AMD Big Navi high-end graphics chip passes certification – Possible RDNA2 raytracing GPU

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A mysterious new AMD Navi GPU has just passed RRA certification with all signs pointing toward this being the eagerly anticipated ‘Big Navi’ chip. An AMD device code named the  “ATI-102-D18802” passed through South Korea’s National Radio Research Agency, the RRA. This means the chip has been finalised in terms of mass production and availability and whatever it is should be heading to market within the next handful of months.

You wouldn’t think there’d be much to go on with this seemingly random string of digits but there’s actually a fair amount of detail which can be ascertained from the ATI-102-D18802. ATI, obviously enough, was the company acquired by AMD and subsequently turned into AMD Radeon. 

‘D18’ ios the code name which signifies a Navi graphics processor, which indicates this is a graphics card we’re dealing with here rather than a CPU. The digits following this pertain to AMD’s internal performance metrics. This Navi GPU is ‘805’, while small Navi is codenamed ‘D18205’, indicating we’re dealing with a vastly more powerful chip.

Based on AMD’s roadmaps, we’re probably looking at a top-end Radeon RX Navi graphics card. AMD CEO Lisa Su said back in July that ‘they are coming’. In all likelihood, this will be based on the second-generation RDNA2 GPU architecture, which is where we can finally expect to see a hardware-based ray-tracing solution from AMD. 

Taking things a step further, this is probably the GPU, or something analogous to this, which is set to power both the PlayStation 5 and Project Scarlett. Sony has confirmed the PS5 will support hardware-based raytracing, yet AMD doesn’t currently offer a graphics solution capable of real-time raytracing. This is probably the very same GPU. 

The pieces are beginning to slot into place then, both for an assault from AMD on the top-end graphics market, as well as a better picture of what’s in store from the next-gen consoles. Factor in an 8C/16T Zen 2 CPU and these boxes definitely don’t sound cheap.