AMD Radeon R9 290X 4GB Graphics Card Review

Overclocking

When we reviewed the R9 290X GPU-Z didn’t fully support it so we’ve got some strange GPU-Z details showing up. GPU-Z has since been updated so the most current version will support the R9 290X. In terms of overclocking we managed to get an extra 100MHz on the core and 275MHz on the memory. Of course because of the way the new AMD PowerTune technology works this doesn’t scale as simply as you might think. Clock speed is dictated by heat output and fan speed profiles so when you do overclock if you’re already reaching that default thermal threshold of 95 degrees celsius then you will see little gain from increasing the clock speeds.

Indeed our results shows a modest increase from P13123 to P13885, which is about a 5.8% boost. With a better cooler that didn’t reach the thermal threshold (or a higher fan speed) you’d probably be able to get “more” performance by consistently reaching that maximum clock speed of 1100MHz.

When overclocked the R9 290X still fends off the GTX 780 but we can imagine that an overclocked GTX Titan (reference vs reference) would beat the R9 290X. Of course the R9 290X is a generally faster GPU and when AIB partners get their custom cooled versions out we’ll see great performance boosts. Nvidia’s AIB partners are still limited by restrictions on the GTX Titan cooling design so in that sense AMD’s R9 290X will have a major advantage.