LOS ANGELES, July 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- SIGGRAPH 2017 --   AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) today formally launched the Radeon™ RX Vega family of GPUs, engineered to be the cornerstone of the world’s most advanced and exciting PC gaming platforms. Designed with forward-looking technologies that punch well above their weight, Radeon RX Vega graphics cards mark AMD’s return to the enthusiast-class gaming segment and a continuation of the company’s calculated strategy to democratize leading technologies, giving more gamers access than ever before.

There are three variants of Radeon RX Vega: Radeon RX Vega ⁶⁴ Liquid Cooled Edition, engineered with 64 compute units¹ to be the most powerful Radeon ever built²; the Radeon RX Vega ⁶⁴ with air cooling, and the Radeon RX Vega ⁵⁶, available starting at just $399 USD SEP.

For a limited time in select regions, AMD and its industry partners are offering Radeon RX Vega purchasers an unprecedented assembly of gamer “must-haves” in new Radeon™ Packs, including deep discounts on select Ryzen™ multi-threaded CPUs and motherboards combos as well as select Samsung displays with Radeon™ FreeSync displays, and two extraordinary AAA game titles – all the ingredients necessary for the best possible PC gaming experience in one of the biggest industry collaborations ever seen.

“The enthusiast gaming experience is defined by high resolutions and a tear-free, buttery smooth 60 frames per second, something that only approximately 600,000 gamers are capable of enjoying today. But there are 4 million more gamers who aspire to enjoy that same enthusiast gaming experience without breaking the bank, and with Radeon RX Vega graphics cards we’re working to give them that.³ The combination of a Radeon RX Vega graphics card, a beautiful FreeSync display, and a high-performance Ryzen CPU and motherboard is everything a gamer needs to enjoy the best possible gaming experience, and with our Radeon Packs, we’re delivering all three at a tremendous value. The groundbreaking new features in the ‘Vega’ architecture, including the High Bandwith Cache Controller, Rapid Packed Math, Next-Generation Compute Units, and Refined Geometry Engine, will ensure that gamers get even more out of their investments as new games take full advantage of them in the weeks and months to come,” said Raja Koduri, senior vice president and chief architect, Radeon Technologies Group, AMD.

Radeon RX Vega: The most advanced consumer graphics cards in the world

Radeon RX Vega graphics cards are built on the “Vega” GPU architecture, a direct response to the evolving complexity and visual demands of today’s games. To meet these needs the “Vega” GPU architecture puts pioneering graphics technologies previously reserved for high-end graphics products into the hands of enthusiast gamers everywhere. Bleeding-edge capabilities like Rapid Packed Math, the High Bandwidth Cache Controller and new Geometry and Pixel Engines will help push the performance envelope while gaming in low-level APIs like DirectX® 12 and Vulkan®, giving developers more flexibility in designing the most intricate and beautiful virtual worlds in today’s and tomorrow’s games.

• Architected for better enthusiast-class gaming – The Radeon RX Vega represents the most sophisticated GPU architecture ever designed for enthusiast-class gaming. It features next-gen compute units enabling native processing of multiple data-type operations in each clock cycle, and supporting variable data types making for a versatile architecture across workloads, an enhanced geometry engine enabling incredible efficiency in processing complex geometry while delivering more than 200% of the throughput-per-clock over previous Radeon GPU architectures, an optimized pixel engine that improves performance through a “fetch once, shade once” approach, and the world’s most advanced GPU memory architecture consisting of a High Bandwidth Cache composed of 8GB of leading-edge HBM2 memory, doubling the bandwidth-per-pin over the previous generation HBM technology, and delivering 60% more memory bandwidth over GDDR5. Together these advances result in the Radeon RX Vega’s phenomenal computational muscle: up to 13.7 TFLOPS of peak performance to power through even the most demanding games and VR applications.
• Exceptional premium design – Radeon RX Vega gaming cards have been impeccably designed with state-of-the-art, premium styling. Select models feature a satin-brushed aluminum shroud, an anodized aluminum backplate, customizable GPU tach meter and iconic LED illumination, and controls for dual vBIOS. Air-cooled versions boast the latest isothermic vapor chamber for maximum heat displacement while the liquid-cooled version features a next-generation cooling design incorporating a high-efficiency pump, zero-bend radius tubing and a Nidec Gentle Typhoon fan for quiet operation.
• Leading display technologies – PC gamers expect variable refresh rate to be a standard feature for monitors, and they don’t expect to pay an extra ‘feature tax’ to get it. Radeon RX Vega graphics cards support Radeon™ FreeSync technology, a true leap forward for PC gaming enabling smooth, vibrant HDR gaming⁴, 10-bit display support and low-framerate compensation. There are more than 200 FreeSync displays available today, almost seven times more than costlier competing technology. Radeon RX Vega graphics cards support HDMI® 4K60 and DisplayPort™ 1.4⁵, enabling high-resolution and high-refresh displays powering experiences such as Radeon™ FreeSync with high-refresh, Ultra HD, ultrawide, and single-cable 5K resolutions.
• Unmatched capabilities and control with Radeon™ Software – Radeon Software compliments the sophisticated hardware of the Radeon RX Vega graphics card, enabling the ultimate in performance, features and stability to ensure an exceptional out-of-box experience that will keep getting better. New Radeon Software features launched last week also benefit Radeon RX Vega users. Radeon™ WattMan now enables memory underclocking for more engine headroom, fine-grained power state controls for increased performance or power savings, and auto-overclock and auto-power save features that allow WattMan to automatically adjust GPU power states to your preference.⁶ The best capture, stream and sharing software in Radeon™ ReLive is now even better with options for higher bitrate recording at 100 mbps, camera transparency for increased HUD visibility, refined notifications and enhanced audio controls. And the AMD LiquidVR™ 360 plugin for VR Video Playback is the first GPU-accelerated end-to-end solution for HEVC 4K x 4K VR video playback⁷. Designed for 360 stereoscopic videos, the plugin supports ambisonic audio and is accelerated by the GPU to enable 65% higher frame rates⁸, no dropped frames⁹, and improve power consumption by 15% during playback.¹⁰               

Radeon Packs: Everything you need for the best experience

A great PC gaming experience comes down to more than just graphics. Serious gamers know that to achieve high resolutions and a buttery smooth 60 frames per second, there are two must-have elements: a beautiful adaptive refresh display for smooth, stutter-free gaming and heightened immersion, a multi-threaded processor to deliver astounding performance on a motherboard that supports these next-generation components. Built around the new Radeon RX Vega graphics cards, Radeon Packs are designed to put all of those technologies at gamers’ fingertips, allowing them to make these upgrades much more cost-effectively than were they to buy each component alone to drive silky 60+ frame-per-second 4K gaming in more than 100 popular titles.¹¹

Radeon Packs include a $200 discount on the 34” Samsung CF791 curved ultrawide FreeSync monitor, and a $100 discount on select Ryzen™ 7 1800X processor and 370X motherboard combos -- $300 in combined hardware savings. To power the new setup, there are three options for Radeon RX Vega:

• Radeon Red Pack – Featuring the Radeon RX Vega ⁵⁶, an air-cooled card priced at $499 SEP.
• Radeon Black Pack – Featuring the Radeon RX Vega ⁶⁴, an air-cooled card priced at $599 SEP.
• Radeon Aqua Pack – Featuring the Radeon RX Vega ⁶⁴ Liquid Cooled Edition, the most powerful of the Radeon RX Vega graphics cards, priced at $699 SEP.

Along with the Radeon RX Vega graphics card, the discount on the Samsung monitor with Radeon FreeSync and Ryzen CPU+motherboard, each Radeon Pack also includes, in select regions, two highly anticipated games in Wolfenstein® II: The New Colossus™ and Prey® for free, an estimated $120 value.¹²

For gamers who already have the ideal setup and just want to get their hands on a groundbreaking Radeon RX Vega graphics card, AMD is also offering the Radeon RX Vega <