Why you can trust Tom's Hardware Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.
Power Consumption
Idle & Professional Application Power Consumption
The Radeon Vega FE uses 14W at idle, according to our measurements. That's not as good as we were hoping for, but it's still solid.
We're annoyed by power use in multi-monitor configurations, though. Consumption varies wildly when more than one display is attached, from approximately 24W for two identical monitors to a massive 40W when you connect three different ones.
When running professional applications, power consumption ranges from ~140W for 2D drawing and 3D wireframes to almost 250W under OpenGL. Finally, it jumps all the way to 265-275W for rendering, depending on the GPU’s temperature.
Gaming Power Consumption – Cold & Hot
Power consumption in games changes depending on the GPU's temperature and clock rate, of course. When the Radeon Vega FE is cold, it consumes almost 300W. Very brief peaks can hit 380W. This isn't a big deal, though: any reasonably modern PSU's secondary side should be able to handle those spikes.
The current measurements look just like you’d expect:
Due to GPU frequency throttling, the Radeon Vega FE’s power consumption drops to 266W once Vega 10 hits its 84°C temperature target. This evens out the corresponding graph a bit:
Naturally, the current readings come in a bit lower as well.
Stress Test Power Consumption
The following graph shows how Power Tune reacts once it predicts too-high of a load. The clock rate control intervals and the effect that throttling has on the card’s power consumption are easily identifiable. The up-and-down cycles look completely different than the shape of the curve did when the GPU was still under full load.
Once again, our current measurement results fit the power consumption ones:
Motherboard Slot Load
Ever since the launch of AMD's Radeon RX 480, there has been demand for this measurement every time a new card is introduced. This time around, there's no cause for concern. The motherboard slot’s 2.7A maximum doesn’t even amount to half of the specified ceiling.
MORE: Best Graphics Cards
MORE: Desktop GPU Performance Hierarchy Table
MORE: All Graphics Content