There have been few confirmed details thus far on AMD’s upcoming RNDA 4 GPUs, which are still at least a few months away from release. That doesn’t mean that anticipation isn’t growing over the company’s next-gen GPUs, however. Now, information spotted within Linux patches posted to GitHub has new rumors flying.
The patches, created by Linux developers, now designate the “dGPU” components as GFX1200 and GFX1201 (via Tom’s Hardware). Past Linux patches referred to RDNA1 and RDNA2 as GFX10 and GFX10.2. Now, it is thought that “GFX12” is being used to reference the RDNA4 architecture of the new GPUs. In the GitHub project spotted online, the developers were told that the code would treat these GPUs as if they “behave identically to GFX11”. The GPUs are expected to have Navi 44 and Navi 48 SKUs — suggesting that these may be lower-end cards, given that in the past, AMD would use SKU numbers ending in 1 to refer to its higher-end models (via WCCF Tech). That being said, their final SKUs have not been determined, nor have their prices or exact release dates. Additionally, AMD has already stated that numbering will not be indicative of performance. The only solid information that is known so far is that the GPUs will feature better ray tracing capabilities, greater efficiency, and better utilization of AI accelerators. They will also be using a new, advanced process node when they debut in 2024.
Despite some of the upgrades we could see in the rumored GFX1200 and GFX1201, TweakTown notes that the Radeon RX 8000 series will not likely launch to compete with Nvidia’s next-gen GeForce RTX 5090. The company has historically struggled to compete with Nvidia’s flagship GPUs, and it looks like it might be giving up on fighting for that market. Of course, these plans can always change as the industry evolves.