AMD Radeon 8050S vs AMD Radeon VII Comparison

AMD Radeon VII and AMD Radeon 8050S occupy radically different positions in the GPU landscape, separated by six years of architectural evolution and a gulf in power consumption. The data shows a clear performance hierarchy in compute workloads, but the 8050S counters with a feature set and efficiency profile that the older card cannot match. Benchmark results indicate the Radeon VII leads in raw throughput, yet the 8050S represents a shift toward integrated solutions with modern API support.

The Verdict

The AMD Radeon VII is the compute king in this pairing, dominating both shared benchmark tests with decisive margins. In Geekbench OpenCL, the VII scores 91947 against the 8050S’s 65818, a 39.7% advantage. The gap widens further in Geekbench Vulkan, where the VII’s 91788 dwarfs the 8050S’s 58398 by 57.2%. For anyone prioritizing raw number-crunching in OpenCL or Vulkan workloads, the Radeon VII is the obvious choice based on these figures alone.

However, the Radeon 8050S is not without merit. It holds a 89th percentile ranking among all GPUs versus the VII’s 90th, a negligible difference in overall standing. The 8050S achieves this with a 55 W TDP compared to the VII’s 295 W, making it a far more power-frugal option. It also brings hardware ray tracing with 32 RT cores, a feature entirely absent from the Radeon VII. For mobile or space-constrained systems, the 8050S is the only viable pick, as it is an integrated graphics processor (IGP) requiring no power connectors and no dedicated slot.

The verdict splits cleanly: choose the Radeon VII for maximum compute performance in a desktop workstation, choose the Radeon 8050S for a modern, efficient, ray-tracing-capable integrated solution in a portable device. The data does not suggest the 8050S can match the VII in raw throughput, but it redefines what an integrated GPU can achieve.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU is faster in OpenCL compute tasks?

A: The AMD Radeon VII wins decisively, scoring 91947 in Geekbench OpenCL versus 65818 for the Radeon 8050S, a 39.7% lead.

Q: Does the Radeon 8050S support ray tracing?

A: Yes, the Radeon 8050S features 32 dedicated RT cores, while the Radeon VII has no RT cores listed in its specifications.

Q: What is the power consumption difference between these two cards?

A: The Radeon VII has a TDP of 295 W and requires two 8-pin power connectors, while the Radeon 8050S has a TDP of just 55 W and needs no power connectors, being an integrated processor.

Q: How do their overall benchmark percentiles compare?

A: The Radeon VII sits in the 90th percentile of all GPUs, while the Radeon 8050S is in the 89th percentile, indicating nearly identical overall standing despite the VII’s large wins in individual tests.

Q: Which GPU has more memory bandwidth?

A: The Radeon VII has 16 GB of HBM2 memory on a 4096-bit bus, delivering 1.02 TB/s bandwidth. The Radeon 8050S uses system-shared memory with bandwidth described as system dependent.

Q: Are these GPUs from the same architectural generation?

A: No, the Radeon VII uses GCN 5.1 architecture on a 7 nm process, while the Radeon 8050S uses RDNA 3.5 architecture on a 4 nm process, representing a significant generational leap.

Architecture Differences

The architectural divide between these two AMD GPUs is vast. The Radeon VII is built on the Vega 20 chip using GCN 5.1 architecture, a design dating back to the Vega II generation. It is manufactured on a 7 nm process at TSMC with 13,230 million transistors packed into a 331 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 40.0M per mm². This is a discrete, dual-slot card with a 280 mm length and 40 mm width.

In contrast, the Radeon 8050S uses the Strix Halo chip with RDNA 3.5 architecture, belonging to the Navi Mobile (RX 8000M) generation. It is built on a more advanced 4 nm process, also at TSMC, with a slightly smaller die size of 308 mm². The transistor count is listed as unknown, but the density metric is not provided. This chip is an integrated graphics processor, meaning it has no slot width, no dimensions, and shares system memory rather than using dedicated VRAM.

The compute architectures differ fundamentally. The Radeon VII features 3840 shading units, 240 texture mapping units, and 64 ROPs, with no ray tracing cores. The Radeon 8050S has fewer shading units at 2048, 128 TMUs, and the same 64 ROPs, but adds 32 RT cores for hardware-accelerated ray tracing. The VII’s FP32 throughput is 13.44 TFLOPS with FP16 at 26.88 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio), while the 8050S delivers 11.47 TFLOPS in both FP32 and FP16 (1:1 ratio), indicating a different compute philosophy.

API support also diverges. The Radeon VII supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. The Radeon 8050S supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, the latter being a newer specification. The 8050S also uses a PCIe 5.0 x16 interface versus the VII’s PCIe 3.0 x16, doubling the available bus bandwidth for data transfer.

Specification Differences

The specification sheets reveal stark contrasts. The Radeon VII has a base clock of 1400 MHz and a boost clock of 1750 MHz, while the Radeon 8050S has a lower base of 1295 MHz but a much higher boost of 2800 MHz. Memory configurations are entirely different: the VII uses 16 GB of HBM2 with a 4096-bit bus and 1.02 TB/s bandwidth, whereas the 8050S relies on system-shared memory with the bus width and bandwidth both listed as system dependent.

Power requirements could not be more different. The Radeon VII has a 295 W TDP, requires a 600 W suggested PSU, and uses two 8-pin power connectors. The Radeon 8050S has a 55 W TDP, no power connectors, and no suggested PSU, reflecting its integrated nature. The VII is dual-slot and 280 mm long, while the 8050S is an IGP with no physical dimensions listed.

Display outputs also differ: the VII offers one HDMI 2.0b and three DisplayPort 1.4a connections, while the 8050S’s outputs are described as portable device dependent. The production statuses tell the story of their lifecycles: the Radeon VII is end-of-life, released in February 2019 with a launch MSRP of 699 USD, succeeded by Navi. The Radeon 8050S is active, released in January 2025, and has no successor listed.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The two shared benchmarks paint a lopsided picture. In Geekbench OpenCL, the Radeon VII scores 91947 against the Radeon 8050S’s 65818, a 39.7% delta in favor of the VII. This is a substantial margin that speaks to the VII’s raw compute power, driven by its higher shading unit count and dedicated HBM2 bandwidth.

The Geekbench Vulkan test is even more one-sided. The Radeon VII scores 91788, while the 8050S manages only 58398, producing a 57.2% lead for the VII. This suggests the VII’s GCN architecture handles Vulkan workloads particularly well, or that the 8050S’s driver stack or hardware configuration limits its Vulkan performance relative to OpenCL.

Interestingly, the 8050S performs notably better in OpenCL relative to its own Vulkan score, with a 12.7% higher OpenCL result. The VII, by contrast, shows near-parity between the two APIs, with a mere 0.2% difference between its OpenCL and Vulkan scores. This could indicate that the newer RDNA architecture is optimized differently across APIs, or that the system-shared memory configuration impacts Vulkan performance more severely.

The average benchmark scores reflect these results: the VII averages 66004 across all tests, while the 8050S averages 62108, a 6.3% overall difference. The VII’s nearest rival in the database is the NVIDIA Tesla T4, which it trails by 1.1%, while the 8050S’s closest competitor is the AMD Radeon Pro W6600M, which it leads by 0.3%.

Where Each One Wins

The Radeon VII wins decisively in raw compute performance. It dominates in both OpenCL and Vulkan benchmarks, with leads of 39.7% and 57.2% respectively. This makes it the clear choice for any application that leverages these APIs for heavy lifting, such as scientific computing, rendering, or machine learning inference. Its 16 GB of HBM2 memory with 1.02 TB/s bandwidth provides a massive data pipeline that the 8050S cannot match with system-shared memory.

The Radeon 8050S wins in every other category that matters for modern usage. Its 55 W TDP is less than one-fifth of the VII’s 295 W, enabling deployment in thin-and-light laptops or compact systems where the VII’s dual-slot, 280 mm form factor would be impossible. The 8050S also brings hardware ray tracing via its 32 RT cores, a feature the VII lacks entirely, making it the better choice for gaming or content creation that uses ray-traced effects. Its support for DirectX 12 Ultimate and Vulkan 1.4 ensures compatibility with the latest graphics APIs, while the VII is limited to DirectX 12 (12_1) and Vulkan 1.3.

The 8050S also benefits from a PCIe 5.0 x16 interface, offering double the bandwidth of the VII’s PCIe 3.0 connection. This matters for system-shared memory access, as the GPU must fetch data from the host system. The VII’s dedicated memory eliminates this bottleneck, but the 8050S’s faster bus helps mitigate its shared-memory disadvantage.

The use-case split is stark: the Radeon VII serves users who need maximum compute throughput and are willing to accept high power draw and a discrete card footprint. The Radeon 8050S serves users who need a capable, efficient, modern graphics solution integrated into a portable device, with ray tracing and the latest API support taking precedence over raw benchmark numbers. The data shows the VII as the performance leader, but the 8050S as the more versatile and forward-looking option.