Here is the Technical Intelligence Report for 2026-01-11.

Executive Summary

  • AMD RDNA 3 & FSR Redstone: AMD Chief Software Officer Andrej Zdravkovic confirmed that while the full FSR “Redstone” feature set is architecturally tied to RDNA 4 (due to specific ML hardware instructions), the company is not strictly ruling out experimental support for RDNA 3.
  • Competitor Thermal Challenges: Analysis of the recalled Asus ROG Matrix RTX 5090 ($4,000 flagship) reveals the extreme manufacturing complexity required to cool NVIDIA’s top-tier silicon, including a revised liquid metal application and power draw hitting nearly 800W in stress tests.
  • ROCm Containerization: Community interest continues regarding the build process for ROCm base images, though specific technical discussions were inaccessible for this scrape.

🔲 AMD Hardware & Products

[2026-01-11] AMD leaves the door open to experimental FSR Redstone support on RDNA 3

Source: Tom’s Hardware

Key takeaway relevant to AMD:

  • Clarifies the architectural gap between RDNA 3 and RDNA 4 regarding Machine Learning capabilities (specifically FP8 and Sparsity support).
  • AMD is adopting a “soft” exclusivity stance: prioritizing RDNA 4 for “Redstone” to ensure performance consistency, but acknowledging community demand for RDNA 3 back-porting.
  • Suggests a potential “experimental” driver path rather than full official support for older architectures to avoid degrading user experience.

Summary:

  • In an interview with PCWorld at CES 2026, AMD’s Andrej Zdravkovic addressed the exclusivity of “Redstone” (associated with FSR 4) to RDNA 4 hardware.
  • While currently not in the plan, AMD is considering the feasibility of a prototype/beta build for RDNA 3 users following community feedback.
  • The primary constraint is performance efficiency regarding ML workloads within a single frame budget.

Details:

  • Architectural Constraint: RDNA 4 introduces specialized hardware instructions (inferred as FP8 and Sparsity) required by the Redstone feature set.
  • Performance Impact on Older Hardware:
    • RDNA 3 lacks these native instructions and must emulate them (likely via INT8), resulting in a performance penalty.
    • Community observations/hacks indicate the RDNA 3/INT8 version of FSR 4 runs 9~15% slower than FSR 3.x, though with significantly better image quality.
    • AMD’s stance is that if ML operations take too long to compute (exceeding the frame budget), the frame generation becomes counterproductive.
  • Official Position: AMD aims to avoid “artificial product segmentation” but refuses to ship features that degrade performance. However, Zdravkovic noted, “we are definitely not going to withhold anything that really makes a difference” if the net result improves gameplay.
  • Community Context: Modders are already forcing parts of Redstone to run on RDNA 3 via DLL injection, though these are based on older code versions.

🤼‍♂️ Market & Competitors

[2026-01-11] Asus revised the liquid metal application on its $4,000 ROG Matrix RTX 5090 cards

Source: Tom’s Hardware

Key takeaway relevant to AMD:

  • Highlights the extreme power and thermal density of the competing RTX 5090 architecture, necessitating exotic and risky cooling solutions (Liquid Metal) even by AIB partners.
  • Validates the manufacturing difficulty of next-gen high-wattage GPUs; AMD engineering may leverage this data point when marketing RDNA 4’s efficiency or simpler thermal requirements.

Summary:

  • Overclocker Roman ‘der8auer’ Hartung analyzed a recalled and revised Asus ROG Matrix RTX 5090.
  • The recall addressed poor liquid metal application which posed a short-circuit risk.
  • The revised retail units use a much more sophisticated application method involving silicon oil mixtures.

Details:

  • Power Consumption: The RTX 5090 GPU pulled almost 800W in FurMark during testing.
  • Thermal Interface Material (TIM):
    • The revised card uses a mixture of Liquid Metal and Silicon Oil (similar to Dell’s “Element 31”).
    • This mixture creates a suspension that is easier to print/apply via machine than raw liquid metal.
  • Safety Mechanisms: Asus implemented a new thermal paste pattern around the perimeter of the GPU core to act as a physical barrier/seal, preventing conductive liquid metal from leaking onto SMD components.
  • Implications: The necessity of such complex cooling solutions on consumer/enthusiast cards ($4,000 MSRP) signals that NVIDIA’s Blackwell architecture pushes thermal density limits significantly.

💬 Reddit & Community

[2026-01-11] How rocm base images are built?

Source: Reddit AMDGPU

Key takeaway relevant to AMD:

  • Indicates continued developer interest in the transparency and customization of ROCm Docker/container environments.
  • Note: Detailed content was inaccessible during data collection due to platform scraping restrictions.

Summary:

  • A discussion thread on the r/AMDGPU subreddit regarding the methodology behind building ROCm base images.

Details:

  • Status: Content blocked by source.
  • Context: Typically, these discussions revolve around optimizing container sizes, stripping unnecessary libraries for specific ML workloads, or compiling ROCm from source for non-standard distributions. Access to the build scripts for official ROCm Docker images is a frequent request from DevOps engineers deploying AMD Instinct clusters.