AMD Radeon RX 5500M vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Mobile vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 (Desktop)

AMD Radeon RX 5500M

The AMD Radeon RX 5500M (or RX 5500 Mobile Graphics) is a mobile mid-range graphics card based on the Navi 14 chip (RDNA architecture) manufactured in the modern 7nm process. It features 1,408 cores clocked at 1,645 MHz (max. Boost, 1448 MHz max game clock) and fast GDDR6 graphics memory (14 Gbps).

The Navi 14 chip uses the new RDNA (Radeon DNA) microarchitecture which is a successor the the GCN instruction set. It features a new processor design, a multi-level cache hierarchy and an improved rendering pipeline with support for GDDR6 memory.

The performance of the RX5500M should be between the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti Max-Q and the normal GeForce GTX 1660 Ti according to AMD. That means it should be best suited for Full HD (1920x1080) with high or maximum settings in demanding games. AMD states that the 5500M should be able to hit a performance of up to 4,6 TFLOPS (theoretical) versus 5,2 (+12%) of the desktop Radeon 5500. In our gaming benchmarks with the MSI Alpha 15, the RX 5500M however was slightly slower on average than the older GTX 1060 (mobile) and therefore between GTX 1650 and GTX 1660 Ti Max-Q.

The chip is specified with a TDP of 85 Watt and therefore 20 Watt more than the slower clocked Radeon RX5300M. In games the power consumption of the chip ranges between 64 and 105 Watt (Ghost Recon gameplay recorded with HWInfo64). In the MSI Alpha 15 the power consumption was clearly higher than the GTX 1060 and GTX 1660 Ti Max-Q and only slightly below a normal GTX 1660 Ti (measured in The Witcher 3 with an external monitor).

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Mobile

The Nvidia GTX 1050 is a mainstream GPU based on the Pascal architecture and was announced in January 2017. Contrary to the faster models, the GTX 1050 uses the GP107 chip, which is manufactured in a 14 nm process at Samsung.

The notebook version differs a bit in terms of clocks, but is equipped with 640 shader units, just like the desktop model. It is shipped with up to 4 GB GDDR5-VRAM attached via 128-bit interface and a 7 Gbps memory data rate (112 GB/s).

Features

The GP107 chip is manufactured in a 14 nm FinFET process at Samsung and offers a number of new features, including support for DisplayPort 1.4 (ready), HDMI 2.0b, HDR, Simultaneous Multi-Projection (SMP) as well as improved H.265 video de- and encoding (PlayReady 3.0). A full list of improvements and the new Pascal desktop GPUs is available in our dedicated Pascal architecture article.

Performance

The performance of the GeForce GTX 1050 can vary quite a lot depending on the cooling performance of the laptop. It can be just as fast as the desktop model under ideal conditions, but the notebook model is usually a bit slower. The GeForce GTX 960M is beaten by around 30%, so the GTX 1050 is comparable to a GTX 965M in general. It is therefore an upper mainstream GPU. Games from 2016 can be played in high settings an the Full HD resolution.

Power Consumption

The power consumption of the GeForce GTX 1050 is roughly on par with the old GTX 960M, which would mean around 40-50 Watts and (probably due to better selection and optimized parts) therefore much lower compared to the desktop counterpart. This means the graphics card will usually be used for powerful multimedia notebooks and entry-level gaming systems with at least 15.4 inches.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 (Desktop)

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 is a graphics card for desktops and high end laptops (upcoming, see our article for the mobile GTX 1060 for benchmarks and specs). It is based on the Pascal architecture and manufactured in 16 nm FinFET at TSMC. The GPU is be based on the smaller GP106 chip. In laptops it has the codename N17E-G1 and will be the successor to the old GTX 970M (predecessor). The laptop version should be launched in August 2016. The desktop version is already out.

The performance of the 6 GB version is on par with an older GeForce GTX 980 (desktop and laptop). Therefore, 1080p gaming at highest detail is currently the best use case for the card. A comprehensive review of the desktop GeForce GTX 1060 Founders Edition with 6 GB GDDR5 can be found here. Beware, the upcoming 3 GB desktop variant should feature 128 shader less but clocked slightly higher. Still the performance should be definately slower than the 6 GB version.