Does 7900XT still has high idle consumption on multiple monitors? And should I wait for the Supers even when I'm leaning towards AMD cards?

[rv8000]

I don’t have the screenshots on my phone but afaik, with 1x1440p 240hz, 1x1080p 75hz, and 1x4k 120hz true idle/desktop consumption was around 53w on my 7900XTX Nitro.

I haven’t checked for few drivers and I replaced the 1080p panel so thing will be different; It highly depends on specific monitor models as well as connection type (and small possibility of cable quality coming into play).

 

[tabascosauz]

Its in the 40W range or below, the clocks at low power have improved too, and substantially at that. Memory clocks back properly now and more in tune with core clock power states. That's probably where the fix is at, too. Earlier, the memory would not clock back as readily. I've seen 40W on my setup too, which really is high.

I'm seeing 12-20W on my 3440x1440 panel at 144hz on the desktop now. Not using any power saving feature like Radeon Chill.
And that's on custom UV/OC settings with a +15% power target, you can do a few watts less if you go -10%. Proof below. Fun fact: with this setup my ingame performance is at stock level, but the card uses a max of 250W instead of 315W. VRAM ticks at 2600, didn't put that in screenshot its just under here.

Here's a bit of logging while clicking around, dragging windows, etc.
To my surprise we can go sub 10W now? Okay!

I'm not sure the jury is out on that statement yet when I see below 10W here.

Interesting. Even back then absolute minimum TBP did dip below 20W but not average. I guess they have made more optimizations to VDDCR_SOC and VDDIO_MEM in the past few months. I've been saying for a long time that the power-wise core itself has always been impressive, but the memory/interconnect-related rails needed a lot of work to stop sabotaging the efficiency that the GCD offers.

4K high refresh + 1080p high refresh + 1080p is a lot of monitor, however. Navi31 has never had idle power problems on a single monitor. More than anything I'm curious what OP's unconventional setup will turn out to be like.

 

[Todestrieb]

I've convinced myself that the deals I'm getting is gonna be better than whatever right after Super launch (at least on my side of the world). I'm now set on getting a 7900XTX. I've now talked myself into spending 3 steps higher...

But before that there is a noob question. How THICC thick? tall? can I go?
The PCIE slots situation on my motherboard is as follows:
(x16) graphic card
(x1) blocked by graphic card
(x1) blocked by graphic card
(x16) PCIE-to-single-M.2 adaptor
(x1) wifi+bluetooth card

The card I'm using, Galax 3070 SG , has its height listed as 61mm, but that's likely included the gimmick fan. Without that it should be around 50mm. Some Chinese publications listed that thing as 3-slot, and without properly knowing what should be called 3-slot, that messed up my reference points.
Yes I know, I googled it and I'm still not sure what 3-slot means.

I was thinking of ordering the Sapphire Pulse (by far the cheapest non-reference card, with a listed height of 53mm, 3-slot, it should be fine size-wise) and call it a day, but I wanted the Powercolor Hellhound (height 62mm, also listed as 3-slot, ~10% pricier) if size is not an issue.
Or , buy a cheap riser cable to put the M2 adaptor elsewhere. Although without using a riser cable ever in my life I'm probably spewing nonsense here.

 

[Toothless]

I've convinced myself that the deals I'm getting is gonna be better than whatever right after Super launch (at least on my side of the world). I'm now set on getting a 7900XTX. I've now talked myself into spending 3 steps higher...

But before that there is a noob question. How THICC thick? tall? can I go?
The PCIE slots situation on my motherboard is as follows:
(x16) graphic card
(x1) blocked by graphic card
(x1) blocked by graphic card
(x16) PCIE-to-single-M.2 adaptor
(x1) wifi+bluetooth card

The card I'm using, Galax 3070 SG , has its height listed as 61mm, but that's likely included the gimmick fan. Without that it should be around 50mm. Some Chinese publications listed that thing as 3-slot, and without properly knowing what should be called 3-slot, that messed up my reference points.
Yes I know, I googled it and I'm still not sure what 3-slot means.

I was thinking of ordering the Sapphire Pulse (by far the cheapest non-reference card, with a listed height of 53mm, 3-slot, it should be fine size-wise) and call it a day, but I wanted the Powercolor Hellhound (height 62mm, also listed as 3-slot, ~10% pricier) if size is not an issue.
Or , buy a cheap riser cable to put the M2 adaptor elsewhere. Although without using a riser cable ever in my life I'm probably spewing nonsense here.

If it's not covering the 4th slot, it'll be fine. Probably can find a review where it shows how thick it is. My Red Devil is like a 3.5 slot but I also only have one card at the bottom for USB unlike your two.

You'll like the XTX. Beefy card.

 

[tabascosauz]

I've convinced myself that the deals I'm getting is gonna be better than whatever right after Super launch (at least on my side of the world). I'm now set on getting a 7900XTX. I've now talked myself into spending 3 steps higher...

But before that there is a noob question. How THICC thick? tall? can I go?
The PCIE slots situation on my motherboard is as follows:
(x16) graphic card
(x1) blocked by graphic card
(x1) blocked by graphic card
(x16) PCIE-to-single-M.2 adaptor
(x1) wifi+bluetooth card

The card I'm using, Galax 3070 SG , has its height listed as 61mm, but that's likely included the gimmick fan. Without that it should be around 50mm. Some Chinese publications listed that thing as 3-slot, and without properly knowing what should be called 3-slot, that messed up my reference points.
Yes I know, I googled it and I'm still not sure what 3-slot means.

I was thinking of ordering the Sapphire Pulse (by far the cheapest non-reference card, with a listed height of 53mm, 3-slot, it should be fine size-wise) and call it a day, but I wanted the Powercolor Hellhound (height 62mm, also listed as 3-slot, ~10% pricier) if size is not an issue.
Or , buy a cheap riser cable to put the M2 adaptor elsewhere. Although without using a riser cable ever in my life I'm probably spewing nonsense here.

A lot of "card takes up 3 slots" comments on w1zz's reviews are just a blanket description for any card whose cooler is even 0.1mm thicker than the precise width of 2 PCIe slots. Which includes the vast majority of midrange and above GPUs in like, the last 5 years. Not wrong, but not exactly precise enough to be helpful. Your 3070 is a 2 slot bracket, but at a glance the cooler looks to be almost exactly 3 slots.

True 3 slot would be the Hellhound. It has an actual 3-slot PCIe bracket that denotes the true width of 3 slots, and the cooler itself is either flush with or ever so slightly thinner than that. So it shouldn't be a problem for your riser card - as long as you don't start exceeding 3 slots, which neither of these cards are.

The Pulse should be thinner so there should be no issues. Both seem like solid choices, could make arguments for either one.

 

[rv8000]

@Todestrieb

Found a post I made when the power debacle was first being discussed, if you wanted a tad more info even though youve made your decision.

https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/...alin-23-7-1-whql-released.310953/post-5055377

*Might need to scroll down, not linking properly

 

[GerKNG]

my 7800XT pulls 50W at idle with two monitors (i prevent their BS "fix" by running your monitors at 60Hz when you don't scroll)

 

[Todestrieb]

After some rudimentary picture rescaling and measurements, the Hellhound and the SG should have very similar heights. I have made my decision to order the Hellhound.
I will let you guys know how the power consumption number goes once I get the card running.
I really can't get the physical measurements right (Without pulling the SG off the rig it really is ~50mm w/o gimmick fan or ~65mm w/ gimmick fan.) Maybe what I need to measure is actually pulling off the card...

Found a post I made when the power debacle was first being discussed, if you wanted a tad more info even though youve made your decision.

Interesting...maybe I will have to research more about the power plans. ( A quick google search here doesn't throw anything useful for GPUs.)

my 7800XT pulls 50W at idle with two monitors (i prevent their BS "fix" by running your monitors at 60Hz when you don't scroll)

Knowing the fact that some modern smartphone do similar things and without actually looking at the result of the implementations, the best I can comment is "Huh, that might be the 'fix' I need..."

 

[chaoshusky]

Yep, wait for the Supers or get yourself a 4070Ti or something.. Screw AMD and their Radeon, unless you want pants drivers that "get better all the time"! I'm now a slightly proud owner of an Intel Arc A770 LE card and holy crap it surprised me. I could have paid a bit more for a 4060 or 4060 Ti (they do run faster than it) but for a first GPU, damn its impressed me - i actually expected to think "yeah, stick to CPUs Intel, that's what you're good at" but you get a lot of card, especially for what i paid which was less than a 3060/Ti still retails at and is faster! Not to mention its actually good looking, though it does run on the warm side.. Strange how soon my 3090 is showing its age though..did i say strange? I try and run everything in 4K, haha..but the new Robocop game (which is awesome for fans, by the way) really hammers it - i *have* to run DLSS or i get 44FPS in 4K, maybe i should try 2K. Tempted to try it on the Intel Arc card in 4K so it cries..definitely have to use XeSS for that!

 

[mama]

Just a little aside: there are only rumours of Supers coming, no announcement from Nvidia. If you want a GPU perhaps look at what's available now.

 

[Avro Arrow]

The idle on Radeon cards was addressed awhile ago:

 

[chaoshusky]

I'll just toss in that running 3440x1440 144hz, and two 1080/60 panels my 7900xtx sits at around 20w or less idle. 6950XT did about the same.

That's still AMD though unfortunately I'm waiting for the 5xxx series RTX cards before upgrading, this ol' 3090 will have to live a little longer lol 3 years overclocked and shunt modded on a waterblock so far.. Yet weirdly Robocop ran better on my Intel Arc card until the update earlier, now its a whole lot better.. Didn't stop my first playthrough though! For the record i pull 28w idle with 27" 2160p main + 2x1080p/75 panels and the TV that duplicates the main..not bad really as i'm driving more pixels! Haha.. What's scary is all the lighting and pump in my annoying PC is pulling about 60 watts! Excluding all the fan supplies lol

Ah crap, i need to update my specs.. Got a 4TB WD SN850X for my birthday and my NAS is now 16TB, totally necessary xD

 

[Vayra86]

The idle on Radeon cards was addressed awhile ago:

A video on a driver update. Oh man. Thats... I cant even

 

[Todestrieb]

Not sure shouting "You unfortunate AMD users AMD DRIVER SUCKS lol BUY NVIDIA HAHA" while showing off a 3090 and an Arc GPU of all things after used 3090 is deemed not an option and I ordered a 7900XTX is anything constructive, but it is what it is.
I will immediate concede if I'm really dragged into a dick contest (I have no interest in spending 3090 or 4090 money, watercooling and shunt mods; I have a prejudice / psychological limit? that any single component costing USD>1000 equivalent is not a good idea that was why I really hesitated on buying 7900XTX in the first place, and that limit was established as USD500 equivalent back when Geforce FX5800 was the top end card and I was a kid), but I will try to summarize the thinking process on the buying decision here (most of the points is already said somewhere in this thread, and by some other members in other "should I buy" thread ) :

Spoiler: My kinda simple but long thought process. YMMV. Walls of text warning

TLDR: I moved to a new place -> got a little more space -> gotta go 4K -> 3070 is overwhelmed -> need to buy new card -> both sides driver okay, feature no care -> Green pricing sucks -> Red lets goooooo

-Timing
The furthest I can wait is the Super launch. I'm completely fine with a consistently "smooth" V-Synced 30FPS like in a console (yes srsly), but the current setup fails to reach 30FPS consistently due to bad optimization / VRAM usage and I ain't wait until 2025.
I live in Macau, which means Taobao in Chinese is the best option in price (not necessarily for warranty; Local brick-and-mortar stores are better for warranty, but prices are always meh especially for AMD cards. Also, apparently the demand for current-gen AMD cards are very low to the point they don't stock the cards). And Taobao is running the 11.11 deals (think Black Friday, except it actually starts on 11.2 and lasts until 11.11 probably).
That leads to some implications:
- The 4090 ban has already turned the 4090 into unobtainium, and ruins the pricing of used 3090 and new 4080 and 4070Ti to an extent. (I didn't think of this when I made the buying decision, but the 4090 ban will also hurt 4080Super and 4070TiSuper because 4080S will be the best thing NVIDIA can legally ship to China)
- Even after 4080S launched, 4080 is not likely to price better than 7900XTX
- Pressure to cut price on 7900XTX is low
- See below; I will pick 7900XTX over 4080 if they are priced at the same level
- Judging on the deals I'm getting now, the pricing of the 7800/7900 series should be no worse than after Super launch
--> BUY NOW !
There are likely flaws on such an overdose of guesswork on this part, but it is what it is.

Brand preferences
-Driver
It may be a suprise to the guy trying to run dick contest, but I have said in 1st post that I have some good and bad experience on driver stability on the current card (3070) and last card (5700XT) before I added the 4K monitor. Granted I skipped the 1st year of the lifecycle on both cards. And I pretty much skipped the 1st year of 7900XT(X).
I know a lot of guys here says AMD DRIVER BAD, but I don't know if it is a outdated take or not; The experience on my 5700XT is not bad enough to say "I will never buy AMD". In terms of driver stability it is ... about the same as the 3070 on my current setup (before 4K monitor upgrade). The card before (1070) was better, but I was not seriously gaming back then.
This can be a usage issue anyway: I got some trivial stuff that I would prefer not to shutdown the PC even when I'm out of home. That leads to the PC being virtually 24/7, which might have screwed up some (V)RAM, and kicks up some graphic driver related gremlins when I want to start a game after a long day. I'm probably spewing nonsense here. Also, if I don't count the kind of crashes after several days of idling, there are virtually no crashes on the 3070 , 5700XT and 1070.
The day 1 review of 7900XT(X) listed those ridiculous idle power consumption numbers, and that's what started this thread.

-Features
RT performance: yeah, sure...?
DLSS: I still got very bad experiences with DLSS/DLAA on the games I play today (Forza Motorsport 8 and Forza Horizon 5: very awful ghosting on at least the player car). Granted FSR/XeSS might also be that bad, but screw it, I'm gonna go native as much as possible anyway. Yes I know, FM8 crashes on 7900XTX, but it is mostly fixed.
AntiLag: I despises any kind of shooter because I suck at them. AntiLag is not (likely) an issue.
Frame Generation: What is that? Can I eat that? /s
NVENC: kinda is an issue (I sometimes do video transcoding), but there are lots of workarounds.
Being a Read-Only member most of the time here on TPU, I can see the sentiment on the higher end is "If you care any of the features enough, buy NVIDIA; else buy AMD. It's pretty obvious that I don't care about the features.
When I brought up the idea of upgrading to my friends, one mentioned the dreaded 12-pin connector on 4080 and 4090 as a reason to steer away from NVIDIA. Although AFAIK it should be safe on everything below the X090 tier.
He also suggested to go for AIO models like AsRock AQUA because it takes less slots, but both water leak and clogging are things I really don't want to deal with.


-VRAM
The main issue that prompted me to upgrade is that 3070 (and its VRAM) is overwhelmed because I went 4K. So 16GB is a hard minimum.

Now I established features and driver stability is a non-factor, the minimum I have to buy on the green side is the 4080 (will be 4070TiSuper / 4070Super/16GB probably. 4060 is a joke and at best a side grade). On the red side there is the 7800XT.
4080 is firmly above USD$1000. Even if 4080 and 7900XTX is in the same price bracket I will likely pick 7900XTX. And the possibility that the green side throws a better deal even after Super launch is low. Maybe it will be outside Asia, but no chance in hell Taobao.
If I ended up going for anything lower than 7900XT, the recent news suggested that the new NVIDIA products will be very competitive on that price range.

Now the choice is 7800XT or go higher, and probably because my monitor is kinda high-end in terms of refresh rate, someone here suggested to go as high as 7900XTX, and I bought into his argument. And it ended up just below USD$1000. yay!
Part of the reasons I chose the M27U as the monitor upgrade despite M28U being cheaper is that in a Techspot / Hardware / Monitor Unboxed's feature article they said M27U is more optimized on 60~100?Hz. Granted, Size is precious, and M27U is a new model, I deliberately go lower-mid end on the 4K monitor spectrum, and I thought I was very likely to buy 7800XT as the card upgrade here, but I digress.

For reference, the pricing here for the cheapest 4070Ti and 4080 is ~10% lower and ~20% higher respectively when compared to the cheapest 7900XTX. 7900XT is ~17% cheaper than 7900XTX.

---

While I'm also suprised to see a Youtube video dedicated to a freaking driver update...That's 2023 AMD Graphics driver, both in a good and bad way.

---

Now the 7900XTX Hellhound has been delivered. This is the first top-end card I have ever owned. YAY! 5700XT doesn't count.

I'm still at work now. Can't wait to see how great (or bad) the new card turns out to be...

 

[AusWolf]

7800 XT here with a 3440x1440 144 Hz and a 1024x600 43 Hz mini display...
30-35 W on the Windows desktop, 42-48 W web browsing, 52-56 W during video playback, and around 10-12 W when the screens are off.
I just set a lower screen switch off time in the OS and call it a day.

Edit: I see you've already made your decision. Congrats!

 

[Todestrieb]

7800 XT here with a 3440x1440 144 Hz and a 1024x600 43 Hz mini display...
30-35 W on the Windows desktop, 42-48 W web browsing, 52-56 W during video playback, and around 10-12 W when the screens are off.
I just set a lower screen switch off time in the OS and call it a day.

Edit: I see you've already made your decision. Congrats!

The day 1 review for 7800XT shows completely normal numbers for multiple monitor idle power, which also steered me towards 7800XT initially. But anyway...Thanks : )

 

[INSTG8R]

Pre-Ada, on a wacky setup like yours, you might regularly expect to see 40W anyway from a RTX 20 or 30 series card. So 40W is really not bad in the grand scheme of things. On the shitty reference cooler 7900XT, video playback was around 40W ish, and it still stayed fanless about half the time so I have no doubt Pulse would be better.

But no promises that you won't see 2500MHz VRAM.

They have added a "middle step" I know I saw it on my 6950XT because I run Steam on my Desktop(GPU accel) and Discord in the Background(still using a bit of accel) I would get like 1300 or so vs the max 2100. Now I do not run multi monitor but I am still running Steam, Discord and FF while viewing this(pretty sure FF has GPU accell as well) my 7900XTX is bouncing between 7 and 23W peak but mostly in the low to mid teens. But I did suffer a long time with the full speed RAM not even thinking about that I had those things running all the time(why I didn't consider them)
They have made continuing efforts to improve it on RDNA3

 

[tabascosauz]

They have added a "middle step" I know I saw it on my 6950XT because I run Steam on my Desktop(GPU accel) and Discord in the Background(still using a bit of accel) I would get like 1300 or so vs the max 2100. Now I do not run multi monitor but I am still running Steam, Discord and FF while viewing this(pretty sure FF has GPU accell as well) my 7900XTX is bouncing between 7 and 23W peak but mostly in the low to mid teens. But I did suffer a long time with the full speed RAM not even thinking about that I had those things running all the time(why I didn't consider them)
They have made continuing efforts to improve it on RDNA3

Middle step I meant more somewhere between 20W and 50W. Even back in January there were already other VRAM states around 40-50W used for video playback, but yet unused in idle at the time. And obviously on RDNA2 and older they have existed for a long time.

Interested to see what numbers @Todestrieb will see

 

[INSTG8R]

True 3 slot would be the Hellhound. It has an actual 3-slot PCIe bracket that denotes the true width of 3 slots, and the cooler itself is either flush with or ever so slightly thinner than that. So it shouldn't be a problem for your riser card - as long as you don't start exceeding 3 slots, which neither of these cards are.

New Hellhound owner can confirm it is a full 3 slots(i had a "vent" cover in my 3rd slot with the idea it may allow more fresh air in. I was puzzled when the card "wouldn't fit" DERP 3 slots...

Middle step I meant more somewhere between 20W and 50W. Even back in January there were already other VRAM states around 40-50W used for video playback, but yet unused in idle at the time. And obviously on RDNA2 and older they have existed for a long time.

Interested to see what numbers @Todestrieb will see

I have already moved on to a a 7900XTX myself and I missed that the OP had as well I too am curious because as I do beta test it may be good info to take back to "headquarters"

 

[jesdals]

I use 3 1440p monitors in Eyefinity - this is my GPUZ in windows

I do not mind the 89watt usage because my PC seldom is in idle. Regarding multi monitor is it correct that AMD still is the strongest when you use your monitors as one (Eyefinity mode)?

 

[Todestrieb]

Some snafu happened, and I have to wait for at least next business day to see what happened to the delivery.
I hope I can get the card tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

 

[INSTG8R]

Some snafu happened, and I have to wait for at least next business day to see what happened to the delivery.
I hope I can get the card tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

I feel you I should have slept last night but didn't and DO have an important package coming today but I will have to drive to the store to pick it up and will be too tired to even play with it. Because I'm still getting used to my 7900 yesterday was play with some OCs etc I am just getting to know it..

 

[Vayra86]

Some snafu happened, and I have to wait for at least next business day to see what happened to the delivery.
I hope I can get the card tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

Oh wow. Those feels I know them. Great time for alcohol

 

[Todestrieb]

Now I got my hands on the card, and after a cleaning and a messy cable running session...
Here are the numbers that somehow a few people a waiting for. Saaaaaaadly...

The numbers are hovering at 80~100W range. Using latest driver at the time (23.11.1) and quiet BIOS, if that matters.
Without the M27U (the 4K monitor) it will average at ~22W, with lows of 7W if I wait hard enough.
Also, the screenshot function doesn't work perfectly probably because of various monitor scaling / position, but I digress.

Other things I tried that didn't help the situation:
Changing color depths of M27U from 10bpc to 8bpc
Changing resolution of M27U 4K to 1080p (I can guess from the Windows setting screen that signal output is still 4K)
Changing refresh rate of M27U (default 150Hz, tried 144Hz, 60Hz, 59.94Hz)
EDIT: Advanced Power Settings-> PCIE -> Changing from Moderate? to Maximum
Flipping the switch for Eyefinity for the second time (see below)

Things that helped the situation in the wrong way:
Flipping the switch for Eyefinity for the first time
(because of the wacky positioning, of course that's gonna be a horror show. Maybe because I touched some other monitor settings for the monitors, the second time I flipped the switch the power draw stayed high.
The physical space constraint means that I can't put 3 monitors horizontally at the same time. But moar monitors are moar monitors, hence the wacky positioning / config.)

---

I just set a lower screen switch off time in the OS and call it a day.

I really didn't think this through huh? What an idiot I am. : /
Now if Windows always remember to turn off the monitors...
( I guess maybe it's the trivial things I run that took away the attention of Windows. )

---

I swear the SG really isn't 61mm tall after I measured and put both cards next to each other for comparison.
Also, I really hate alcohol beverages (allergy I guess, but also general hate), but I appreciate the thoughts out there...

 

[rv8000]

Now I got my hands on the card, and after a cleaning and a messy cable running session...
Here are the numbers that somehow a few people a waiting for. Saaaaaaadly...
View attachment 320872
The numbers are hovering at 80~100W range. Using quiet BIOS, if that matters.
Without the M27U (the 4K monitor) it will average at ~22W, with lows of 7W if I wait hard enough.
Also, the screenshot function doesn't work perfectly probably because of various monitor scaling / position, but I digress.

Other things I tried that didn't help the situation:
Changing color depths of M27U from 10bpc to 8bpc
Changing resolution of M27U 4K to 1080p (I can guess from the Windows setting screen that signal output is still 4K)
Changing refresh rate of M27U (default 150Hz, tried 144Hz, 60Hz, 59.94Hz)
Flipping the switch for Eyefinity for the second time (see below

Things that helped the situation in the wrong way:
Flipping the switch for Eyefinity for the first time
(because of the wacky positioning, of course that's gonna be a horror show. Maybe because I touched some other monitor settings for the monitors, the second time I flipped the switch the power draw stayed high.
The physical space constraint means that I can't put 3 monitors horizontally at the same time. But moar monitors are moar monitors, hence the wacky positioning / config.)

---

I really didn't think this through huh? What an idiot I am. : /
Now if Windows always remember to turn off the monitors...
( I guess maybe it's the trivial things I run that took away the attention of Windows. )

---

I swear the SG really isn't 61mm tall after I measured and put both cards next to each other for comparison.
Also, I really hate alcohol beverages (allergy I guess, but also general hate), but I appreciate the thoughts out there...

You can also try enabling “maximum power savings” for the pci-e under the advanced power settings for the windows power profile.

3 monitors seems to be a tipping point between relatively decent idle usage and basically doubling idle power draw; especially with higher res, refresh, and bpc.