WTF?! China's first serious attempt at a homegrown gaming GPU might not be worrying Nvidia or AMD when it comes to performance, but it's already managed to create a rush of buyers. Lisuan Technology says the LX 7G100 Founder Edition drew more than 30,000 reservations within 48 hours, while the first limited batch sold out almost instantly through its JD.com storefront.
As we reported last week, the LX 7G100 is more impressive as a milestone for China than as a value proposition. A review of the 12GB card showed it running a range of modern games with few major crashes, which is no small achievement for a new GPU vendor using its own hardware, architecture, driver stack, and software ecosystem.
The problem is that simply working is not the same as competing. The card often lands around RTX 3060 territory in 3DMark, but actual game performance is less flattering. Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p with FSR3 Quality and frame generation averaged 88 fps, compared with 232 fps on an RTX 4060 and 243 fps on Intel's Arc B580. Black Myth: Wukong reached 56 fps, while Forza Horizon 5 managed 48 fps on the Low preset.
That performance might not be so bad if it were priced right. The LX 7G100 Founder Edition was listed at 3,299 RMB, or about $455, before subsidies, putting it close to much more powerful mainstream cards from established vendors, such as Nvidia's RTX 5060 Ti 16GB.
Lisuan's own product page lists modern features including 12GB of GDDR6, four DisplayPort 1.4a outputs, 8K60 HDR support, and compatibility with DirectX 12, Vulkan 1.3, OpenGL 4.6, and OpenCL 3.0.
For Chinese enthusiasts, a domestic gaming GPU that can actually launch and play demanding titles has symbolic value. The Founder Edition also has an Nvidia-style limited run, including numbered cards and a signature from Lisuan Tech's co-founder and co-CEO, Xuan Yifang, which should appeal to collectors.
Following the first batch selling out almost instantly, Lisuan says that a second batch of Founder Edition cards will be released on June 18.
Lisuan has published a 40-game recommended settings list that includes Cyberpunk 2077, Black Myth: Wukong, Elden Ring, Resident Evil 4, GTA V, and several others. Many recommendations lean on FSR, frame generation, or carefully chosen presets, which says plenty about the hardware's shortcomings.
The LX 7G100 remains a poor buy for anyone chasing performance per dollar alone. But as China's first credible gaming GPU, it has already proved that people are willing to support domestic alternatives to Team Red and Team Green, even when the products themselves are inferior.