Michał Stekla
Did you want a cheap graphics card from the Radeon RX 9000 series? Well, we're sorry — you'll get it, but without the opportunity to check what it can actually do. AMD has just officially lifted the embargo on reviews of the RX 9060 XT and… there are no surprises. Tests have appeared online, but only for the 16 GB version. The cheaper, 8-gigabyte edition? Almost completely overlooked.
And this is not a coincidence.
In the official response to Linus Tech Tips, AMD explains that “the availability of the Radeon RX 9060 XT 8 and 16 GB depends on demand in specific markets.” That's it. Specifically — nothing.
But in practice? The Red team's strategy seems painfully simple:
We do not show tests of the 8 GB, because they may perform worse, especially at higher resolutions.
We promote the 16 GB, because better graphs = more sold cards.
Richer markets like the USA and Europe should buy the more expensive versions, while the cheaper models will go to countries with lower purchasing power.
And what about the 16 gigabyte version?
The AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT is an example of a graphics card that theoretically was meant to level the playing field in the mid-range segment, but in practice it balances on the edge of sensibility. The RDNA 4 architecture brings a lot of technical improvements – from a monolithic design, to a modified CU structure, to better support for AI and ray tracing – however, all of this has been packaged in a configuration almost identical to its predecessors from the RX 7600 series. On one hand, we have noticeable technological progress, but on the other – a disturbingly conservative specification and limited memory bandwidth, which at a 128-bit bus and GDDR6 clearly falls short of the GDDR7 used by NVIDIA. The RX 9060 XT therefore appears to be a product created more for the marketing narrative than the real needs of gamers, which only strengthens the frustration towards AMD's publishing strategy.
So you have a choice: buy a pig in a poke or pay extra for the model that AMD wants you to buy. Trust in the brand? It's becoming increasingly difficult to find in the world of GPUs, where even the availability of reviews is part of the sales strategy.
