We may well be looking at the final specifications for the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT and RX 6600 here. Based on the Navi 23 GPU, new screenshots from GPU-Z purport to show the RX 6600 XT with 2,048 cores, with the cut-down RX 6600 offering slightly fewer at 1,792. Importantly, both are listed with 8GB of GDDR6 memory.
The information comes from two screenshots of GPU-Z, which appeared over at tech forum Chiphell (via Videocardz). They claim to list the specifications for the two unreleased RDNA 2 graphics cards, the first being the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT, noted as 73FF C1, and built on the Navi 23 GPU. Its 2,048 cores would accompany 32 ROPs and 128 TMUs, and would be accessible via a 128-bit bus and 8GB of GDDR6.
Then there's the RX 6600 with just 1,792 cores, 32 ROPs, and 112 TMUs. That card's also fitted with 8GB of GDDR6 and a 128-bit bus.
Both would feature the same RDNA 2 architecture, currently found in the RX 6700 XT right the way up to the RX 6900 XT.
These two GPUs also appeared in a EEC listing from ASRock recently, and where there's smoke, there's fire. We've had no official confirmation from AMD as to any budget or mid-range graphics card launch, but I wouldn't put it past AMD to rock up to a virtual E3 with its own stream and announce the two cards there.
The potential spanner in the works being the ongoing GPU shortage, but as Nvidia is starting to roll out cheaper GPUs in the RTX 3060 12GB and mobile RTX 3050 Ti and RTX 3050, perhaps the pressures mounting for AMD's own RDNA 2 answer.
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Beyond the Navi 23 GPU, which is codenamed Dimgrey Cavefish, by the way, there's now confirmation in the Linux driver code of another GPU codename: Beige Goby (via Phoronix). Likely to be Navi 24, this chip would probably be rather slim for our gaming tastes as it stands today, but that could still be good news for budget gamers looking for their first real entry-level fix since Polaris.
There's definitely more to come out of the RDNA 2 architecture, and if AMD's track record is anything to go by, it could be where the company flourishes best. That is, if the global chip shortage doesn't get in the way. Something tells me we'll still be struggling for stock for a good while yet.
If AMD's RDNA 2 GPUs begin topping the Ethereum hash rates of the RTX 30-series they may end up being in high demand. It's starting to look like that may be the case, too. The RX 6600 XT is reported with a mining hashrate of 30MH/s, and while that's nothing to write home about today, once Nvidia slices hash rates in half across its gaming cards, as it's reported to be doing, RDNA 2 will look that much sweeter for miners.
