AMD FirePro D500 vs AMD Radeon RX 9060 Comparison

The AMD FirePro D500 and the AMD Radeon RX 9060 come from different eras and different product philosophies, but the database places them close enough in overall percentile ranking to make the comparison interesting: the FirePro D500 sits at the 62nd percentile against all recorded GPUs while the RX 9060 sits at the 59th. That near-parity in percentile terms conceals a decisive gap in the one benchmark where the two cards were measured on the same test. On Geekbench Vulkan, the RX 9060 scored 39,476 against the FirePro D500's 18,533, more than double the older card's result. The recorded data therefore points to a clear generational leap in graphics throughput, offset only partially by the FirePro's professional heritage: a wide memory bus, six mini-DisplayPort outputs plus an SDI output, and certified workstation positioning.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

Only one test appears in the database for both cards, Geekbench Vulkan, and it produces an unambiguous winner. The Radeon RX 9060 recorded 39,476 points while the FirePro D500 recorded 18,533 points, a gap of roughly 53 percent in favor of the newer card. For a Vulkan-based graphics and compute workload, that is not a marginal win; the RX 9060 delivers over twice the measured performance on identical software.

Context from each card's surrounding rivals sharpens the picture. The FirePro D500's average benchmark score across its recorded tests is 18,533, which lands it in a tight cluster: the Radeon RX 560X averages 18,626 (about half a point ahead), the Intel Arc A770M averages 18,383 (just under one point behind), the Radeon Pro 5700 XT averages 18,685 (under one percent ahead), and the Radeon RX 460 averages 18,373 (roughly one percent behind). In other words, the FirePro D500 performs like a mainstream tier card from that mid-range band, and it trades blows with all four of those rivals within about one percent in either direction.

The RX 9060's average score across its ten recorded tests is 16,014, and its neighborhood is similarly compressed. The GeForce RTX 3060 Ti averages 16,129, less than one percent ahead. The Radeon R9 370X averages 15,862 and the Radeon RX 7700 averages 15,852, both about one percent behind. The Radeon Pro W5500 averages 15,679, a little over two percent behind. The average scores of the two cards look closer than the head-to-head result because the RX 9060's average is pulled down by low raw scores on the older Passmark DirectX tests (104 on DirectX 10, 182 on DirectX 11, 44 on DirectX 12, 280 on DirectX 9, and 1,002 on the 2D test), which scale very differently from the Geekbench tests. The higher-throughput measurements tell the real story: 3322 on 3DMark Steel Nomad (DX12), 88,183 on Geekbench OpenCL, 17,631 on Passmark G3D, and 9,919 on Passmark GPU Compute.

The win tally in the recorded head-to-head data is one win for the RX 9060 and zero for the FirePro D500. On the evidence available, there is no benchmark in the database where the FirePro D500 beats the RX 9060.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gulf between these two cards spans more than a decade of AMD design. The FirePro D500 is built on the Tahiti chip, GCN 1.0 architecture, and belongs to the FirePro Data Center (Dx00) generation. It was fabricated at TSMC on a 28 nm process, packs 4,313 million transistors onto a 352 mm² die, and achieves a transistor density of 12.3 million transistors per square millimeter. The RX 9060 uses the Navi 44 chip, codename Strix Point, on RDNA 4.0 architecture, part of the Navi IV (RX 9000) generation in the Radeon RX 9000 series. It is built at TSMC on a 4 nm process, with 29,700 million transistors on a 199 mm² die, yielding a density of 149.2 million transistors per square millimeter. That is more than twelve times the transistor density on a die a little over half the area, with nearly seven times the total transistor count.

Compute resources scale accordingly. The FirePro D500 has 1536 shading units, 96 TMUs, and 32 ROPs, with no ray tracing cores. The RX 9060 has 1792 shading units, 112 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, plus 28 ray tracing cores. The theoretical rates diverge dramatically. The FirePro D500 delivers 23.20 GPixel/s of pixel fill, 69.60 GTexel/s of texture fill, and 2.227 TFLOPS of FP32 compute. The RX 9060 delivers 191.4 GPixel/s, 334.9 GTexel/s, and 21.43 TFLOPS FP32, with FP16 at the same 21.43 TFLOPS in a 1:1 configuration. That is over eight times the pixel rate, close to five times the texture rate, and nearly ten times the FP32 throughput.

Memory design reflects each card's era and intent. The FirePro D500 carries 3 GB of GDDR5 on a wide 384-bit bus running at an effective 5.1 Gbps, for 243.8 GB/s of bandwidth. The RX 9060 carries 8 GB of GDDR6 on a narrower 128-bit bus at an effective 18 Gbps, for 288.0 GB/s. The workstation card's wide-but-slow approach and the modern card's narrow-but-fast approach end up in a similar bandwidth ballpark, but capacity clearly favors the RX 9060, which matters for modern texture-heavy workloads.

Clock behavior also differs in kind. The database records no base, boost, or game clock for the FirePro D500, only its memory clock. The RX 9060 lists a 1700 MHz base clock, a 2400 MHz game clock, and a 2990 MHz boost clock. Power draw runs strongly in the newer card's favor: the FirePro D500 is rated at 274 W TDP with a 600 W suggested PSU, while the RX 9060 is rated at 132 W with a 300 W suggested PSU and a single 8-pin connector. Both are dual-slot cards. The RX 9060 connects over PCIe 5.0 x16 versus PCIe 3.0 x16, and supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, against DirectX 12 (11_1) and Vulkan 1.2.170 on the FirePro. Both support OpenGL 4.6.

FAQ

Q: Which card wins the only shared benchmark?

A: The Radeon RX 9060, by a wide margin. It scored 39,476 on Geekbench Vulkan versus 18,533 for the FirePro D500, a gap of about 53 percent.

Q: How do the two compare in percentile ranking against all GPUs?

A: They are close: the FirePro D500 sits at the 62nd percentile and the RX 9060 at the 59th. The percentile similarity does not reflect the head-to-head result, where the RX 9060 is decisively ahead.

Q: Which card uses less power?

A: The RX 9060, rated at 132 W with a suggested 300 W PSU. The FirePro D500 is rated at 274 W with a suggested 600 W PSU.

Q: Which card has more memory?

A: The RX 9060, with 8 GB of GDDR6. The FirePro D500 has 3 GB of GDDR5.

Q: Does either card support ray tracing?

A: The RX 9060 has 28 ray tracing cores. The FirePro D500 has none.

Q: Are both cards still in production?

A: No. The FirePro D500 is end-of-life, released in January 2014. The RX 9060 is active, released in August 2025.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ on nearly every specification in the database. Chip: Tahiti versus Navi 44. Architecture: GCN 1.0 versus RDNA 4.0. Process node: 28 nm versus 4 nm, both at TSMC. Transistors: 4,313 million versus 29,700 million. Die size: 352 mm² versus 199 mm². Transistor density: 12.3M versus 149.2M per mm².

Shading units: 1536 versus 1792. TMUs: 96 versus 112. ROPs: 32 versus 64. Ray tracing cores: none versus 28. FP16: not recorded versus 21.43 TFLOPS at 1:1. Pixel rate: 23.20 versus 191.4 GPixel/s. Texture rate: 69.60 versus 334.9 GTexel/s. FP32: 2.227 versus 21.43 TFLOPS.

Memory: 3 GB GDDR5 on a 384-bit bus at 243.8 GB/s versus 8 GB GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus at 288.0 GB/s. TDP: 274 W versus 132 W. Suggested PSU: 600 W versus 300 W. Bus interface: PCIe 3.0 x16 versus PCIe 5.0 x16. Display outputs: six mini-DisplayPort 1.2 plus one SDI versus one HDMI 2.1b and two DisplayPort 2.1a. API support: DirectX 12 (11_1) and Vulkan 1.2.170 versus DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4. Recorded length for the FirePro D500 is 279 mm; no dimensions are recorded for the RX 9060. Production status: end-of-life versus active. Predecessor and successor lineages also differ, with the FirePro line succeeded by Radeon Instinct and the RX 9060 following Navi III.

Where Each One Wins

The RX 9060 wins every performance category in the recorded data. It wins the shared Geekbench Vulkan test outright, posts strong individual results across 3DMark Steel Nomad, Geekbench OpenCL, Passmark G3D, and Passmark GPU Compute, and its rivals list (GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, Radeon R9 370X, Radeon RX 7700, Radeon Pro W5500) confirms competitive standing against a modern mid-range peer group. Its higher memory capacity, ray tracing hardware, and modern API support make it the choice for current gaming and compute workloads. Efficiency also belongs to the RX 9060: roughly half the TDP and a much lower suggested PSU.

The FirePro D500's advantages are situational and structural rather than measured. Its six mini-DisplayPort outputs plus SDI suit multi-monitor and broadcast-adjacent setups that the RX 9060's three outputs cannot match. Its 384-bit bus gives it comparable bandwidth despite the older memory type. And its percentile ranking of 62, slightly above the RX 9060's 59, indicates that against the full historical spread of GPUs in the database it remains a solidly upper-tier performer for its class. But on direct measurement, it records no wins.

The Verdict

For any workload represented in the database, the Radeon RX 9060 is the pick. It more than doubles the FirePro D500 on the sole shared benchmark, offers far higher theoretical rates across pixel fill, texture fill, and FP32 compute, includes ray tracing hardware, doubles-plus the memory capacity, and does all of this at less than half the power draw. The FirePro D500 makes sense only where its unique I/O matters: driving many displays through its six mini-DisplayPort and SDI outputs. As an active product versus an end-of-life one, the RX 9060 is also the only one of the two that represents a current platform. The data's verdict is one-sided: one win for the RX 9060, zero for the FirePro D500.