I was lucky enough to grab a Radeon 6800 XT Midnight Black Edition 2 weeks ago when AMD released it.
I finally received it and updated my system this week-end and ran both Half-Life:Alyx and MSFS 2020 to see if I can spot any difference - which I knew would be the case.
Alyx is butter smooth even at the highest settings, even though my 5500 XT was able to get me 80 fps with relatively high settings too. I have to say their engine if especially efficient in VR.
But what about MSFS? It is just so better. I used to fly with an OpenXR render scale at 100 and the MSFS one at 60 in order to get about 22 fps - which was sufficient to get smooth vision in the front part of the view, the sides being choppier because of the larger displacement per frame.
With the 6800 XT, I started with both render scales at 100 and what a difference it makes. Everything is so much cleaner. And it’s so much smoother. MSFS, especially in VR really shines with a recent GPU.
If anyone using VR was planning to get a better GPU and hesitated, just grab one. It really is worth it.
Glad to hear that upgrade worked for you! I am debating on getting a build with the 6800xt but keep seeing posts regarding poor performance and crashing. Is this not the case with your upgrade? Also, which headset are you using? Thanks for any advice.
Performance is excellent. And surprisingly to me, the card runs quieter and cooler than I thought. My 5500 XT was actually noisier, with fans running faster during MSFS sessions.
On the graphics side, even with the higher details level, it’s night and day. Everything is much smoother.
On the stability, for now, it seems better. I have no clue why yet. The VRAM is now 16 GB instead of 8 GB previously. My driver was unfortunately updated automatically on power-up and thus, this is another possible factor. I had one CTD and my debugger indicated it was an MSFS crash (pure and simple null pointer access).
I am using a generation 1 WMR Lenovo Explorer with a resolution of 1440 x 1440 per eye (2880 x 1440 total). Not the latest one but extremely reliable with no issues whatsoever in this front.
Great to know, thank you for the fast and detailed reply. I am so close to pulling the trigger on a 6800xt build from Alienware since it is available now and a reasonable price. The nightmare stories about AMD crashing and performance issues on here have been dettering me though.
Yes it is scary. One of the previous driver version really gave me a hard time, with CTD every 5 minutes. I reverted to the previous one and it went back to “normal”.
One must admit though that MSFS is especially picky and fragile. I finished Half Life:Alyx 3 times and never had an issue with my 5500 XT.
As an advice, make sure you’re not paying an excessively inflated price for your 6800 XT - the market being abnormally bad these days. I got mine directly from AMD.COM at the MSRP, which is close to 1/3 the awful street price. It’s hard to go through the buying process there (the site not responding because of the insane amount of people trying to get one) but when it works, it’s an especially good price.
They usually have cards on Thursday between 9:00AM and 1:00PM EST (you have to check every 30 minutes).
It is so crazy how expensive the cards are now! Thank you for the tip on getting the card direct, I had no idea they were available on the website on Thursdays. I know what I’ll be doing tomorrow morning now instead of working Hopefully I’ll be flying out there with ya soon. Thanks again.
Hopefully I’ll be flying out there with ya soon. Thanks again.