When announcing modifications of GeForce RTX 4070 graphics cards equipped with GDDR6 memory chips, NVIDIA claimed that such adapters have the same performance as the base devices of the line with GDDR6X chips. Is this really the case? Wccftech reviewers have already managed to test the new version of the GDDR6 adapter from GALAX and compare the performance with the results of the GDDR6X model.

GALAX GeForce RTX 4070 GDDR6

As a reminder, the decision to offer GeForce RTX 4070 with GDRR6 arose due to the shortage of GDDR6X chips used for top-end NVIDIA graphics cards, starting with the RTX 4070. To improve the availability of models in the popular series, the developers decided to use GDDR6 memory chips with an effective operating frequency of 20,000 MHz instead of the original GDDR6X (21,000 MHz). Otherwise, the specifications of the adapters have not changed: the AD104-251 GPU with 5888 CUDA computers, a GPU operating frequency of 1920/2475 MHz, a 192-bit bus, and 12 GB of memory on board.

The only difference is in the total memory bandwidth. In the case of GDDR6X (21,000 MHz), it is 504 GB/s, and when using GDDR6 (20,000 MHz), it is 480 GB/s. So, the ROM is reduced by about 5%. How does this affect performance?

GeForce RTX 4070 GDDR6 vs. GDDR6X 3DMark

The set of synthetic benchmarks from the 3DMark package does not actually register a difference. The difference in performance is in the range of 0-0.7%.

GeForce RTX 4070 GDDR6 vs. GDDR6X games performance

In real-world gaming, GeForce RTX 4070 GDDR6 offers almost the same performance on average as a GDDR6X card at 1920×1080 resolution. When using the 1440p mode, the performance of this version is 1% lower, and in 4K – by 2.3%. Metro Exodus was a bit of an exception, with a difference of 4.2-10.4%. However, we assume that there may have been some methodological errors during testing. For example, automatic switching of certain parameters when changing the video card. After all, a decrease in bandwidth of only ~5% could not have such a significant impact on fps.

In general, practical tests confirm the expectations that there is a certain impact on performance from replacing GDDR6X with GDDR6, but 1-2% in 1440p/4K is usually only 1-2 fps.