MSI Radeon RX 6950 XT Gaming X Trio Review

Name: MSI Radeon RX 6950 XT Gaming X Trio
Brand: MSI

W1zzard

on May 10th, 2022,

in Graphics Cards.

Manufacturer: MSI

(93 Comments) »

Introduction

MSI Radeon RX 6950 XT Gaming X Trio is the company's new flagship AMD Radeon graphics card based on the red team's new crown jewel. The new RX 6950 XT is being launched at $1,099 (baseline MSRP), pushing the RX 6900 XT to prices under the $1,000-mark for the first time. AMD says that the RX 6950 XT is an "encore" of the RX 6900 XT, what its RX 6000 flagship would have looked like if launched in 2022. It is a lifecycle update for the series, improving in three key areas with the goal of taking on NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3090, and possibly even trading blows with the RTX 3090 Ti (a card NVIDIA very likely launched with the RX 6950 XT on the horizon).

The RX 6950 XT is based on the same RDNA2 graphics architecture as the rest of the RX 6000 series. The underlying silicon is built on the same 7 nm process as the RX 6900 XT, too. There are three sets of improvements over the RX 6900 XT. First, GPU clock speeds have been increased with a minimal increase to the typical board power, with the GPU "game clocks" now 2100 MHz, compared to 2015 MHz on the RX 6900 XT, with the typical board power at "just" 330 W, compared to 300 W on the RX 6900 XT (compare this to the 450 W of the RTX 3090 Ti or the 350 W of the RTX 3090).

Memory gets a neat 12.5 increase in bandwidth, with AMD opting for faster 18 Gbps memory speeds, compared to 16 Gbps on the RX 6900 XT. This increases bandwidth to 576 GB/s, up from 512 GB/s on the RX 6900 XT. These are still low compared to the 900+ GB/s of the NVIDIA high-end, but helping matters is the 128 MB on-die Infinity Cache memory, which operates at 1.5 TB/s and accelerates the memory sub-system. The third area of improvement is shrouded in mystery. AMD says it's at the firmware and driver levels, but does not elaborate.

The core configuration of the RX 6950 XT is the same as the RX 6900 XT. There are 5,120 stream processors across 80 RDNA2 compute units, 80 Ray Accelerators, 320 TMUs, and 128 ROPs. 16 GB is the standard memory amount, across a 256-bit wide GDDR6 memory interface cushioned by Infinity Cache. The 330 W typical board power at reference speeds means building RX 6950 XT cards with just two 8-pin PCIe power connectors is still possible (something that's impossible for the RTX 3090 Ti).

The MSI Radeon RX 6950 XT packs a fairly large factory overclock of 2224 MHz game clocks (vs. 2100 MHz reference). The memory is untouched at 18 Gbps. The card features the company's largest variant of the latest Tri Frozr Gaming X cooler featuring a heavy aluminium fin-stack heatsink ventilated by a trio of TorX 3.0 fans that are webbed at the edges to guide all their airflow axially. There's also plenty of RGB LED illumination to be had, as this will be the most premium custom-design RX 6950 XT from the MSI marquee. The company is pricing this card at $1,250, a $150 premium over the AMD baseline.

AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT Market Segment Analysis
	Price	Cores	ROPs	Core Clock	Boost Clock	Memory Clock	GPU	Transistors	Memory
RTX 2080	$500	2944	64	1515 MHz	1710 MHz	1750 MHz	TU104	13600M	8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 2080 Super	$600	3072	64	1650 MHz	1815 MHz	1940 MHz	TU104	13600M	8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 3060 Ti	$570	4864	80	1410 MHz	1665 MHz	1750 MHz	GA104	17400M	8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RX 6700 XT	$540	2560	64	2424 MHz	2581 MHz	2000 MHz	Navi 22	17200M	12 GB, GDDR6, 192-bit
RX 6750 XT	$600 MSRP: $550	2560	64	2495 MHz	2600 MHz	2250 MHz	Navi 22	17200M	12 GB, GDDR6, 192-bit
RTX 2080 Ti	$720	4352	88	1350 MHz	1545 MHz	1750 MHz	TU102	18600M	11 GB, GDDR6, 352-bit
RTX 3070	$650	5888	96	1500 MHz	1725 MHz	1750 MHz	GA104	17400M	8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 3070 Ti	$700	6144	96	1575 MHz	1770 MHz	1188 MHz	GA104	17400M	8 GB, GDDR6X, 256-bit
RX 6800	$750	3840	96	1815 MHz	2105 MHz	2000 MHz	Navi 21	26800M	16 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RX 6800 XT	$800	4608	128	2015 MHz	2250 MHz	2000 MHz	Navi 21	26800M	16 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 3080	$900	8704	96	1440 MHz	1710 MHz	1188 MHz	GA102	28000M	10 GB, GDDR6X, 320-bit
RTX 3080 Ti	$1,200	10240	112	1365 MHz	1665 MHz	1188 MHz	GA102	28000M	12 GB, GDDR6X, 384-bit
RX 6900 XT	$1,000	5120	128	2015 MHz	2250 MHz	2000 MHz	Navi 21	26800M	16 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RX 6950 XT	$1,150 MSRP: $1,100	5120	128	2100 MHz	2310 MHz	2250 MHz	Navi 21	26800M	16 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
MSI RX 6950 XT Gaming X Trio	$1,300	5120	128	2244 MHz	2454 MHz	2250 MHz	Navi 21	26800M	16 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 3090	$1,500	10496	112	1395 MHz	1695 MHz	1219 MHz	GA102	28000M	24 GB, GDDR6X, 384-bit
RTX 3090 Ti	$2,000	10752	112	1560 MHz	1950 MHz	1313 MHz	GA102	28000M	24 GB, GDDR6X, 384-bit

Packaging

The Card

Visually, the MSI Radeon RX 6950 XT Gaming X Trio looks identical to the RX 6900 XT and RX 6800 XT Gaming X Trio models. On the back, you'll find a high-quality metal backplate.

Dimensions of the card are 32 x 14 cm, and it weighs 1605 g.

Installation requires three slots in your system.

Display connectivity includes three standard DisplayPort 1.4 and one HDMI 2.1.

The card has three 8-pin power inputs. This configuration is rated for up to 525 W of power draw.

The AMD Radeon RX 6000 series doesn't support multi-GPU.

Teardown

MSI's heatsink uses seven heatpipes to quickly move heat away from the GPU and to the cooler. The main heatsink also provides cooling for the memory chips and VRM circuitry. This is a slightly different heatsink design than on the RX 6900 XT Gaming X Trio.

Once the main heatsink is removed, we find a secondary heatsink for the VRMs and an anti-sag brace near the top of the card.

The backplate is made out of metal and protects the card against damage during installation and handling.

High-resolution PCB Pictures

These pictures are for the convenience of volt modders and people who would like to see all the finer details on the PCB. Feel free to link back to us and use these in your articles, videos or forum posts.