AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q

AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT is a mid-range desktop graphics card that is based on the RDNA 2 architecture and uses the Navi 23 chip. It offers 2,048 shaders and 8 GB GDDR6 VRAM with a 128 bit memory interface (16 Gbps, 256 GB/s max).

The RDNA2 architecture offers new features like SAM (Smart Access Memory) and Infinity Cache. PCIe 4.0, RIS (Radeon Image Sharpener) and Raytracing support are also included in the RX6600XT.

The gaming performance of the RX 6600 XT is comparable to a GeForce RTX 3060 (Desktop). The previous generation Radeon RX 5600 XT can be easily bested. Therefore, the RX 6600 XT is best suited for demanding games in 1080p and high details.

The power consumption is rated at 160 Watt (TGP) by AMD and therefore similar to a GeForce RTX 3060 (170 Watt).

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 with the Max-Q design is a mobile high-end GPU from the Pascal series. It is designed for thin and light laptops and about 10-15% slower than a regular GTX 1070 for laptops based on the cooling capabilities. The base frequency (1101-1215 MHz) is also much lower than on the regular GTX 1070 (1433 MHz, at least -10%) and the Boost (1265-1379 MHz) is also much lower compared to 1645 MHz (at least -6%) for the regular GTX 1070. The memory clock, however, is identical.

The clock is not the only difference compared to the regular GTX 1070 though. The drivers for the Max-Q version were optimized for efficiency (and not performance; only for Max-Q models), there are optimized voltage converters for 1V operation, high-end cooling methods, and a 40 dB limit for the fan noise (with clock adjustments to ensure this at all times).

Features

The GP104 chip is manufactured in 16nm FinFET process at TSMC and offers a range of new features. DisplayPort 1.4 (ready), HDMI 2.0b, HDR, Simultaneous Multi-Projection (SMP), improved H.265 video en- and decoders (for PlayReady 3.0) are only some of the improvements. See our detailed Pascal architecture article for more details.

The power consumption of the Max-Q design is notably lower than the normal GTX 1070 for laptops and ranges between 80 and 90 Watt (TGP) according to Nvidia.