AMD Radeon Vega Frontier Edition GPU Priced at $999

By Edward Leano, Christian Post Contributor Thursday, June 29, 2017

Advanced Micro Devices has finally rolled out the Radeon Vega Frontier Edition video card to the market, after a hesitant start from the company. The card has become available since Tuesday, June 27, starting at $999 for the air cooled model.

Along with the price, AMD has also revealed the final specifications for their new Graphic Processing Unit. The Vega Frontier Edition is clocked at 1,600 Mhz at peak operation, and it will have a typical running frequency of 1,382 MHz, according to Anandtech.

Instead of the usual Graphics Double Data Rate Type 5 (GDDR5) Memory, the new video card from AMD features a dual stack High Bandwidth Memory 2 (HBM2) for a total of 16 GB of video memory. At the current speed of this video memory, at 1.89 Gigabits per second, the Vega Frontier Edition has a memory bandwidth of 483 GB per second.

Benchmarks for the new card are few and far between, as review samples have not been released to reviewers as of this time. Even more puzzling is that AMD looks to be guiding potential buyers to wait for the Vega RX series of video cards instead, according to The Verge.

Early adopters for the Vega Frontier Edition are expected to use the video card for professional applications, like 3D modeling and Computer-Aided Design (CAD) purposes rather than video games.

With all that said, AMD has nevertheless seen it fit to provide dual-mode drivers for their new GPU, which supposedly makes the card optimized for both professional work and gaming use. For that purpose, the Vega Frontier Edition is expected to be comparable to NVIDIA's Titan Xp, which retails for $1,200.

A liquid cooled version of the card is also expected to come out in the near future, and it will cost about $1,499. The card is expected to be released on Thursday, June 29, to server pre-orders from online retailers like NewEgg.