R9 290x

[keynes]

Expected retail price is around £450 and outperforms the GTX 780 in most games.
http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/61505-amd-radeon-r9-290x/

 

[Deklore]

Ohh jeez, this is sooo tempting!

EDIT - strange how this card is meant to, and is designed to run at 95 degrees C

 

[Grimezy]

These cards make me a bit nervous, must be some compromises to get them that cheap surely?

 

[steaky360]

These cards make me a bit nervous, must be some compromises to get them that cheap surely?

Maybe, or Nvidia is just overpriced!

 

[tom_gr7]

Ohh jeez, this is sooo tempting!

EDIT - strange how this card is meant to, and is designed to run at 95 degrees C

They basically let the cards run hotter, and reduce the fan speeds to make the card seem quieter. As most gamers wont check the temps until they get a problem. However, we do notice if the card is noisy out of the box.

 

[steaky360]

And... the cards designed to run hot so its not an immediate issue

 

[Wozza63]

Most modern cards can withstand about 125'C for a short time without failure, although Nvidia puts fans at 100% when at 100'C and I think it switches it off at about 110 for safety, I don't know about AMD

 

[SlimCini]

Why are Nvidia cards more expensive than AMD? More expensive materials used? More expensive labour? Or are Nvidia just like Apple and make things expensive to increase desirability??

 

[Wozza63]

Why are Nvidia cards more expensive than AMD? More expensive materials used? More expensive labour? Or are Nvidia just like Apple and make things expensive to increase desirability??

They are generally known as the better cards and are higher quality. So they can charge a bit of a premium price for it. And even being more expensive they still have like 75% of the market.

 

[edwjac]

Well I dunno the 7990 had serious heat issues and this is based on the same tech, and its driver support where AMD lose most of it customers rather than hardware. I think people want to see this and the 780ti toe2toe before opening their wallets.

 

[Rakk]

Why are Nvidia cards more expensive than AMD? More expensive materials used? More expensive labour? Or are Nvidia just like Apple and make things expensive to increase desirability??

They are generally known as the better cards and are higher quality. So they can charge a bit of a premium price for it. And even being more expensive they still have like 75% of the market.

NVidia cards also have Physx, which the AMD cards do not have.

 

[keynes]

A few more weeks they will offer better cooling. I like this, will force nvidia to lower their prices.

 

[fedris the red]

Too hot and loud for my liking - but I can see the fact you could get two for about the same price as a Titan, for Crossfiring purposes, (Isn't that what the kids call it?) would be attractive to some people. (Also I can see the same people giving up on conventional cases and just buying a fridge to put their build in...)

 

[NilSatis]

Too hot and loud for my liking - but I can see the fact you could get two for about the same price as a Titan, for Crossfiring purposes, (Isn't that what the kids call it?) would be attractive to some people. (Also I can see the same people giving up on conventional cases and just buying a fridge to put their build in...)

In my opinion, letting it get to 95c maybe in some ways a bit of a step backwards; or a slightly lazy way of increasing performance on first glance, but i can also guarantee this wont be helped AMDs fan profile or the reference cooler. The fan profile will be too slight, and therefore temps will go up. In all other aspects, this will be an awesome card. If anyone wants this card I would either wait for the none x version (non reference) or just wait for the non reference versions of this card with dual and even triple fans.

Then the temps will be lower and therefore the noise The price and the performance speak for themselves. As for the build quality....you really can't go down the route of Nvidias making the better quality card any more. It is a price vs/ performance driven market, and with the latest drivers being so good by AMD, it is this price vs performance people should look at. So far, this is just what we need to push Nvidias prices down too. Well done AMD.

 

[Wozza63]

Nvidia always releases their graphics cards early so they can charge extra for being the first of the next gen, they always bring their prices down when AMD releases their new cards.
AMD aren't exactly helping themselves by using a rebranded HD7970 and other cards.

Its the same in the CPU area, where Intel is clearly outperforming AMD, but are only beaten on the budget options for value

 

[steaky360]

[video=youtube;QQhqOKKAq7o]https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=QQhqOKKAq7o[/video]

 

[tom_gr7]

I cant watch the video (waiting for a lecture to start) but the card does look visually nice.

 

[Boozad]

I know someone with a 780 bought one of these too, put it in for benchmarking purposes and put the 780 straight back in due to the noise from the 290. Can't vouch for it myself but apparently it's a really noisy card.

 

[Deklore]

Yeah i dont care what AMD says, for the card to be running "normally" at 95 degrees cant be good for the longevity of the card. But im surprised at how noisy it is since the fan speed is limited to 55% is it not?

 

[Boozad]

Here's a quote from the guy I know. He's a serious overclocker and benchmarker and he's basically debunked the theory that the 290x is better than the 780.

Paul i'll let you edit the scores because you are on a rampage and I don't know which one you want listed

I think you will be keeping the 290X

No mate, I just ran tropics benchmark and passmark and the 290X loses out to the 780 on both of them, so the final score is 3-1 to the 780, and the 780 doesn't sound like a hoover/hair dryer/jet engine which is good.