AMD’s Radeon RX 7800 XT is the worst kept secret in PC gaming. The mid-range RDNA 3 card has been a long time coming – it’s been nine months since Big Boss Radeon RX 7900 XTX / XT came out to play – but for those who’ve held out in the hope of a meaningful upgrade, the signs are good.
Testing a glut of cards on our trusty Ryzen 9 5950X-based system reveals excellent QHD performance, yet there’s further food for thought as today’s gamer-focussed CPUs can help extract even higher framerates through winning combinations.
The natural companion for a Radeon RX 7800 XT GPU would be its CPU namesake, Ryzen 7 7800X3D. Intrigued to see how much of an uplift is achievable, we’ve transplanted our Sapphire card to an AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D system and ran five games at FHD using exactly the same settings as our lead review.
| Game | Ryzen 9 5950X | Ryzen 7 7800X3D | % gain avg / min |
|---|---|---|---|
| AC Valhalla | 156 / 69 | 157 / 77 | 0.6 / 11.6 |
| Far Cry 6 | 100 / 77 | 135 / 117 | 35.0 / 51.9 |
| Final Fantasy | 198 / 58 | 238 / 97 | 20.2 / 67.2 |
| Forza Horizon 5 | 157 / 127 | 165 / 146 | 5.1 / 14.9 |
| Rainbow 6 Extraction | 287 / 209 | 313 / 221 | 9.1 / 5.7 |
Oftentimes, we’re beguiled by comparative performance against GPUs costing $50 more or less, but heightened framerate is more than merely the domain of the graphics card.
Not only does the average go up by an appreciable degree, the increase in minimums is even more marked. As every gamer knows, it’s the slowest frames that hurt the most. A whopping 67 per cent increase in minimum framerate for Final Fantasy is not a typo, and you need further evidence of how much difference 7800X3D can make when it comes to gameplay, note that Far Cry 6’s minimum is boosted by over 50 per cent.
The increase isn’t quite so profound in every title – there will be instances where the average is barely any different – yet it’s safe to say that Radeon RX 7800 XT and Ryzen 7 7800X3D are a match made in gaming heaven. So much so that we wonder if AMD or an enterprising partner will choose to bundle the duo as a special offer.
If you’re thinking about upgrading the system, it pays to take a holistic look at every component. Failing that, you could always overclock the graphics card.
