This is it. No doubt AI will have its time. We’re getting close to the nm wall with physical manufacturing limitations but I feel like everyone’s jumping the gun here. You don’t need DLSS to look good and if you do I’m sorry the game you bought was ported or programmed like shit and they used fsr or DLSS as a crutch. Maybe if everyone didn’t jump on that bandwagon we wouldn’t have that issue.

Ray tracing is neat but it’s still a niche. Despite everyone bashing amd, they forget they power the console market which means they control the rate of adoption. With some niche exceptions, publishers care where the money is and the console market is it. So expect games like cyberpunk and path traced portal to be the exception, not the rule.I simply don’t care about hype machines that drool over three or four games that are not good enough to play on repeat 500 times and advertise bench scores on reddit as if this is the one true end to gaming. I play a ton of games front to back and most hardly support ray tracing or don’t at all.

So I’ll continue to buy amd cards because they’re cheaper and press that which is still the spine of the industry…raster. The hype machine can come back at me when 90% of the industry is supporting ray tracing and FSR/DLSS (and they’re finished). Until then, from a purely gaming standpoint and under $1000us…7900xtx it is for brute force supremacy. F ai for now.

Meanwhile I’m chilling here with a 7900xtx, ultrawide 1440p oled, raster native, max settings hitting 120-165fps on everything and it’s just beautiful. Don’t care about ai trash and marketing hype. Brute forcing through native raster the way I always have on an OLED is just beautiful and ray tracing on half a dozen games that I actually care about that have it does good enough. Paid $800 for the 7900xtx vs $1200 for a 4080 at the time.

Cyber punk was great and it’s the only title I’d say I’d rather experience on a Nvidia alternative. Thankfully I played it twice after release (once immediately and again after it was patched up), and a 3rd time with expansion. It’s a good game but it’s literally the only title I’d love instead on Nvidia. Still, not good enough for me to want to play 50 times and quote benches on to justify a 4090 purchase.

It’s more a testament to the power of Nvidias marketing and AMD ready and willing to shoot themselves in the foot. Say what you will about ray tracing, it hasn’t been significant for years until Nvidia had it running good enough with DLSS and other ai assistance in their mid tier cards. 2000 series was absolute ass with rt, the 2080ti was barely good enough but they got everyone on the hype train while AMD just rolled over with nothing to offer but a Radeon 7 and 5700xt. But the pictures of like 6 ray traced titles available at the time had everyone drooling.

The 5700xt was a whole different affair. If the common dumb dumb didn’t install with a fresh windows installation or properly full clear previous drivers, it was a nightmare with reported issues. Blame the customer if you want but the reality is, the series instilled the mindshare thought that if you want driver headaches, you go AMD.

Then comes 6000 series with no supply despite being a great round finally for AMD. Nvidia was ready tho. More 3000 series available even if you had to fight for them and dlss2 made ray tracing performance relevant in the medium tier, even if the game support selection from either was meh. You absolutely cannot stop the “buuuuttttt cybbeeerrrpunk” crowd spamming performance benches as they play the same title on repeat for years. It was dumb but the fact is, it looked great and it convinced many that if you had to fight for a GPU during the pandemic, you might as well fight for the hype.

Fast forward to modern day. The 7000 series is finally out and actually good after price drops and driver issues worked out. Too bad Europe and high energy cost states in the US have users wondering if they want the extra space heater or not. Nvidia firmly controls the high end with the 4090 and they’re willing to put their marketing beasts to work to remind you of it. AI is getting even better but amd is a gen behind. Amd marketing effectively ghosted the market except dumb comments from their execs at conferences or social media. There hasn’t been a good marketing run from amd since the 580. The 5700 era was fine but it led inexperienced users into a driver trap.

Still, despite all this, because Nvidia hiked prices amd still has a place. Their igpu/APUs are second to none, console dominance controls how fast ray tracing is integrated because publishers care about where the money is (consoles), and the low to mid/lower high market still has competitive price points, even if higher then previously. Fact is, you don’t have an alternative but to sit out, hunt aggressively for a deal, or pay up.

History will repeat, Nvidia will push features that are not ready for the masses and their God tier marketing will make you think you’re missing out even if you aren’t. AMD will play second place but isn’t going anywhere, and we’ll continue to hope Intel finally disrupts the market with something that can compete.

Personally I just enjoy being at the high end of the previous gen. Prices are where they should of been and it can do 99% of what I want without paying an arm and a leg. A 5800x3d and a 6950xt allowed me to build a beast that is up to the task and cost roughly $1400 vs throwing up over $2500.