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PC World has a story about some changes AMD (apparently) made to the RX 560 line:

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3240264 ... worse.html

The short version, as posted on AMD's site is that the RX 560 now has either 14 or 16 CUs for 896 stream processors (like the RX 460 before it) or 1024 SPs, which is how the card launched a year ago.

If you're in the market for one of these cards (as I was last month, and apparently got lucky by getting a 1024-SP card) it's worth looking at the PC World article to see which models to avoid.

GG, AMD. Way to make your cards worse and not really tell anybody about it.

derFunkenstein wrote:

GG, AMD. Way to make your cards worse and not really tell anybody about it.

Who do they think they are... Ngreedia??!?!?!

chuckula wrote:

Who do they think they are... Ngreedia??!?!?!

It'd be really fun if it came to light that this was Raja's last decision before his "sabbatical" and ultimate departure from AMD.

Urgh. Call it a 550ti or something at least. Using the same name for an inferior product after the reviews of the original model is extra gross, and even worse than what NVidia did with the 1060.

NTMBK wrote:

Urgh. Call it a 550ti or something at least. Using the same name for an inferior product after the reviews of the original model is extra gross, and even worse than what NVidia did with the 1060.

Heck, just bring back the Pro and XT nomenclature to denote each. Or make an RX 555. But don't flood the market with parts and fail to tell customers what they're buying.

This kind of thing is why I get so annoyed when posters try to make AMD out as being the last of the good guys amongst the evil monopolists.

I certainly wouldn't suggest that Intel and NVidia are "good guys" either (far from it) but it's hopelessly naive to proceed as if AMD is somehow better from a moral stand point.

Buyer beware, no matter who the supplier is. And stop trying to convince people to base their buying decisions on which supplier is one of the "good guys" -- there are no good guys.

That's pretty lame.

Don't worry guys, the AMD fans will be along soon to tell us how much worse Nvidia is!

techguy wrote:

Don't worry guys, the AMD fans will be along soon to tell us how much worse Nvidia is!

Most likely some mouth-frothing histrionics about the 970's memory split for a start....

K-L-Waster wrote:

techguy wrote:

Don't worry guys, the AMD fans will be along soon to tell us how much worse Nvidia is!

Most likely some mouth-frothing histrionics about the 970's memory split for a start....

That's the difference between Ngreedia and AMD: People actually cared about the GTX-970. Nobody give's a rodent's posterior about the Rx 560.

chuckula wrote:

K-L-Waster wrote:

techguy wrote:

Don't worry guys, the AMD fans will be along soon to tell us how much worse Nvidia is!

Most likely some mouth-frothing histrionics about the 970's memory split for a start....

That's the difference between Ngreedia and AMD: People actually cared about the GTX-970. Nobody give's a rodent's posterior about the Rx 560.

Aside from those who want a basic video card they can game on without spending a lot of money.

I have an RX 550 in my media server - it was the cheapest "decent" card with HDMI 2.0 support which I need for 4k60 to my 4k TV that I use as a monitor for my video editing workflow. I had a 970 in there before that was giving me problems (seemingly related to a Windows update) so I switched to an AMD card to get away from driver issues. I should have known better. Audio distortion, video corruption when going in and out of full screen - this card suuuuuuuuuuuucks.

techguy wrote:

I have an RX 550 in my media server - it was the cheapest "decent" card with HDMI 2.0 support which I need for 4k60 to my 4k TV that I use as a monitor for my video editing workflow. I had a 970 in there before that was giving me problems (seemingly related to a Windows update) so I switched to an AMD card to get away from driver issues. I should have known better. Audio distortion, video corruption when going in and out of full screen - this card suuuuuuuuuuuucks.

It seems like there's no sure-fire solution, you know? Nvidia has that stupid default limited color range assumption for HDMI video that has to be manually overriden, AMD's drivers have weird edge cases, and prior to Haswell Intel didn't gracefully handle 24 fps mode for media. And for some reason my Philips HDTV and Intel graphics don't get along: about every fourth time an audio application exits, the Intel sound driver pumps a harsh, shrill tone through the TV speakers that won't stop until I start playing audio again.

Concupiscence wrote:

It seems like there's no sure-fire solution, you know? Nvidia has that stupid default limited color range assumption for HDMI video that has to be manually overriden,

Could it be a bandwidth limitation? I have a 2560x1600@60 panel that ran fine on DVI-D, but NVIDIA wouldn't show the 10-bit color option unless I swap to a displayport cable. Given the mess HDMI is with cable specs an older card may not officially support the newer specs/bandwidth possibly.

Kougar wrote:

Concupiscence wrote:

It seems like there's no sure-fire solution, you know? Nvidia has that stupid default limited color range assumption for HDMI video that has to be manually overriden,

Could it be a bandwidth limitation? I have a 2560x1600@60 panel that ran fine on DVI-D, but NVIDIA wouldn't show the 10-bit color option unless I swap to a displayport cable. Given the mess HDMI is with cable specs an older card may not officially support the newer specs/bandwidth possibly.

Oh, it's not even a 10-bit color issue. It literally crimps color ranges from [0-255] per channel to something like [16-235] over vanilla HDMI. I don't know the rationale and don't really care, it's just nettlesome.

AMD claims the obfuscation is not intentional on their part:

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3240264 ... worse.html

It’s correct that 14 Compute Unit (896 stream processors) and 16 Compute Unit (1024 stream processor) versions of the Radeon RX 560 are available. We introduced the 14CU version this summer to provide AIBs and the market with more RX 500 series options. It’s come to our attention that on certain AIB and etail websites there’s no clear delineation between the two variants. We’re taking immediate steps to remedy this: we’re working with all AIB and channel partners to make sure the product descriptions and names clarify the CU count, so that gamers and consumers know exactly what they’re buying. We apologize for the confusion this may have caused.

derFunkenstein, that looks like Grade-A BS to me. "We're sorry we got caught".

Think about it for a second. Say that AMD is correct that this is meant for OEM use and wasn't intended to reach the AIB channel.

If that's true, then AMD is intending for OEMs to advertise "buy our stuff, we're including a Radeon RX 560!" - but they aren't. They're actually bundling a RX 460 with some updates - it's a different card and performs differently with a different number of CUs.

In summary, whether the press statement was true or not, AMD is lying. They're just being more specific about how they're lying. The correct response to OEMs wanting a cut-rate cut-down RX 560 is to rename the card "RX 560 Pro" or something.

Yeah AMD is clearly washing its hands of this and throwing the board partners under the bus. "They wanted it! We gave it to them!"

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yeah AMD is clearly washing its hands of this and throwing the board partners under the bus. "They wanted it! We gave it to them!"

I would have renamed the cards as 560Ce or something along those lines.

whm1974 wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yeah AMD is clearly washing its hands of this and throwing the board partners under the bus. "They wanted it! We gave it to them!"

I would have renamed the cards as 560Ce or something along those lines.

560SE, 560RGE (for Really Good Edition), 560 Pro... So many options, and they did nothing. Just dumb, all around.

Concupiscence wrote:

whm1974 wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yeah AMD is clearly washing its hands of this and throwing the board partners under the bus. "They wanted it! We gave it to them!"

I would have renamed the cards as 560Ce or something along those lines.

560SE, 560RGE (for Really Good Edition), 560 Pro... So many options, and they did nothing. Just dumb, all around.

Well the CE would stand for Crippled Edition. Personally if I was running a company that made GPUs and CPUs, I would more refuse to make such a product out of pride and simply offer a discount to OEMs.

whm1974 wrote:

Well the CE would stand for Crippled Edition. Personally if I was running a company that made GPUs and CPUs, I would more refuse to make such a product out of pride and simply offer a discount to OEMs.

They may be GPUs with a couple of failed CUs in them, which would otherwise get thrown in the trash. If you can still make use of them and sell them at a slight discount, then everyone wins (provided the product is clearly differentiated from the ones with a full set of functional CUs).

whm1974 wrote:

Well the CE would stand for Crippled Edition. Personally if I was running a company that made GPUs and CPUs, I would more refuse to make such a product out of pride and simply offer a discount to OEMs.

whm1974, they are probably selling OEMs harvested cards.

Since the 560 uses the entirety of the GPU, there are probably some CU failures that they can fuse off for another SKU. Of course they should have renamed the harvest GPUs to something else.

OK then selling those type of GPUs to OEMs make sense then.

The problem isn't that they made a cut-down 560 in the first place. It is that they weren't clearly labeled as such.

just brew it! wrote:

The problem isn't that they made a cut-down 560 in the first place. It is that they weren't clearly labeled as such.

I can agree with that.

AMD can say what it likes, but if they aren't going to differentiate it themselves, then they can conveniently pretend to blame the OEMs for following their example.

just brew it! wrote:

The problem isn't that they made a cut-down 560 in the first place. It is that they weren't clearly labeled as such.

And yet, they used to be. AMD called it the RX 560D and they were a regionally limited model. Now AMD has removed the 560D branding when making it a global card.

whm1974 wrote:

Well the CE would stand for Crippled Edition.

You mean like Windows? Go Manjargos!

Another day, another blunder in marketing for AMD.

You're supposed to make buying this stuff easy, guys. This is not making it easy.

Nah, somebody at AMD thought they could slip this one under the rug. You don't change your own website's product page to include both 560 variants unless you don't intend to differentiate between them. With the latest statement someone else at AMD is simply shoving the first person aside and trying to hide the rug.