 Hz, you will not have a problem taking advantage of the high frame rates in these games and achieving up to 300 frames and more, but at the same time it is not the best in its class as we mentioned earlier, as the RTX 3060 still outperforms it by a good difference in most the games.

Catastrophic ray tracing

As for the ray tracing performance, unfortunately, it’s very disappointing, after we got the card in person and saw its tech specs that AMD sent us early on, and the number of 28 Ray Accelerators before we started the tests, we expected the card to deliver at least RTX 2060 performance in tracing X-rays have already mentioned this in the review.

Well, it can’t even catch up with the RTX 2060 which is the lowest-ever ray tracing performance card in the past Turing generation of the green camp. With the results and the Port Royal test that measures ray tracing performance, the AMD Radeon RX 6600 scored 3,781 points while outperforming It has the lowest NVIDIA cards from the last generation, not even the current generation, with about 600 full points, as the RTX 2060 card achieved 4353 points in the same test!

While the main competitor to the card of this generation, the RTX 3060, got a full 5,190 points! That is, a difference of about 1,700 points in favor of Nvidia’s ray tracing performance, and this, if it indicates or reflects something, reflects the extent of Nvidia’s clear superiority in ray tracing.

So, this generation can be considered for AMD as the new soldier who learns his first steps in the use of weapons, so this generation is just experimental for the Red Camp in support of ray tracing and therefore we are not waiting for anything new in this regard with RDNA 2, however, If you want to enjoy ray tracing then this card is absolutely not for you.

Temperature and energy consumption

The graphics have been tested in labs by trying the card in a real usage scenario. In our case, we run the graphical test of Metro Exodus with the highest settings on 4K resolution to ensure that the full capacity of the card is fully exploited and that it reaches its maximum limits in temperatures and power consumption. Test We record the highest temperature and output power consumption level.

As we can see from the graph, the card recorded the highest temperature of 63 degrees Celsius while pressing and playing on 4K display resolution. This temperature is more than wonderful. Thanks to the WINDFORCE 3X cooling system, which did its job well and proved its strength as it proves its strength in every card from gigabyte.

As for the rates of power consumption, the card recorded 136 watts during the same test. Here it can be said that the card has good consumption in terms of power consumption as well, so a 450 watt power supply can do its job to operate the card with the rest of the computer components safely.

However, we recommend having at least a 500W power supply for added safety.

Final Word and Final Review for AMD Radeon RX 6600

What makes me buy the RX 6600 card? Or in other words, why do we prefer it over other options on the market that are geared for the same display resolution, namely the RTX 3060 TI, RTX 3060, and RX 6600 XT, as well as the RTX 2060, GTX 1660 and Super from the last generation? This is if you find any of all these cards in the market:

If you want to play on 1080p display resolution.

If you have no problems lower some graphical gaming settings a bit.

If you mainly play esports games.

If you own a modern AMD platform and want to take advantage of the Smart Access Memory feature to increase performance.

What makes the wrong RX 6600 purchase decision then?

If you plan to enable ray tracing in games.

If the goal is to play games at a resolution higher than 1080p.

If you are a fan of high tires even in AAA games.

If you have the possibility to buy an RTX 3060 or 6700XT.

Simply those circumstances above are a summary of the review of the RX 6600 chip in general, which positions itself and describes itself as the “entryway” to the world of new generation cards and games. Yes, this card may be the lowest performance card in this generation, but it advances the desired goal of playing on 1080p resolution at an acceptable frame rate even in first-party AAA games, and also the cheapest for AMD in this generation.

The RX 6600 card is priced at $329? Mmmm really? What a silly joke, the price is high, even very high, keep in mind that it will also be available in the markets with difficulty and at a higher price than that due to the faltering state of the market as we know.

Thus, it is less than its predecessor, the RX 6600 XT, by only about $ 50, although the performance difference between them is not less than 12% and increases in some games to reach 15 and 16%, and it is the same pricing for the RTX 3060 card, which outperforms it overall by 5% In normal performance it is crushed in ray tracing.

While the version we have, the GIGABYTE Radeon RX 6600 EAGLE, is priced at a price that we did not get at the time of writing this review and we will update the review as soon as we know, anyway to be honest the differences between the versions are no longer important at the moment due to the strength of the cooling systems of all companies and also the futility of increasing the factory frequencies that affect only two or three frames at most.

In the past, third-party companies were wrestling with each other to provide better cooling for the graphics processor, and there was a superiority of companies at the expense of companies, the matter is different now, the point of this talk is that we want to say: Get the card you like “look” or “the cheapest” in a way general.

The rating of 6.5 is just a tribute to the efforts of the third-party company “Gigabyte” in providing a good cooling system as they had no hand in the performance of the chip, if AMD had dared to provide a reference version of the Radeon RX 6600 card and it did not happen the rating would have been worse, on the team NVIDIA not to worry too much about the future of the RTX 3060 after AMD launched its main competitor.