Unlock your AMD Radeon RX 460 to gain 12.5% of free performance

When talking about graphics cards, the Radeon RX 460 from AMD is considered a pretty good model. However, it is well known in the community that this particular graphics card is held back by its manufacturer because of parts of its physical composition locked. While this is a process that’s often used, most of the times it has beneficial results. In this instance, though, it seems Radeon might have gotten it wrong. Before we get into that, let’s take a look at what exactly Radeon did.

The issue is related to the number of texture mapping units found on the card and the number of texture mapping units actually used. Both the TMUs and stream processors are distributed with a portion locked off. This is done due to the usage of faulty pieces of hardware which could compromise the card. By locking them off, Radeon is able to sell the card at a lower market level and capitalize on the stream processors and TMUs that would otherwise become obsolete.

That being said, Roman Hartung, also known as der8auer, realized that locking off some of the components might have not been necessary and came up with a firmware update that would unlock said components. According to him, users that get the firmware are looking at 12.5% increased performance in completely safe conditions.

There is a flip side to this, however. Even though it is believed Radeon was looking to falsely brand the TMUs and stream processors as faulty with the intention of supplying a product at a lower market point, there is a chance the components are actually unstable. If this is the case, users that unlock them might be  left with a dead graphics card. Since no one wants that, you should know that flashing the edited firmware is done at your own risk.

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