AMD announced on its website that RX 9070 series graphics cards (RDNA 4) will require computers with UEFI. This means that the BIOS will no longer be supported.
This doesn’t mean that RDNA 4 graphics cards will stop working on older systems, but AMD makes no guarantees. The company briefly explains the history and importance of UEFI and lists its advantages over legacy BIOS:
- Significantly improved security
- Fully specified interfaces that enable interoperability and testing
- Reliable firmware updates from the Internet with minimal user intervention
- Support for storage devices over 2.2 TB
- Support for many new hardware types, including booting from NVMe SSDs
- Windows Secure Boot to protect against malware
- Faster shutdown, startup, sleep and resume times
UEFI offers a CSM (Compatibility Support Module) feature that allows you to emulate the BIOS environment to support older hardware. Almost all modern processors and motherboards are designed with UEFI support. In most cases, the limiting factor for UEFI is the use of the MBR bootloader by the drives — a GPT system is required to support UEFI.
AMD RDNA 4 graphics cards will only support UEFI systems, as they have stopped supporting the older CSM/Legacy modes. They will work in the BIOS, but they will work less optimally and are not guaranteed. In addition, the video card may lose such necessary features as Smart Access Memory. BSOD screens and other compatibility issues are also possible.
AMD’s article provides additional detailed instructions on how to make a smooth transition to UEFI. In short, you need a GPT drive, and you need to disable the CSM option in UEFI or «Compatibility Support Module».
AMD Radeon RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT video card reviews will be available today, and they will be released on March 6. The company can offer competitive price and probably greater availability of video cards compared to NVIDIA. But judging by the latest demonstration, graphics technologies «red» are far from parity with GeForce.
Source: Tom’s Hardware
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