AMD Radeon Pro W5500 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Comparison

The Verdict

The recorded data presents a decisive outcome: the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 wins all nine head-to-head benchmark comparisons against the AMD Radeon Pro W5500. The RTX 2070 holds a 63rd percentile ranking among all GPUs, while the W5500 sits at the 58th percentile. Its average benchmark score of 18,789 places it 19.8% above the W5500's 15,679, a substantial gap that persists across every test category. For users prioritizing raw compute performance in DirectX workloads, OpenCL, or Vulkan, the RTX 2070 is the clear choice from this data.

The AMD Radeon Pro W5500 does not win any of the nine recorded comparisons. However, it is not without merit: its nearest rival list shows it performing within 1.2% of cards like the AMD Radeon RX 7700 and Radeon R9 370X, indicating it sits in a competitive mid-range tier. The RTX 2070, by contrast, trades blows within 0.9% of the AMD Radeon RX 560X and sits just 0.4% below the NVIDIA Tesla K80. The verdict is straightforward: the RTX 2070 dominates in every measured metric, while the W5500 offers a more modest profile for those who do not need the RTX 2070's level of throughput.

Architecture Differences

The two cards come from fundamentally different design philosophies. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 uses the TU106 chip built on Turing architecture, fabricated on a 12 nm process at TSMC. It packs 10,800 million transistors into a 445 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 24.3M per mm². The AMD Radeon Pro W5500 uses the Navi 14 chip on RDNA 1.0 architecture, also from TSMC but on a more advanced 7 nm node. It contains 6,400 million transistors on a much smaller 158 mm² die, achieving a higher density of 40.5M per mm². The process node difference is significant: 12 nm versus 7 nm, which explains the W5500's smaller physical footprint despite its lower transistor count.

Feature sets diverge sharply. The RTX 2070 includes 36 dedicated ray tracing cores and 288 tensor cores, hardware that the W5500 lacks entirely; the Radeon Pro card records null values for both RT and tensor cores. This is a fundamental architectural distinction. The RTX 2070 also supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), while the W5500 is limited to DirectX 12 (12_1). Both cards support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4, so API coverage is otherwise identical. The RTX 2070's Turing design targets real-time ray tracing and AI-accelerated workloads, whereas the W5500's RDNA 1.0 architecture focuses on efficiency and professional rendering without those specialized units.

Memory subsystems also differ in structure. Both cards use 8 GB of GDDR6, but the RTX 2070 runs a 256-bit bus with 448.0 GB/s bandwidth, while the W5500 uses a 128-bit bus with 224.0 GB/s bandwidth, exactly half. Clock speeds favor the AMD card: the W5500 boosts to 1855 MHz versus the RTX 2070's 1620 MHz, with base clocks of 1744 MHz and 1410 MHz respectively. Yet the RTX 2070 compensates with far more execution resources: 2304 shading units, 144 texture mapping units, and 64 render output units, against the W5500's 1408, 88, and 32. The result is that the NVIDIA card's raw throughput metrics, 7.465 TFLOPS FP32 versus 5.224 TFLOPS, outpace the AMD card despite lower clocks.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The RTX 2070's largest victory comes in PassMark DirectX 10, where it scores 111 against the W5500's 47, a 136.2% delta. That is more than double the AMD card's result, and it is not an isolated case. In DirectX 11, the RTX 2070 scores 129 versus 56, a 130.4% advantage. The pattern holds across every API generation. Vulkan shows an 96.4% delta, with scores of 82,521 and 42,021. OpenCL follows at 75.3%, 79,966 versus 45,615. Even in the older DirectX 9 test, the RTX 2070 leads 211 to 126, a 67.5% margin.

The closest contest in the entire comparison is PassMark G2D, which measures 2D graphics performance. The RTX 2070 scores 819, the W5500 scores 806, a mere 1.6% difference. This is the only head-to-head result where the two cards approach parity, suggesting that for 2D desktop workloads, architectural differences matter little. The RTX 2070 also wins PassMark GPU Compute by 33.5%, scoring 6,411 to the W5500's 4,804, a solid but less dramatic margin. The most important gaming-adjacent metric, PassMark G3D, shows the RTX 2070 at 16,094 versus 8,978, a 79.3% lead. Across all nine tests, the smallest win is that 1.6% G2D margin, and the largest is the 136.2% DirectX 10 blowout. The data leaves no ambiguity about which card delivers higher performance in every recorded benchmark.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ on nearly every specification field. The RTX 2070 uses a 12 nm process and TU106 chip; the W5500 uses 7 nm and Navi 14. Transistor counts are 10,800 million versus 6,400 million, with die sizes of 445 mm² and 158 mm². Transistor density favors AMD at 40.5M per mm² versus 24.3M per mm². Base clocks differ: 1410 MHz on the RTX 2070, 1744 MHz on the W5500. Boost clocks are 1620 MHz and 1855 MHz. Memory bandwidth is 448.0 GB/s against 224.0 GB/s, despite both using 8 GB GDDR6 at 14 Gbps effective. Bus widths are 256-bit and 128-bit.

Compute resources differ substantially: 2304 shading units versus 1408, 144 TMUs versus 88, and 64 ROPs versus 32. The RTX 2070 includes 36 RT cores and 288 tensor cores; the W5500 has none. Pixel rates are 103.7 GPixel/s versus 59.36 GPixel/s, and texture rates are 233.3 GTexel/s versus 163.2 GTexel/s. FP32 performance is 7.465 TFLOPS versus 5.224 TFLOPS, with FP16 at 14.93 TFLOPS and 10.45 TFLOPS respectively. Power draws are 175 W and 125 W, with the RTX 2070 requiring a dual-slot cooler, a 1x 8-pin power connector, and a 450 W suggested PSU, while the W5500 uses a single-slot design, a 1x 6-pin connector, and a 300 W suggested PSU.

The RTX 2070 supports PCIe 3.0 x16; the W5500 uses PCIe 4.0 x8. Display outputs differ: the RTX 2070 offers 1x DVI, 1x HDMI 2.0, 2x DisplayPort 1.4a, and 1x USB Type-C, while the W5500 provides 4x DisplayPort 1.4a. Dimensions vary slightly: the RTX 2070 is 229 mm long, 113 mm tall, and 35 mm wide, while the W5500 is 241 mm long and 111 mm tall with no recorded width. DirectX support is 12 Ultimate (12_2) for NVIDIA and 12 (12_1) for AMD. The RTX 2070 launched on 2018-10-16 with a launch MSRP of 499 USD; the W5500 launched on 2020-02-09 with a launch MSRP of 399 USD.

FAQ

Q: Which card has higher raw FP32 performance?

A: The RTX 2070 delivers 7.465 TFLOPS FP32, while the W5500 delivers 5.224 TFLOPS, a difference of roughly 43% in favor of the NVIDIA card.

Q: Does the W5500 support ray tracing like the RTX 2070?

A: No. The RTX 2070 includes 36 RT cores and 288 tensor cores, while the W5500 records null values for both, meaning it lacks dedicated hardware for those workloads.

Q: How much memory bandwidth does each card provide?

A: The RTX 2070 provides 448.0 GB/s over a 256-bit bus, while the W5500 provides 224.0 GB/s over a 128-bit bus. Both have 8 GB of GDDR6 memory.

Q: What is the closest benchmark result between the two?

A: The PassMark G2D test shows the RTX 2070 at 819 and the W5500 at 806, a 1.6% difference. This is the only test where the gap is under 33%.

Q: Which card is more efficient in terms of transistor density?

A: The W5500 has a density of 40.5M transistors per mm² on its 7 nm process, compared to the RTX 2070's 24.3M per mm² on 12 nm, despite the RTX 2070 having more total transistors.

Q: What DirectX versions do the two cards support?

A: The RTX 2070 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), while the W5500 supports DirectX 12 (12_1). Both support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4.

Where Each One Wins

The RTX 2070 wins everywhere in the recorded data, but the magnitude of its victories varies by workload. Its largest advantages appear in older DirectX APIs: 136.2% in DirectX 10 and 130.4% in DirectX 11. These are legacy rendering paths, and the NVIDIA card crushes the AMD card there. In DirectX 12, the lead narrows to 53.8%, and in DirectX 9 it is 67.5%. For compute-oriented tasks, the RTX 2070 leads by 33.5% in GPU Compute and 75.3% in OpenCL. Vulkan is its second-best result at 96.4%, indicating strong performance in cross-platform graphics APIs.

The W5500's only near-win is in PassMark G2D, where it trails by just 1.6%. This suggests that for basic 2D operations, the two cards are functionally equivalent, and the W5500's lower power draw of 125 W versus 175 W, along with its single-slot design and 300 W suggested PSU, could make it appealing for compact or power-constrained systems. Its 7 nm process also gives it a higher transistor density, which may imply better efficiency per transistor, though the benchmark data does not directly measure power efficiency.

For professional workloads that rely on Vulkan or OpenCL, the RTX 2070's margins are overwhelming. For DirectX 10 and 11 legacy applications, it is more than twice as fast. For 2D desktop use, either card suffices, and the W5500's smaller physical profile and lower power requirements become relevant. The RTX 2070 is the performance pick across every measured dimension; the W5500 is the efficiency-oriented alternative, but it concedes every benchmark in the database.