Review and testing of the MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC video card : Test | Specs | CPU | Config

MSI, like other AMD partners, presented their versions of the Radeon RX 550 graphics card, these are the Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC and the MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 4G OC. Both of them are characterized by compact dimensions (155 x 112 x 38 mm), so they are suitable even for building Mini-ITX systems. For cooling, like other manufacturers, a small CO with a radiator and a single fan is responsible. In this review, we take a look at the Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC, which has a slight factory overclocking and its own cooling system. Video card MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC replaced the Radeon R7 250, which was focused on the lower price segment and did not have a receiver until the release of the Radeon RX 550.

The design of the MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX model is improved with the help of a solid Military Class 4 element base, and a two-slot cooler is responsible for cooling, the design of which includes an aluminum radiator and one axial fan. The set of external interfaces includes DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort ports. The MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC graphics card is based on the Polaris 12 GPU, which is the youngest chip in the Polaris architecture line of graphics cards. Unlike the next highest-rated chip, the Polaris 21 GPU of the Radeon RX 560, the number of Radeon RX 550 stream processors has been cut in half. While the older model has 1024 stream processors, the Radeon RX 550 will have to be content with 512 stream processors. The Radeon RX 550 is bundled into eight Compute Units (CUs) that make up two Shader Engines.

Thus, AMD has disabled one Compute Unit in each Shader Engine, leaving four CUs. In addition to 512 stream processors, the GPU contains 32 texture units and eight ROPs. AMD indicates the clock speed of the Radeon RX 550 1183 MHz, in the case of the MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC we get 1203 MHz. Two gigabytes of GDDR 5 memory are made up of Micron chips. Four W4032BABG-70-F modules have a volume of 512 MB, they are connected via a 128-bit bus and operate at a maximum clock frequency of 1750 MHz.

Compact graphics cards usually have a fairly simple and neat layout, and the MSI RX 550 Aero ITX 2GB is no exception. The dimensions of the video card are 155 mm long, 105 mm high and 35 mm wide. With this size MSI Radeon RX 550 AERO ITX 2G OC occupies exactly two expansion slots. MSI’s logo is on the top of the RX 550 Aero ITX 2GB card, there is no additional power connector. The voltage supply to the GPU is provided by the Richtek RT3662AC three-phase dual-channel PWM controller. The slot cover has three outputs: one dual-link DVI port, one HDMI 2.0, and a DisplayPort connector. The video card is powered exclusively using the PCI Express 3.0 x16 slot, which is quite logical, given the declared TDP level (within 50 W). The cooler consists of a small radiator and one fan with an impeller diameter of 90 mm, mounted on a plastic casing.

Specifications

Testing

Power-saving CPU technologies are disabled in all tests. Testing the performance of video cards was carried out in a closed case of the system unit on a system with the following configuration:

Test configuration

• Processor: Intel Pentium G 4560 3500 MHz
• Motherboard: MSI B250M Bazooka
• RAM: 16 GB DDR 4 -2400 MHz
• Data storage: WD Hard Drive 1 TB 5400 RPM
• ОС: Windows 64 bit

The performance of a video card is determined by the number of fps (frames per second) that it can produce in a particular application under certain settings. The performance of the video card in gaming applications is affected by the software installed on the PC, the version of the video driver, as well as the configuration of the computer..

Synthetic tests

To evaluate the performance in synthetics, we used the 3DMark Fire Strike and Fire Strike Extreme tests. Futuremark 3DMark allows you to compare devices ranging from smartphones to high-end PCs. In the Fire Strike settings, you can select the method and quality of texture filtering, the type of full-screen anti-aliasing and the number of multisampling samples, the partitioning factor of primitives for objects to which tessellation is applied, the maximum possible partitioning factor, the resolution and number of samples from shadow maps, the quality of volumetric lighting (sample step in the “ray marching” algorithm when calculating volumetric lighting – an important parameter, large values ​​of which reduce performance), the number of samples per pixel when calculating indirect lighting in the ambient occlusion algorithm, as well as the quality of one of the post-processing types – imitation of the depth of field effect. This parameter adjusts the size of the bokeh texture used in post-processing for objects in the scene, while the Color saturation setting only changes the color saturation of the final image without affecting performance.

Futuremark 3DMark Fire Strike

Game tests

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Is a multi-platform computer role-playing game developed by the Polish studio CD Projekt RED based on the series of novels The Witcher by Polish writer Andrzej Sapkowski, a sequel to the computer games The Witcher and The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. The final part of the trilogy. According to the developers, the third part of the series will combine a non-linear storyline and a multi-regional open game world, which will be thirty times larger than the world of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. For movement, you can use various vehicles, such as a horse or a ship. The passage of the main storyline will take about 50 hours of the game. Side quests will take about the same amount. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was developed on the RedEngine 3 game engine, which is focused on next generation platforms and will ultimately break the boundaries between game graphics and CGI movies. The fundamental difference between RedEngine 3 compared to its predecessor is that REDengine 3 is built to support open world games. RED Engine 3 focuses not only on graphics and physics, but also on building a non-linear quest system, allowing you to make the gameplay even more close to real life. RED Engine supports dynamic shadows, normal mapping and parallax. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt has both basic and advanced graphical settings. Any user will be able to customize the game to their liking, relying on the performance of the existing system.

Graphics settings: (1080p) High -FPS

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Graphics Settings: (1080p) High -FPS

Rise of the Tomb Raider Is another game from the Tomb Raider series popular for many years, which is a continuation of the 2013 game of the same name, which we remember, among other things, for the fact that it used physically accurate imitation of the main character’s hair. A sequel to the series was announced back in June 2014 at E3 2014 in Los Angeles, with an estimated late 2015 release date originally announced. As a result, the game was actually released on November 10, 2015, but only in the version for Xbox 360 and Xbox One game consoles from Microsoft. But the PC version of Rise of the Tomb Raider, according to Square Enix’s plans, was pushed back until January 28, 2016, when it came out. The game Rise of the Tomb Raider is developed on the basis of the Foundation engine already known from the previous game, which has been substantially improved. It uses the Physically Based Rendering technique to make all materials look realistic under different lighting conditions, HDR rendering and adaptive tone mapping, deferred lighting with Global Illumination – all of this is just enhances the realism of the picture.

Graphics Settings: (1080p) High -FPS

Battlefield 1 — sensational sequel to the famous game Watch Dogs. The plot continues the main goal of its predecessor: hacking and hacking in a vast, endless space for exploration. The game is based on the Disrupt 2 game engine, a modified engine from the first part of the series. The main feature of the Disrupt Engine is agility. Many real phenomena have been recreated in the city. How people drive cars, behavior of water, wind, electricity. Everything reacts to everything, interacts with each other and you get branching reactions.

Graphics Settings: (1080p) High-FPS