By Brady Betzel

The main players in the discrete GPU game, AMD and Nvidia, have released a barrage of new GPUs this past year. From the Nvidia 4090 Founder’s Edition I reviewed last October to the latest AMD W7800 and W7900, technology and energy efficiency have improved dramatically.

With AI on the forefront of everyone’s mind — whether it is because of the questionable deep fake videos or the amazing ability to take hours of work down to minutes when using Magic Mask in Blackmagic’s DaVinci Resolve — one of the most important pieces of hardware you can have is a powerful GPU.

AMD has always been in the race with Nvidia, but once Apple decided to work internally and create its own GPU, AMD struggled to find its footing… until now. The AMD Radeon Pro W7800 and W7900 GPUs are the latest in professional GPUs from the company, and they are powerful. The AMD Radeon Pro W7800 is a 32GB GPU that retails for $2,499 (from online retailer B&H Photo), while the AMD Radeon Pro W7900 48GB GPU retails for $3,999 (also from B&H). Yes, the prices give you a bit of a sticker shock if you are pricing consumer-level cards like the Nvidia 4090, but for those in need of an enterprise-level, professional workstation-compatible GPU, the $3,999 is actually pretty reasonable for the best. For comparison, the Nvidia RTX 6000 ADA retails for just under $7,000. But AMD isn’t trying to beat Nvidia at the moment. They are providing a much more reasonably priced alternative that may quench your GPU thirst without breaking the bank.

A Closer Look
First up is a basic comparison between the AMD Radeon Pro W7800 and W7900 in advertised specs:

What sets the W7900 apart from the W7800 are the increased dedicated memory of 48GB, increased AMD Infinity Cache technology to 96MB, memory interface boosted to 384-bit, increased peak memory bandwidth up to 864GB/s, triple-slot size and addition of AVI encode and decode.

AMD Radeon Pro W7800
Up first in benchmarking tests is the AMD Radeon Pro W7800 inside of DaVinci Resolve 18.1.2 and Adobe Premiere 2023 as well as a few other apps and plugins. For testing inside of Resolve and Premiere, I used the same UHD (3840×2160) sequences and effects that I have used in previous reviews. The clips include:

• ARRI RAW: 3840×2160 24fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
• ARRI RAW: 4448×1856 24fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
• BMD RAW: 6144×3456 24fps – 15 seconds
• Red RAW: 6144×3072 23.976fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
• Red RAW: 6144×3160 23.976fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
• Sony a7siii: 3840×2160 23.976fps – 15 seconds

I then duplicated the sequence and added Blackmagic’s noise reduction, sharpening and grain. Finally, I replaced the noise reduction with Neat Video’s noise reduction

From there, I exported multiple versions: DNxHR 444 10-bit OP1a MXF file, DNxHR 444 10-bit MOV, H.264 MP4, H.265 MP4, AV1 MP4 and then an IMF package using the default settings.

For comparison’s sake, here are the results from the Nvidia RTX 4090:

Again, here are the results from the Nvidia RTX 4090:

Benchmarks
Blender Benchmark CPU samples per minute:

1. Monster: 179.475890
2. Junkshop: 124.988030
3. Classroom: 86.279909

Blender Benchmark GPU samples per minute:

1. Monster: 1306.493713
2. Junkshop: 688.435718
3. Classroom: 630.02515

Blackmagic Proxy Generator (H.265 10-bit, 4:2:0, 1080p):

• RedR3D: 2 files – 50fps
• Sony a7iii .mp4: 46 files – 267fps

Neat Video HD: GPU-only 69.5 frames/sec

Neat Video UHD: GPU-only 16.4 frames/sec

PugetBench for After Effects 0.95.7, After Effects 23.4×53:

• Overall Score: 1018
• Multi-Core Score: 202.6
• GPU Score: 76.8
• RAM Preview Score: 101.4
• Render Score: 106.4
• Tracking Score: 93.6

PugetBench for Premiere Pro 0.98.0, Premiere Pro 23.4.0:

• Extended Overall Score: 532
• Standard Overall Score: 828
• LongGOP Score (Extended): 79.8
• Intraframe Score (Extended): 80.9
• RAW Score (Extended): 26
• GPU Effects Score (Extended): 47.7
• LongGOP Score (Standard): 112.9
• Intraframe Score (Standard): 95.5
• RAW Score (Standard): 75.6
• GPU Effects Score (Standard): 57.8

PugetBench for Resolve 0.93.1, DaVinci Resolve Studio 18.5

• Standard Overall Score: 2537
• 4K Media Score: 175
• GPU Effects Score: 123
• Fusion Score: 463

Those are a ton of numbers and comparisons. The important thing to note is this: The W7800 is a little pricier than the 4090 but requires almost 200W less power and includes DisplayPort 2.1 technology if your display is compatible. Finally, keep in mind that the AMD Radeon Pro W7800 is an enterprise-level card that is made to run flawlessly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. For similar guarantees, you would need to jump to something like the Nvidia RTX A5000, which currently retails from B&H for $1,899.99 but has less memory and some other differences.

AMD Radeon Pro W7900
Up next, we’ve performed similar benchmarks for the AMD Radeon Pro W7900:

Benchmarks

Blender Benchmark CPU samples per minute:

1. Monster: 181.802109
2. Junkshop: 125.356688
3. Classroom: 86.608965

Blender Benchmark GPU samples per minute:

1. Monster: 1095.478227
2. Junkshop: 969.553103
3. Classroom: 865.631865

Blackmagic Proxy Generator (H.265 10-bit, 4:2:0, 1080p):

• Red R3D: 2 files – 27fps
• Sony a7iii .mp4: 46 files – 266fps

Neat Video HD: GPU Only 89 frames/sec

Neat Video UHD: GPU Only 24.4 frames/sec

PugetBench for After Effects 0.95.7, After Effects 23.4×53:

• Overall Score: 1038
• Multi-Core Score: 203.9
• GPU Score: 82.3
• RAM Preview Score: 103.4
• Render Score: 109.4
• Tracking Score: 93.4

PugetBench for Premiere Pro 0.98.0, Premiere Pro 23.4.0:

• Extended Overall Score: 567
• Standard Overall Score: 891
• LongGOP Score (Extended): 80.3
• Intraframe Score (Extended): 82.5
• RAW Score (Extended): 26.6
• GPU Effects Score (Extended): 58.7
• LongGOP Score (Standard): 114.9
• Intraframe Score (Standard): 97.7
• RAW Score (Standard): 78.3
• GPU Effects Score (Standard): 71.6

PugetBench for Resolve 0.93.1, DaVinci Resolve Studio 18.5

• Standard Overall Score: 2847
• 4K Media Score: 179
• GPU Effects Score: 173
• Fusion Score: 502

These benchmarks are heavily favored toward video editors, content creators and even colorists, so some of the benefits — like the 48GB of memory on the W7900 — may not be useful and could be a reason to stick with the W7800. Between the AMD Radeon Pro W7800 and the W7900, a lot of the performance increases will be seen in large designs and renders — heavy Blender scenes or even Unreal creations.

Summing Up
After using the AMD Radeon Pro W7800 and W7900 for a couple of months in and out of DaVinci Resolve (versions 18-18.5) and Premiere 2023, I felt very comfortable in keeping the W7800 as the daily driver. I didn’t experience any GPU-related crashes or errors. I was actually a little surprised at how comfortable I was with the W7800 and W7900 after using the Nvidia RTX 4070 Ti and 4090 for so long.

Keep in mind that the AMD Radeon Pro series of GPUs is certified with certain software application versions to run without error. You can search for specific applications here.

Brady Betzel is an Emmy-nominated online editor at Margarita Mix in Hollywood, working on shows like Life Below Zero and Uninterrupted: The Shop . He is also a member of the Producers Guild of America. You can email Brady at bradybetzel@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @allbetzroff.