AMD Radeon Pro 580

AMD Radeon Pro 580

AMD Radeon Pro 580: A Professional Tool in the GPU World

April 2025


Introduction

The AMD Radeon Pro 580 is a graphics card that has remained in the spotlight for professionals for several years. Despite its age, it continues to be used in workstations due to its reliability and optimization for professional tasks. However, in 2025, its gaming capabilities appear modest compared to new GPUs. Let’s explore who should pay attention to this model and why.


Architecture and Key Features

Polaris Architecture: A Time-Tested Foundation

The Radeon Pro 580 is built on the Polaris architecture (4th generation GCN). The manufacturing process is 14 nm, which seems archaic by modern standards (5–7 nm for the latest cards), but it provides stability.

Unique Features

- FidelityFX: AMD’s toolkit for improving graphics, including Contrast Adaptive Sharpening (CAS).

- Lack of Hardware Ray Tracing: Unlike NVIDIA's RTX, the Pro 580 does not have dedicated RT cores. Ray tracing is possible only through software methods, which significantly reduces FPS.

- Pro Drivers: Optimization for professional applications (AutoCAD, Blender, DaVinci Resolve) and increased stability.


Memory: A Balance Between Capacity and Speed

Type and Volume

- 8 GB GDDR5: For 2025, this type of memory is outdated (GDDR6X and HBM2e are currently relevant), but the volume is sufficient for editing 4K video or working with 3D models.

- 256-bit bus and 224 GB/s bandwidth: This is adequate for most professional tasks, but in games with high-resolution textures, there may be "drops."


Gaming Performance: Modest Results

Average FPS in Popular Titles (High settings, 1080p):

- Cyberpunk 2077 (2023): 28–35 FPS (without ray tracing).

- Horizon Forbidden West (2024): 40–45 FPS.

- Apex Legends: 60–70 FPS.

Resolution Support:

- 1080p: Optimal for most games.

- 1440p: Requires settings to be reduced to Medium.

- 4K: Only for less demanding projects (e.g., CS2).

Ray Tracing: Software implementation via DirectX 12 Ultimate decreases FPS by 40–60%, rendering RTX effects impractical.


Professional Tasks: Where the Pro 580 Shines

Video Editing

- DaVinci Resolve: Rendering 4K videos in 10-bit color takes 20% less time compared to gaming cards of the same class (thanks to Pro drivers).

3D Modeling

- Blender, Maya: OpenCL support ensures stable performance, but it falls behind NVIDIA Quadro in CUDA-accelerated tasks.

Scientific Calculations

- OpenCL and ROCm: Compatible with machine learning and physical simulations, but for serious projects, it’s better to choose cards with a higher number of cores (e.g., Radeon Pro W6800).


Power Consumption and Thermal Output

- TDP 185 W: Higher than modern alternatives (e.g., NVIDIA RTX 4060 — 115 W).

- Cooling Recommendations:

- A case with 2–3 fans for ventilation.

- It is advisable to use a tower CPU cooler to avoid overheating in compact builds.

- Power Supply: At least 500 W (with some headroom for peak loads).


Comparison with Competitors

1. NVIDIA Quadro P2200 (5 GB GDDR5X)

- Better for CUDA tasks, but weaker in OpenCL and video rendering. Price: $450 (new supplies are rare).

2. AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (8 GB GDDR6)

- More modern architecture (RDNA), support for PCIe 4.0. Price: $600.

3. NVIDIA RTX 3060 (12 GB GDDR6)

- Gaming: 2–3 times higher FPS. Professional tasks: lags behind without Studio drivers. Price: $330.

Conclusion: The Pro 580 ($300–$350) is suited for those who prioritize stability in work applications rather than peak performance.


Practical Tips

1. Power Supply: 500–600 W from trusted brands (Corsair, Seasonic).

2. Compatibility:

- PCIe 3.0 x16.

- macOS: Supported in 2019 Mac Pro models.

3. Drivers:

- For Windows: Only use Pro versions from the AMD website.

- Avoid gaming drivers as they might compromise stability in professional programs.


Pros and Cons

Pros:

- Reliability and long lifespan.

- Optimization for professional software.

- Affordable price for the Pro segment.

Cons:

- Weak gaming performance in 2025.

- High power consumption.

- No support for hardware ray tracing.


Final Conclusion: Who is the Radeon Pro 580 Suitable For?

This graphics card is an option for professionals who:

- Work with video editing, 3D graphics, or CAD software.

- Seek a budget solution with guaranteed driver support.

- Do not plan to run modern games on ultra settings.

For gamers or AI development enthusiasts, it is better to consider newer models. However, if you need a "working tool" without excess — the Pro 580 is still relevant.


Prices are as of April 2025 for new devices. Cards may be available in limited quantities.

Basic

Label Name
AMD
Platform
Mobile
Launch Date
June 2017
Model Name
Radeon Pro 580
Generation
Radeon Pro Mac
Base Clock
1100MHz
Boost Clock
1200MHz
Bus Interface
PCIe 3.0 x16
Transistors
5,700 million
Compute Units
36
TMUs
?
Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) serve as components of the GPU, which are capable of rotating, scaling, and distorting binary images, and then placing them as textures onto any plane of a given 3D model. This process is called texture mapping.
144
Foundry
GlobalFoundries
Process Size
14 nm
Architecture
GCN 4.0

Memory Specifications

Memory Size
8GB
Memory Type
GDDR5
Memory Bus
?
The memory bus width refers to the number of bits of data that the video memory can transfer within a single clock cycle. The larger the bus width, the greater the amount of data that can be transmitted instantaneously, making it one of the crucial parameters of video memory. The memory bandwidth is calculated as: Memory Bandwidth = Memory Frequency x Memory Bus Width / 8. Therefore, when the memory frequencies are similar, the memory bus width will determine the size of the memory bandwidth.
256bit
Memory Clock
1695MHz
Bandwidth
?
Memory bandwidth refers to the data transfer rate between the graphics chip and the video memory. It is measured in bytes per second, and the formula to calculate it is: memory bandwidth = working frequency × memory bus width / 8 bits.
217.0 GB/s

Theoretical Performance

Pixel Rate
?
Pixel fill rate refers to the number of pixels a graphics processing unit (GPU) can render per second, measured in MPixels/s (million pixels per second) or GPixels/s (billion pixels per second). It is the most commonly used metric to evaluate the pixel processing performance of a graphics card.
38.40 GPixel/s
Texture Rate
?
Texture fill rate refers to the number of texture map elements (texels) that a GPU can map to pixels in a single second.
172.8 GTexel/s
FP16 (half)
?
An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy.
5.530 TFLOPS
FP64 (double)
?
An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy, while single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.
345.6 GFLOPS
FP32 (float)
?
An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.
5.641 TFLOPS

Miscellaneous

Shading Units
?
The most fundamental processing unit is the Streaming Processor (SP), where specific instructions and tasks are executed. GPUs perform parallel computing, which means multiple SPs work simultaneously to process tasks.
2304
L1 Cache
16 KB (per CU)
L2 Cache
2MB
TDP
185W
Vulkan Version
?
Vulkan is a cross-platform graphics and compute API by Khronos Group, offering high performance and low CPU overhead. It lets developers control the GPU directly, reduces rendering overhead, and supports multi-threading and multi-core processors.
1.2
OpenCL Version
2.1
OpenGL
4.6
DirectX
12 (12_0)
Power Connectors
None
Shader Model
6.4
ROPs
?
The Raster Operations Pipeline (ROPs) is primarily responsible for handling lighting and reflection calculations in games, as well as managing effects like anti-aliasing (AA), high resolution, smoke, and fire. The more demanding the anti-aliasing and lighting effects in a game, the higher the performance requirements for the ROPs; otherwise, it may result in a sharp drop in frame rate.
32

Benchmarks

FP32 (float)
Score
5.641 TFLOPS

Compared to Other GPU

FP32 (float) / TFLOPS
5.519 -2.2%