AMD Radeon PRO W7900 vs NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB Comparison

The AMD Radeon PRO W7900 and NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB represent two distinct eras of professional computing, with the data showing a decisive victory for the newer AMD card. The W7900 wins the only common benchmark by 6%, but the underlying architectural and specification gaps suggest a far larger real-world performance chasm. The Tesla P100, while a capable compute card in its day, is now end-of-life and trails in nearly every measurable category, making this comparison less about close competition and more about generational progression.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The single direct comparison available in the data is the Geekbench OpenCL test, where the AMD Radeon PRO W7900 scores 84,379 points against the NVIDIA Tesla P100’s 79,605 points. This gives the W7900 a 6% advantage in this specific workload. While a 6% delta is notable, it does not fully encapsulate the performance gap, as the OpenCL test is often compute-bound and may not stress the features where the W7900 excels most.

Looking at the broader benchmark averages, the W7900’s average score of 110,725 places it in the 94th percentile of all GPUs, while the Tesla P100’s average of 79,605 places it in the 92nd percentile. This two-percentile difference is modest, but the average score gap is substantial: the W7900 is roughly 39% higher than the P100’s average. However, this comparison is skewed by the fact that the W7900 has two benchmark entries (OpenCL and Vulkan) while the P100 has only one. The W7900’s Vulkan score of 137,070 is significantly higher than its OpenCL score, indicating that its performance scales better with modern APIs.

The nearest rival data further illustrates the W7900’s positioning. Its closest competitor is the NVIDIA Tesla V100 SXM2 16 GB, which scores 114,395 and is 3.2% ahead of the W7900. This is a more relevant comparison than the P100, as the V100 is a newer architecture. The W7900 also sits 2.8% behind the NVIDIA RTX A5500 Mobile (113,944) and 1% ahead of the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II (109,617). In contrast, the Tesla P100’s closest rival is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090, which is only 0.3% ahead, showing that the P100 is clustered with much older or lower-tier hardware.

The win count is clear: the W7900 takes 1 win in the head-to-head, while the P100 takes 0. No benchmark in the data shows the P100 beating the W7900, which sets the tone for the rest of this analysis.

Where Each One Wins

The AMD Radeon PRO W7900 wins in raw compute throughput, as evidenced by its FP32 performance of 61.32 TFLOPS versus the Tesla P100’s 9.526 TFLOPS. This is a 6.4x advantage, which directly translates to faster single-precision compute tasks. The W7900 also leads in FP16 performance, achieving 61.32 TFLOPS (1:1 ratio) compared to the P100’s 19.05 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio). For workloads that can leverage FP16, the W7900 is over 3x faster. The pixel rate and texture rate tell a similar story: the W7900 outputs 479.0 GPixel/s and 958.1 GTexel/s, while the P100 manages only 127.6 GPixel/s and 297.7 GTexel/s.

Memory capacity and bandwidth are another clear win for the W7900. It offers 48 GB of GDDR6 memory with 864.0 GB/s bandwidth, versus the P100’s 16 GB of HBM2 with 732.2 GB/s. The W7900 has 3x the capacity and 18% more bandwidth, which is critical for large datasets that must reside in VRAM. The W7900 also supports modern features like ray tracing (96 RT cores) and DirectX 12 Ultimate, which the P100 lacks entirely.

The Tesla P100’s only advantage is its memory bus width and its lower power draw. The P100 uses a 4096-bit bus, which is wider than the W7900’s 384-bit bus, but this does not translate to higher bandwidth due to the slower memory clocks. The P100 has a TDP of 250 W versus the W7900’s 295 W, making it 45 W more power-efficient. It also requires a single 8-pin power connector versus the W7900’s two 8-pin connectors, and it is a dual-slot card compared to the W7900’s triple-slot design. These are physical advantages, but they do not offset the performance deficit.

The Verdict

The data is unambiguous: the AMD Radeon PRO W7900 is the superior product for nearly any professional workload. It wins the only direct benchmark, has a higher average benchmark score, and offers significantly more compute, memory, and feature support. The W7900 is designed for modern, graphics-intensive tasks like real-time rendering, AI inference, and high-resolution video processing, all of which benefit from its 61.32 TFLOPS FP32 performance, 48 GB memory, and ray tracing capabilities.

The NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB is an end-of-life product from 2016, and the benchmark results confirm its age. Its 9.526 TFLOPS FP32 performance is roughly 15% of the W7900’s, and its 16 GB memory is a third of the capacity. It has no display outputs, making it unsuitable for any workstation use that requires a monitor. Its only potential use case is in legacy compute clusters that cannot migrate to newer drivers or architectures, but even then, its performance is severely limited.

Who should pick the W7900? Anyone needing maximum FP32 and FP16 throughput, large memory capacity, or modern API support (DirectX 12 Ultimate, Vulkan 1.4). Who should pick the P100? Only those with a strict power budget or a legacy system that requires a 250 W, dual-slot, single-8-pin card with no display output. The 0.3% delta between the P100 and the RTX 5090 in its nearest rival list suggests it is still competitive with some modern consumer cards, but it is not in the same league as the W7900.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU has a higher average benchmark score?

A: The AMD Radeon PRO W7900 has an average benchmark score of 110,725, which is 39% higher than the NVIDIA Tesla P100’s average of 79,605.

Q: What is the memory capacity difference?

A: The W7900 has 48 GB of GDDR6 memory, while the P100 has 16 GB of HBM2. The W7900 provides 3x the capacity.

Q: Does the Tesla P100 support ray tracing?

A: No, the P100 has no RT cores listed, while the W7900 has 96 RT cores.

Q: Which card has a higher FP32 performance?

A: The W7900 achieves 61.32 TFLOPS FP32, compared to the P100’s 9.526 TFLOPS. This is a 6.4x advantage for the AMD card.

Q: What is the power consumption difference?

A: The P100 has a TDP of 250 W, which is lower than the W7900’s 295 W. The P100 also uses a single 8-pin connector, while the W7900 requires two 8-pin connectors.

Q: Are there any display outputs on the P100?

A: No, the P100 has no display outputs. The W7900 has 3x DisplayPort 2.1 and 1x mini-DisplayPort 2.1 outputs.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gap between these two cards is vast. The W7900 uses the Navi 31 chip built on a 5 nm TSMC process, packing 57,700 million transistors into a 529 mm² die. The P100 uses the GP100 chip on a 16 nm TSMC process, with 15,300 million transistors on a 610 mm² die. The W7900’s transistor density is 109.1M / mm², which is over 4x higher than the P100’s 25.1M / mm². This explains how the W7900 fits 6,144 shading units, 384 TMUs, and 192 ROPs into a smaller die, versus the P100’s 3,584 shading units, 224 TMUs, and 96 ROPs.

The W7900 is based on the RDNA 3.0 architecture (codename Plum Bonito) from the Radeon Pro Navi (Navi III Series), while the P100 is based on the Pascal architecture from the Tesla Pascal (Pxx) generation. The W7900 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, while the P100 supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. The W7900 also supports ray tracing via its 96 RT cores, a feature entirely absent from the P100.

Memory architecture differs fundamentally: the W7900 uses 48 GB of GDDR6 on a 384-bit bus, while the P100 uses 16 GB of HBM2 on a 4096-bit bus. The W7900’s GDDR6 memory runs at 2250 MHz (18 Gbps effective), while the P100’s HBM2 runs at 715 MHz (1430 Mbps effective). The result is that the W7900 achieves 864.0 GB/s bandwidth versus the P100’s 732.2 GB/s, despite the P100’s wider bus.

The W7900’s FP16 performance is 61.32 TFLOPS (1:1 ratio), meaning it treats FP16 and FP32 equally, while the P100’s FP16 is 19.05 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio), indicating it halves the rate for FP16. This makes the W7900 more flexible for mixed-precision workloads. The P100’s production status is "End-of-life," while the W7900 is "Active," which affects driver support and long-term viability.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ in nearly every specification. The W7900 has a base clock of 1760 MHz and a boost clock of 2495 MHz, while the P100 has a base clock of 1190 MHz and a boost clock of 1329 MHz. The W7900’s clocks are 48% higher at base and 88% higher at boost. The memory clock is 2250 MHz for the W7900 versus 715 MHz for the P100.

The W7900 has 6,144 shading units, 384 TMUs, and 192 ROPs, while the P100 has 3,584 shading units, 224 TMUs, and 96 ROPs. The W7900 has 96 RT cores; the P100 has none. The pixel rate is 479.0 GPixel/s for the W7900 versus 127.6 GPixel/s for the P100. The texture rate is 958.1 GTexel/s versus 297.7 GTexel/s.

Power and physical specifications differ as well. The W7900 has a TDP of 295 W and is a triple-slot card with two 8-pin power connectors, measuring 280 mm in length, 110 mm in height, and 51 mm in width. The P100 has a TDP of 250 W and is a dual-slot card with one 8-pin power connector, measuring 267 mm in length. Both cards have a suggested PSU of 600 W.

The bus interface is PCIe 4.0 x16 on the W7900 versus PCIe 3.0 x16 on the P100. Display outputs are present on the W7900 (3x DisplayPort 2.1 and 1x mini-DisplayPort 2.1) but absent on the P100. The W7900 was released on 2023-05-25, while the P100 was released on 2016-06-19. The W7900’s predecessor is the Radeon Pro Vega, while the P100’s predecessor is Tesla Maxwell and its successor is Tesla Volta.