AMD Navi will not be based on RDNA completely, due to the optimization of games and graphics engines
That AMD Navi is not completely RDNA and is a hybrid with GCN, it would be due to the optimization of the games and graphics engines for this architecture.
At Computex 2019, Lisa Su announced the AMD Radeon RX 5000 Series. She emphasized that these Navi graphics cards were based on RDNA, a new and innovative architecture. She noted that they had spent two years developing what would be the replacement for GCN. GCN arrived on the market in 2012 and was available for seven years, the last three of which saw its use decline. As we've already mentioned, the RX 5000 Series will not be entirely based on RDNA; they will incorporate traces of GCN. The information from wccftech appears to be refuted by Sweclockers.
It seems that the AMD Radeon RX 5000 Series is confirmed to have some GCN
These new graphics cards will be based on 7nm lithography, which offers more transistors, energy efficiency and higher frequencies. RDNA would have been specially optimized for video games, while GCN was a hybrid architecture. GCN was intended to be good for games as well as massive calculations. In the end I ended up being better for computing than gaming.
RDNA is a new build structure optimized for games with a new multi-level cache hierarchy. It seeks to reduce latencies, energy consumption and improve bandwidth. This architecture has also been optimized for high frequencies. It is also the first consumer architecture entirely designed for PCIe 4.0.
According to Sweclockers, a large part of Navi's architecture is based on GCN. This contradicts the initial information indicating that it would be RDNA completely.
The motivation for doing this is that current games and graphics engines are optimized for GCN. Jumping directly to RDNA would mean starting from scratch and would have a high performance cost for the company. First generation Navi will be an intermediate step, a transitional architecture. Navi 2 will be purely RDNA.
The company's Roadmap would indicate that Navi 20 is the first pure RDNA version. These graphics would hit the market during the first half of 2020. Although the new RX 5000 Series is expected to do battle with NVIDIA, it will be the Navi 20 that will fight.
Contradiction with what was said by Lisa Su in Computes 2019?
Everything indicates that Lisa Su's statement was actually misinterpreted or not correctly qualified. Its would indicate that RDN is a new architecture, not that Navi would be entirely RDNA. It is clear that AMD knows very well that it was time to retire GCN and usher in a new architecture. Something similar to what happened with Bulldozer and Zen.
