AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo vs NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada Generation Comparison

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The recorded benchmark data shows a decisive advantage for the NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada Generation across the two shared tests. In Geekbench OpenCL, the NVIDIA card scores 175286 against the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo’s 98432, a delta of 78.1% in NVIDIA’s favor. This is not a marginal lead; it represents a near-doubling of raw compute throughput in a general-purpose GPU compute workload. The Geekbench Vulkan result is even more lopsided: NVIDIA scores 194041, AMD scores 99296, and the delta widens to 95.4%. In practical terms, the RTX 5000 Ada delivers roughly 95% more performance in Vulkan, which is a substantial gap for any application relying on that API.

The average benchmark score reinforces this narrative. The RTX 5000 Ada posts an average of 184664 across its recorded benchmarks, placing it in the 98th percentile of all GPUs in the database. The Vega II Duo’s average is 106750, sitting in the 94th percentile. While both are high-end parts, the percentile gap (98 vs 94) understates the raw score difference: NVIDIA’s average is 73% higher than AMD’s. The nearest rivals for the RTX 5000 Ada include the NVIDIA A100 SXM4 80 GB (183725, delta 0.5%), the A100 SXM4 40 GB (187147, delta -1.3%), the RTX PRO 5000 Blackwell (182109, delta 1.4%), and the GeForce RTX 4090 D (178050, delta 3.7%). This means the RTX 5000 Ada is effectively trading blows with A100-class accelerators, coming within 1.3% of the 40 GB variant and edging out the 80 GB variant by 0.5%. For the Vega II Duo, its nearest rivals are the Radeon Pro W6600X (107342, delta -0.6%), the Radeon Pro Vega II (109617, delta -2.6%), the Radeon PRO W7900 (110725, delta -3.6%), and the Quadro RTX 6000 (101872, delta 4.8%). The Vega II Duo is essentially at parity with the W6600X, slightly behind the single Vega II, and clearly behind the W7900.

One notable asymmetry in the data: the Vega II Duo has a Geekbench Metal score of 122522, but the RTX 5000 Ada has no Metal benchmark recorded. This means the Metal result cannot be used for a direct comparison. However, it does indicate that the AMD card has a strong presence in Apple-centric environments, which aligns with its “Radeon Pro Mac” generation label. For the two tests where both cards have data, NVIDIA wins both, giving it a 2-0 record in head-to-head matchups.

FAQ

Q: Which card has the higher average benchmark score?

A: The NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada Generation has an average benchmark score of 184664, compared to 106750 for the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo. This is a 73% advantage for NVIDIA.

Q: How does the RTX 5000 Ada compare to its closest rival, the A100 SXM4 80 GB?

A: The RTX 5000 Ada scores 184664 on average, while the A100 SXM4 80 GB scores 183725. The delta is 0.5% in NVIDIA’s favor, meaning the two are essentially tied in aggregate performance.

Q: Is the Vega II Duo competitive with any modern workstation GPU?

A: The data shows the Vega II Duo sits near the Radeon Pro W6600X (107342, delta -0.6%) and just below the Radeon Pro Vega II (109617, delta -2.6%). It is 3.6% behind the Radeon PRO W7900, which is a significant margin for a workstation-class product.

Q: What does the Vulkan benchmark reveal about the two cards?

A: In Geekbench Vulkan, the RTX 5000 Ada scores 194041 versus 99296 for the Vega II Duo, a delta of 95.4%. This is the largest performance gap in any shared test.

Q: Are there any benchmarks where the AMD card outperforms the NVIDIA card?

A: No. In the head-to-head data, the RTX 5000 Ada wins both Geekbench OpenCL and Geekbench Vulkan. The Vega II Duo has a Metal score (122522), but the NVIDIA card has no Metal result recorded, so no comparison is possible.

Q: What is the percentile ranking of each card?

A: The RTX 5000 Ada is in the 98th percentile of all GPUs, while the Vega II Duo is in the 94th percentile. This means the NVIDIA card outperforms 98% of the database, versus 94% for the AMD card.

Architecture Differences

The two cards come from fundamentally different architectural lineages. The NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada Generation uses the AD102 chip built on Ada Lovelace architecture, fabricated on a 5 nm process at TSMC. It packs 76,300 million transistors on a 609 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 125.3M per mm². The AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo uses the Vega 20 chip with GCN 5.1 architecture, also from TSMC but on a 7 nm process. It contains 13,230 million transistors on a 331 mm² die, with a density of 40.0M per mm². The density difference is stark: NVIDIA packs more than three times the transistors per area, reflecting the newer process node and more complex design.

The compute resources differ dramatically. The RTX 5000 Ada has 12,800 shading units, 400 TMUs, and 176 ROPs. It also includes 100 ray tracing cores and 400 tensor cores, making it a fully featured accelerator for both raster and AI workloads. The Vega II Duo has 4,096 shading units, 256 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, with no ray tracing or tensor cores at all. This is a fundamental capability gap: the AMD card cannot hardware-accelerate ray tracing or tensor operations, while the NVIDIA card is designed specifically for those tasks.

Memory architecture is another major divergence. The RTX 5000 Ada uses 32 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, delivering 576.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The Vega II Duo also has 32 GB, but uses HBM2 on a massive 4096-bit bus, achieving 1.02 TB/s of bandwidth. The AMD card has nearly double the memory bandwidth, which is a genuine advantage for bandwidth-bound workloads. However, the NVIDIA card compensates with far higher compute rates: its FP32 throughput is 65.28 TFLOPS versus 14.09 TFLOPS for the AMD card. The texture rate is 1,020.0 GTexel/s versus 440.3 GTexel/s, and the pixel rate is 448.8 GPixel/s versus 110.1 GPixel/s. The FP16 figures are also telling: NVIDIA offers 65.28 TFLOPS (1:1 ratio with FP32), while AMD offers 28.18 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio), meaning NVIDIA’s FP16 is more than double AMD’s.

The API support also differs. The RTX 5000 Ada supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. The Vega II Duo supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. The NVIDIA card is one API revision ahead in both DirectX and Vulkan, which matters for compatibility with newer titles and compute frameworks.

Specification Differences

The most obvious difference is the process node: 5 nm for NVIDIA versus 7 nm for AMD. This leads to a transistor count of 76,300 million versus 13,230 million, and a die size of 609 mm² versus 331 mm². The clock speeds also differ: the RTX 5000 Ada has a base clock of 1155 MHz and a boost of 2550 MHz, while the Vega II Duo runs at 1400 MHz base and 1720 MHz boost. Despite lower clocks, the NVIDIA card achieves far higher throughput due to its massive core count.

Memory specifications are a key differentiator. Both have 32 GB, but the NVIDIA card uses GDDR6 with a 256-bit bus and 576.0 GB/s bandwidth. The AMD card uses HBM2 with a 4096-bit bus and 1.02 TB/s bandwidth. The memory clock is also different: 2250 MHz (18 Gbps effective) for NVIDIA versus 1000 MHz (2 Gbps effective) for AMD.

Power and physical dimensions diverge significantly. The RTX 5000 Ada has a TDP of 250 W, is dual-slot, and uses a single 16-pin power connector with a suggested PSU of 600 W. The Vega II Duo has a TDP of 475 W, is quad-slot, has no listed power connector, and requires an 850 W suggested PSU. The NVIDIA card is nearly half the power draw and occupies half the slot width. The bus interface also differs: PCIe 4.0 x16 for NVIDIA versus Apple MPX for AMD, which reflects the AMD card’s Mac-centric design.

Display outputs are another contrast. The RTX 5000 Ada offers 4x DisplayPort 1.4a. The Vega II Duo provides 1x HDMI 2.0b and 4x Thunderbolt, which is a very different connectivity profile aimed at Apple ecosystems. Physical dimensions are only listed for the NVIDIA card: 267 mm length (10.5 inches) and 112 mm height (4.4 inches). No dimensions are recorded for the AMD card.

Production status and release timing differ as well. The RTX 5000 Ada is Active, released on 2023-08-08, with a predecessor in Workstation Ampere and a successor in Blackwell PRO W. The Vega II Duo is End-of-life, released on 2019-06-02, with no predecessor or successor listed. The AMD card has a launch MSRP of 4,399 USD, while the NVIDIA card has no launch MSRP recorded.

Where Each One Wins

The RTX 5000 Ada Generation wins decisively in every shared benchmark. Its 78.1% OpenCL lead and 95.4% Vulkan lead indicate it is the superior choice for general-purpose compute and cross-platform rendering workloads. The 98th percentile ranking means it outperforms nearly all GPUs in the database, and its nearest rivals are all A100-class accelerators or the newer RTX PRO 5000 Blackwell. The presence of ray tracing cores and tensor cores makes it suitable for ray-traced rendering and AI inference tasks, which the AMD card cannot accelerate in hardware. Its 65.28 TFLOPS FP32 and FP16 performance is 4.6 times higher than the AMD card’s FP32, making it the clear pick for compute-heavy simulations, deep learning, and high-resolution 3D rendering.

The Vega II Duo wins in specific niches. Its 1.02 TB/s memory bandwidth is 77% higher than the NVIDIA card’s 576.0 GB/s, which is a meaningful advantage for memory-bound workloads such as large dataset processing or certain scientific computations. Its HBM2 memory on a 4096-bit bus is an unusual design that excels at streaming data. The card also has a Geekbench Metal score of 122522, and while the RTX 5000 Ada has no Metal result, this indicates the AMD card is designed for Apple’s Metal API. The 4x Thunderbolt display outputs and Apple MPX bus interface make it a natural fit for macOS workstations. For users locked into Apple’s ecosystem, the Vega II Duo is likely the only option that works natively, despite its lower raw performance. Its 94th percentile ranking is still respectable, and it sits within 3.6% of the Radeon PRO W7900, so it is not a weak card by any means.

The Verdict

The data is unambiguous for most users: the NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada Generation is the superior GPU in nearly every measurable way. It wins both head-to-head benchmarks by margins of 78.1% and 95.4%, has an average benchmark score 73% higher, and ranks in the 98th percentile versus the 94th for its rival. It offers more shading units, TMUs, ROPs, dedicated ray tracing and tensor cores, a newer architecture, a smaller process node, and a lower TDP (250 W versus 475 W) in a dual-slot form factor. For anyone building a workstation for compute, rendering, or AI workloads, the RTX 5000 Ada is the clear recommendation based on the recorded measurements.

The AMD Radeon Pro Vega II Duo is an older, end-of-life product with a specific niche. Its 1.02 TB/s memory bandwidth is a genuine strength, and its Metal support plus Thunderbolt outputs make it the only viable choice for Apple-centric environments that require native compatibility. Its launch MSRP was 4,399 USD, which was a premium price at launch, but the product is now end-of-life. For users on Apple hardware, the Vega II Duo may still be the right pick. For everyone else, the RTX 5000 Ada’s benchmark dominance, architectural features, and efficiency make it the definitive winner in this comparison. The 2-0 head-to-head record for NVIDIA is not a close contest; it is a reflection of two cards from different eras, and the data consistently favors the newer, more capable NVIDIA part.