AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo vs AMD Radeon VII Comparison

The Verdict

The database shows a clear split between these two Vega 20 cards, despite their shared DNA. The AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo is the compute and bandwidth monster, winning all three head-to-head benchmarks against the AMD Radeon VII. Its average benchmark score sits at 106,750, which places it in the 94th percentile of all GPUs. The Radeon VII, with an average score of 66,004, lands in the 90th percentile. That is a massive gap, and it comes down to the Duo carrying double the memory, more shading units, and a higher board power limit.

If you need raw Metal performance, the Duo is the only choice. Its Geekbench Metal score of 122,522 crushes the Radeon VII's 77,975, a 57.1% advantage. For OpenCL and Vulkan workloads, the Duo also leads, but by smaller margins of 7.1% and 8.2% respectively. The Radeon VII is not without merit though. It is a dual-slot card with a 295 W TDP, while the Duo is a quad-slot board pulling 475 W. The VII also uses standard PCIe 3.0 x16 and dual 8-pin power connectors, making it far easier to install in a conventional PC. The Duo requires the Apple MPX bus interface and a suggested 850 W power supply. Pick the Duo if you are building or upgrading a Mac Pro and need maximum compute density. Pick the Radeon VII if you want Vega 20 performance in a standard PC chassis with lower power demands.

Architecture Differences

Both cards use the same Vega 20 chip, built on TSMC's 7 nm process, with 13,230 million transistors on a 331 mm² die. Transistor density is identical at 40.0M per mm². The architecture is GCN 5.1 for both. That is where the similarities end.

The Duo packs 4,096 shading units, 256 texture mapping units, and 64 ROPs. The Radeon VII has 3,840 shading units, 240 TMUs, and the same 64 ROPs. The Duo's extra 256 shading units and 16 additional TMUs translate directly into higher compute throughput. The Duo also doubles the memory capacity: 32 GB of HBM2 versus 16 GB on the VII. Both run the same 4096-bit memory bus and achieve the same 1.02 TB/s bandwidth, since the memory clock is identical at 1000 MHz or 2 Gbps effective.

Clock speeds are close. Base clocks are identical at 1400 MHz. The boost clock differs slightly: 1720 MHz on the Duo versus 1750 MHz on the VII. The VII actually boosts higher, but the Duo compensates with more compute units and a much higher TDP of 475 W versus 295 W. The Duo's pixel rate is 110.1 GPixel/s, while the VII's is 112.0 GPixel/s. The texture rate favors the Duo at 440.3 GTexel/s versus 420.0 GTexel/s. FP32 compute is 14.09 TFLOPS on the Duo versus 13.44 TFLOPS on the VII, and FP16 follows the same pattern at 28.18 TFLOPS versus 26.88 TFLOPS, both at 2:1 ratio.

The physical design differs dramatically. The Duo is a quad-slot card with an Apple MPX bus interface and no standard power connectors listed. The VII is a dual-slot card, 280 mm long, 125 mm tall, and 40 mm wide, powered by two 8-pin connectors. Display outputs also differ: the Duo offers 1x HDMI 2.0b and 4x Thunderbolt, while the VII offers 1x HDMI 2.0b and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a. Both support DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. Neither has ray tracing or tensor cores.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The Geekbench Metal test is the headline result. The Duo scores 122,522 against the VII's 77,975, a 57.1% lead. That is the single largest delta in the comparison and it reflects the Duo's doubled memory capacity and higher shading unit count, which heavily benefit Metal's compute-oriented workloads. If your rendering or compute pipeline is Metal-based, this is a decisive margin.

OpenCL is a closer contest. The Duo scores 98,432 versus 91,947 for the VII, a 7.1% advantage. The gap narrows because OpenCL scales differently across the memory and compute resources, but the Duo still comes out ahead. Vulkan shows a similar pattern: the Duo scores 99,296 against 91,788, an 8.2% lead. Neither result is a blowout, but the Duo wins consistently across all three APIs.

The Radeon VII's nearest rivals in the database include the NVIDIA Tesla T4 at 66,733 (1.1% behind), the NVIDIA Tesla P40 at 65,095 (1.4% ahead), the AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100 at 64,212 (2.8% ahead), and the NVIDIA CMP 30HX at 63,842 (3.4% ahead). These are small deltas, which suggests the VII sits in a tightly packed performance band. The Duo, by contrast, sits among much faster company: the AMD Radeon Pro W6600X at 107,342 (0.6% behind), the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II at 109,617 (2.6% behind), and the AMD Radeon PRO W7900 at 110,725 (3.6% behind). The Duo also leads the NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000, which scores 101,872, by 4.8%. The data indicates the Duo is a different performance class entirely, while the VII competes with workstation and data-center accelerators from the previous generation.

FAQ

Q: Which card is faster in Geekbench Metal?

A: The AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo scores 122,522, which is 57.1% higher than the Radeon VII's 77,975.

Q: Do both cards have the same memory bandwidth?

A: Yes. Both use HBM2 on a 4096-bit bus with 1.02 TB/s bandwidth. The Duo has 32 GB of memory, the VII has 16 GB.

Q: Are these cards the same architecture?

A: Yes, both use the Vega 20 chip with GCN 5.1 architecture, built on TSMC's 7 nm process with 13,230 million transistors.

Q: What is the power consumption difference?

A: The Duo has a 475 W TDP and requires a suggested 850 W power supply. The VII has a 295 W TDP and requires a suggested 600 W power supply.

Q: Can the Radeon VII be installed in a standard PC?

A: Yes. The VII uses PCIe 3.0 x16, dual 8-pin power connectors, and a dual-slot design. The Duo uses the Apple MPX bus interface and is quad-slot.

Q: Which card has more shading units?

A: The Duo has 4,096 shading units, while the VII has 3,840. The Duo also has 256 TMUs versus 240 on the VII.

Where Each One Wins

The AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo wins every benchmark in the head-to-head comparison. Its biggest advantage is Metal performance, where it leads by 57.1%. It also wins OpenCL by 7.1% and Vulkan by 8.2%. The Duo is the clear choice for macOS-centric workflows, given its Apple MPX interface, 4x Thunderbolt outputs, and 32 GB of HBM2 memory. The 475 W TDP and quad-slot cooler are acceptable trade-offs in a Mac Pro environment where power and space are less constrained. The Duo's 94th percentile ranking among all GPUs, with an average score of 106,750, confirms its position near the top of the database.

The AMD Radeon VII wins on practicality. It is a dual-slot card with a 295 W TDP, a suggested 600 W power supply, standard PCIe 3.0 x16, and dual 8-pin connectors. It fits in conventional PC cases and uses standard display outputs: 1x HDMI 2.0b and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a. Its 16 GB of HBM2 memory is half the Duo's capacity, but the 1.02 TB/s bandwidth is identical. The VII's 90th percentile ranking and average score of 66,004 place it alongside the NVIDIA Tesla T4, Tesla P40, AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100, and NVIDIA CMP 30HX, all within a 3.4% band. That means the VII is a sensible pick for users who need Vega 20 compute without the Duo's power, size, and platform requirements.

Specification Differences

The two cards share the same chip, process, and memory clock, but diverge on almost every other measurable spec. The Duo has 4,096 shading units versus 3,840 on the VII. TMUs are 256 versus 240. ROPs are identical at 64. The Duo's boost clock is 1720 MHz, while the VII boosts to 1750 MHz. Base clocks match at 1400 MHz.

Memory capacity is the biggest split: 32 GB on the Duo versus 16 GB on the VII, both HBM2 on a 4096-bit bus with 1.02 TB/s bandwidth. The Duo's pixel rate is 110.1 GPixel/s, slightly below the VII's 112.0 GPixel/s. Texture rate favors the Duo at 440.3 GTexel/s versus 420.0 GTexel/s. FP32 compute is 14.09 TFLOPS versus 13.44 TFLOPS. FP16 is 28.18 TFLOPS versus 26.88 TFLOPS, both at 2:1.

Power and physical specs are radically different. The Duo is rated at 475 W with a quad-slot cooler and an Apple MPX bus interface. The VII is rated at 295 W, dual-slot, with 2x 8-pin power connectors, and measures 280 mm by 125 mm by 40 mm. Suggested PSU is 850 W for the Duo and 600 W for the VII. Display outputs: the Duo has 1x HDMI 2.0b and 4x Thunderbolt; the VII has 1x HDMI 2.0b and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a. Both support DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. The Duo's launch MSRP was 4,399 USD, while the VII's was 699 USD. Both are end-of-life products, with the VII releasing on 2019-02-06 and the Duo on 2019-06-02.