AMD board leak hints at next-gen 'Navi' graphics tech

Little is known about AMD's upcoming graphics hardware based on the new Navi architecture, but a number of leaks and driver releases are starting to bring the project into focus. Navi is the codename for new Radeon video cards based on the new 7nm process technology, allowing for more rendering power and higher efficiency - and it's also the architecture confirmed for use in Sony's upcoming PlayStation 5 GPU.

Beyond that, official details on the tech are somewhat thin on the ground. All that we really know is that like Vega before it, the new architecture is arriving late to market, while AMD roadmaps refer only to support for 'next generation memory' as a defining feature. Beyond AMD's next GPU releases, the next phase of development refers to a next generation architecture, suggesting that Navi is based on the same Graphics Core Next (GCN) foundations as hardware going all the way back to 2011's Radeon HD 7970. This has been confirmed by Linux drivers released this week, explicitly tying the Navi codename to the GCN architecture, according to this Phoronix report.

How the core has been enhanced over Vega and its prior GCN stablemates remains to be seen, but a PCB leak from Komachi Ensaka via a now-deleted post on a Chinese forum reveals an all-new board design we've not seen before, marked with AMD branding. The boards seen in the photos are not populated with any silicon, but a lot of information can be gleaned from them. First of all, the pin configuration on the memory side of things confirms that the new AMD GPU will be paired with GDDR6 modules. 16GB - or more likely 8GB - of memory will be paired with the new core, and based on established memory speeds, a total of 348GB/s or 448GB/s of bandwidth seems likely, operating over a 256-bit interface. Which speed we get depends on which spec of GDDR6 AMD eventually settles upon.

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from Eurogamer.net http://bit.ly/2V32eE2
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