Jesper Berg
Like XFX and Sapphire, PowerColor is an AMD-exclusive add-in board (AIB) partner, fully focused on graphics cards based on AMD GPUs. Other than a PowerColor-branded Made-by-AMD (MBA) reference card, the manufacturer also offers the PowerColor Red Devil, Liquid Devil (with pre-mounted water block), and Hellhound Radeon RX 7900 XTX graphics cards.
What sets the Red Devil model apart among the RX 7900 XTX cards is a substantially larger cooling solution and higher clock speeds out of the box. It also features three 8-pin power connectors instead of the standard two. There is also a Limited Edition version of the Red Devil, which has some cosmetic differences but the same overall specifications.
Specifications
| Specifications | PowerColor Red Devil RX 7900 XTX | PowerColor Hellhound RX 7900 XTX | AMD RX 7900 XTX Reference Model |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPU | Navi 31 XTX | Navi 31 XTX | Navi 31 XTX |
| Shading Units | 6144 | 6144 | 6144 |
| GPU Clock: Base/Game/Boost | 1855 MHz / 2395 MHz / 2565 MHz | 1855 MHz / 2330 MHz / 2525 MHz | 1855 MHz / 2300 MHz / 2499 MHz |
| FP32 Theoretical Performance | 63 TFLOPS | 62 TFLOPS | 61.4 TFLOPS |
| Dual BIOS | Yes | Yes | No |
| Memory Configuration | 24 GB GDDR6 | 24 GB GDDR6 | 24 GB GDDR6 |
| Memory Clock (Effective) | 2500 MHz (20 Gbps) | 2500 MHz (20 Gbps) | 2500 MHz (20 Gbps) |
| Memory Bandwidth (Bus Width) | 960 GB/s (384-bit) | 960 GB/s (384-bit) | 960 GB/s (384-bit) |
| Outputs | 1x HDMI 2.1a 3x DisplayPort 2.1 | 1x HDMI 2.1a 3x DisplayPort 2.1 | 1x HDMI 2.1a 2x DisplayPort 2.1 1x USB Type-C |
| TDP | 355 Watt | 355 Watt | 355 Watt |
| Recommended Power Supply | 900 Watt | 800 Watt | 800 Watt |
| PCIe Power Connectors | 3x 8-pin | 2x 8-pin | 2x 8-pin |
| Slots | 3.5-Slot | 3-Slot | 2.5-Slot |
| Dimensions (Length/Width/Height) | 338 mm (13.3 in) 135 mm (5.3 in) 73 mm (2.9 in) | 320 mm (12.6 in) 119 mm (4.7 in) 62 mm (2.4 in) | 287 mm (11.3 in) 110 mm (4.3 in) 51 mm (2 in) |
Launched in late 2022, the Radeon RX 7900 XTX (Navi 31) is AMD’s top GPU in the original RX 7000 lineup. Its 355 Watt TDP places it among the more demanding GPUs in the market and requires a large cooling solution for the same reason. As such, there are no compact models of the RX 7900 XTX, but PowerColor’s Red Devil is still a physically large card even compared to other boards based on the same GPU. Any PC case housing the Red Devil card needs to accommodate its 338 mm/13.3 inches length and width of effectively four expansion slots.
Compared to other RX 7900 XTX cards, the Red Devil mainly competes with other oversized models with 3x 8-pin power connectors, such as the Aorus Elite and Sapphire Nitro+. The game clock (an expected average while gaming) in OC mode is however a bit more modest compared to either of those competitors at 2395 MHz versus 2510 MHz.
With an extra power connector (+150 W per 8-pin connector) and a factory overclock, the PowerColor Red Devil RX 7900 XTX is theoretically able to pull a great deal more power from the PSU than the specified 355 W. PowerColor has therefore increased the PSU (power supply) recommendation from the original 800 W to 900 W.
Cooling Solution
Visually, the PowerColor Red Devil RX 7900 XTX cooler has many similarities with previous-gen Red Devil-branded graphics cards. However, the RX 7900 XTX model is a bit larger than, for example, the Red Devil RX 6950 XT. Other changes include a heatpipe arrangement adapted to the new GPU and new 9-bladed, ringed fans that allegedly improve cooling performance at the same noise level as previous models.
In terms of power delivery, the Red Devil uses a DrMOS 12+3+2-phase VRM that powers the GPU and an additional 2+2 phases dedicated to the memory chips. New IMON technology monitors and reports the electric current and power consumption on each individual phase. PowerColor claims that new power consumption and current monitoring technology improve stability and thermal protection when overclocking.
The PowerColor Red Devil card also comes with a dual BIOS feature, meaning that a physical switch lets you swap between OC and Silent mode. In OC mode, the fan curve is more aggressive to keep temperatures in check at the cost of higher noise levels.
Reviews
… excellent 2160p performance combined with a very well-designed, quiet, and perfectly cooled Powercolor Red Devil make us opt for the gold award.
About the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX
AMD’s flagship Radeon RX 7900 XTX GPU was revealed in November of 2022 and remains the manufacturer’s top model in 2023. It uses the XTX variation of the Navi 31 chip, which is the largest variant with a die area of 529 mm². The architecture is RDNA 3.0, meaning that it is a successor to RDNA 2.0 used for the RX 6000-series GPUs. Along with the RX 7900 XT, the RX 7900 XTX is the first consumer GPU to be manufactured using a chiplet-based design (5 nm production process at TSMC).
The XTX GPU comes with 192 ROPs (render output units), 6144 shading units, and 384 TMUs (texture mapping units), as well as 96 onboard raytracing acceleration cores. It supports DirectX 12 Ultimate with Feature Level 12_2.
Performance
Rasterization performance with the RX 7900 XTX GPU is often ahead of Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 4080. It is also about 25% faster than the previous-gen flagship RX 6950 XT.
In ray-tracing workloads, the RX 7900 XTX trails Nvidia’s fastest cards from the current generation.
Note that the above benchmark scores are not based on the Red Devil RX 7900 XTX, but are average scores for cards using the same GPU.
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