Home / AMD / AMD Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL: Performance and Specs

AMD Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL

AMD Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL: Review and Analysis in 2025

Introduction

The AMD Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL is a hybrid solution released in 2018 for mobile workstations and compact systems. Despite its age, this card remains an interesting option for niche tasks. In 2025, its relevance raises questions, but we will explore who might still find it useful.

1. Architecture and Key Features

Vega Architecture: Based on the GCN 5.0 (Graphics Core Next) microarchitecture. The manufacturing process is 14nm from GlobalFoundries.

Unique Features:

- FidelityFX: AMD's toolkit for enhancing graphics (adaptive contrast sharpening, post-processing shaders).

- Radeon ProRender: Support for rendering based on OpenCL and Vulkan.

- Lack of RT Cores: Hardware ray tracing is not available, but software implementation is possible through DirectX 12 or Vulkan APIs.

Competing Technologies:

- DLSS and RTX (NVIDIA): Not supported. This limits its use in modern games and applications with ray tracing.

2. Memory: Speed and Impact on Performance

Type and Size: 4GB HBM2 (High Bandwidth Memory).

Bandwidth: 204.8 GB/s thanks to a 1024-bit bus.

Pros of HBM:

- Low power consumption.

- Compactness — memory is integrated into one module with the GPU.

Cons:

- Limited capacity for modern tasks (e.g., 8K rendering).

Impact on Performance:

- In games from 2018-2020 (e.g., Shadow of the Tomb Raider), 4GB is sufficient for 1080p, but in projects from 2023-2025 (e.g., Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty), there may be drops due to insufficient VRAM.

3. Gaming Performance: Realities of 2025

Average FPS (1080p, medium settings):

- CS2 — 90–100 FPS.

- Apex Legends — 50–60 FPS.

- Hogwarts Legacy — 25–30 FPS (without ray tracing).

Resolutions Above 1080p:

- 1440p: Performance drops by 30–40%.

- 4K: Only for less demanding games (e.g., League of Legends).

Ray Tracing:

- Software implementation reduces FPS by 2–3 times. Practically unsuitable for ray-tracing games.

Advice: The card is suitable for retro game emulation or indie projects, but not for AAA hits of 2025.

4. Professional Tasks

Video Editing:

- Support for Adobe Premiere Pro via Mercury Playback Engine (OpenCL). 1080p/60fps rendering works fine, but 4K/60fps with effects causes delays.

3D Modeling:

- Shows stability in Autodesk Maya and Blender, but lags behind newer cards (e.g., Radeon Pro W6800).

Scientific Computation:

- Support for OpenCL 2.0. Suitable for entry-level machine learning but slower than the NVIDIA RTX A2000 (CUDA).

Conclusion: The card is relevant for students and small studios with a limited budget.

5. Power Consumption and Heat Generation

TDP: 120W.

Recommendations:

- Cooling: Minimum system — two fans or liquid cooling in a compact case.

- Case: Modular solutions with good ventilation (e.g., Fractal Design Define 7 Nano).

Advice: Avoid installation in mini-PCs without active cooling—risk of overheating!

6. Comparison with Competitors

NVIDIA Quadro P2000 (2017):

- NVIDIA Advantages: Better optimization for the Adobe Suite.

- Disadvantages: 5GB GDDR5 vs. 4GB HBM2 from AMD.

NVIDIA RTX A2000 (2021):

- RT cores, DLSS, 12GB GDDR6. Price $600–700 compared to $350–400 for Vega M GL (on the second-hand market).

Radeon Pro W6600 (2021):

- 8GB GDDR6, support for PCIe 4.0. 30–40% faster in rendering.

Conclusion: Vega M GL falls behind modern models but wins on price in the second-hand market.

7. Practical Tips

Power Supply: At least 450W (e.g., Corsair CX450).

Compatibility:

- Requires PCIe 3.0 x8.

- macOS/Linux Support: Drivers available, but updates ended in 2023.

Drivers:

- Use the latest Adrenalin Pro 22.Q4 (2022) — new optimizations are unlikely.

8. Pros and Cons

Pros:

- Energy efficiency for HBM2.

- Stability in professional applications.

- Compactness.

Cons:

- No support for ray tracing or DLSS.

- Limited memory capacity.

- Outdated drivers.

9. Final Conclusion: Who is Vega M GL Suitable For?

Who It's For:

- Students: An affordable solution for learning 3D modeling.

- Office PCs with Load: Rendering presentations, light editing.

- Retro Game Enthusiasts: Compact systems in a "retro-futurism" style.

Why Not to Buy:

- If modern games or 4K rendering are needed.

Price: For new devices (rare!) — about $300–400. On the second-hand market — $150–200.

Conclusion

The AMD Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL in 2025 is a niche product. It won't impress gamers or professionals but can serve as a budget solution for specific tasks. As a temporary option or part of a collection — yes; as the base of a powerful system — no.

Basic

Label Name

AMD

Platform

Mobile

Launch Date

April 2018

Model Name

Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL

Generation

Vega

Base Clock

931MHz

Boost Clock

1011MHz

Bus Interface

IGP

Transistors

5,000 million

Compute Units

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.

Foundry

GlobalFoundries

Process Size

14 nm

Architecture

GCN 4.0

Memory Specifications

Memory Size

4GB

Memory Type

HBM2

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.

1024bit

Memory Clock

700MHz

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.

179.2 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.

32.35 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.

80.88 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.

2.588 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.

161.8 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.

2.64 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.

1280

L1 Cache

16 KB (per CU)

L2 Cache

1024KB

TDP

65W

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)

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.

Benchmarks

FP32 (float)

Score

2.64 TFLOPS

Compared to Other GPU

FP32 (float) / TFLOPS

Radeon HD 7950

2.81 +6.4%

GeForce GTX 970M

2.71 +2.7%

Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL

2.64

T1000

2.55 -3.4%

ROG Ally GPU

2.509 -5%