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Although AMD’s Radeon graphics cards are a minority on the laptop market, a few models still have them. This is the case of the new ROG Zephyrus G14 from Asus, which features an RX 6800S that we have riddled with tests.
With its Advantage program, AMD tries to guarantee a certain level of requirement for PCs equipped with both a processor and a branded graphics card. Relatively few on the market, we have already been able to test a Lenovo Legion 5 with the entry-level Radeon RX 6600M, as well as a ROG Strix G15 equipped with the 6800M, the highest-end GPU.
A new kind of Radeon GPU
This time it’s a new version of this graphics card that we are testing, in the 6800S version, embedded in a ROG Zephyrus G14, ultraportable gaming 14-inch decked with one of AMD’s brand new processors, the Ryzen 9 6900HS. Let’s start with a small technical point on what differentiates the 6800 S version from the M: the S series simply characterizes the GPUs intended for thin and light PCs whose heating must be more contained. To this end, the GPU operating frequencies have been lowered slightly, from 2.3 GHz to 1.98 GHz, while the number of calculation units is lower: 2560 compared to 2048 in the S version. This should therefore impact the performance of the chip compared to its larger M-series sibling. Let’s see how well, and where, this 6800 S stacks up against competing Nvidia GeForce RTXs.
What performance to expect?
In game, the card did very well in Full HD with a number of frames per second clearly exceeding 60 fps in all games in ultra, except Cyberpunk 2077 which always hurts the GPUs (48 fps here). Unfortunately, Radeon GPUs struggle with the technology of raytracing and the performance drop is substantial when enabled. In this regard, Nvidia’s RTXs generally do better, it must be admitted. striking example, Call of Duty Black Ops goes from 102 fps to 14 fps by activating the raytracing, totally unplayable under these conditions. Other games better optimized for AMD, like Godfallare doing much better (barely 7 fps loss with the raytracing), but this is an exception.
AMD’s FSR technology (competitor of DLSS) can compensate for the drop in the number of frames per second to a certain extent, but this has unfortunately not been implemented in many titles, even if more and more games are updated to offer it. The results again vary according to the games: with the raytracing activated, the FSR barely allows you to pass the 30 fps mark in The Medium (+9 fps), while control goes from 42 fps to 85 fps and Godfall from 75 fps to 101 fps.
We also tested a few games in the native resolution of the Zephyrus G14 (2560 x 1600 px), and it is obviously much more complicated for the RX 6800S. That said, the experience remains very fluid on Assassin’s Creed Valhallafor example (just 60 fps on average), or even Godfall (68 fps in raytracing + FSR), but don’t expect to keep the ultra-safe graphics cyberpunk running at 24 fps without raytracing. For this very resource-intensive game, it will necessarily be necessary to make concessions by modifying the graphics settings, especially since it does not support FSR.
The Radeon RX 6800S against the competition
The graphics card does not budge and our GPU test index even places it at the level of its big sister the 6800M on the ROG Strix G15 that we tested. However, the comparison has its limits, the chassis and the processor being different on the two PCs, let us remember. Overall, it can be placed between a GeForce RTX 3060 and a mobile RTX 3070, although again we know that the TGP of each Nvidia graphics card can vary performance widely.
Finally, this AMD Radeon RX 6800S is a good graphics card that allows you to play the latest titles in 1080p settings pushed to the limit without flinching, even in 1440p in many games. Alas, there is always a delay of AMD in terms of raytracing which heavily impacts its GPUs on most games. Similarly, FSR is clearly not as widespread as Nvidia’s DLSS which is still doing well in the field. These technologies are not important for all games and some gamers could quite live with their absence, while still benefiting from the good raw performance of the GPU, in competitive multiplayer in particular. In addition, only this ROG Zephyrus seems to be currently equipped with this graphics card on the French market. We will have to wait for other PC releases to be able to enjoy it.