AMD Radeon R9 290X 4GB Graphics Card Review

Final Thoughts

Pricing

AMD have explicitly told us an MSRP of $549 is in place for the R9 290X. In Europe that means €400 excluding VAT so €480 is roughly what most European countries will see if they have a 20% VAT rate. In the UK that MSRP is about £430 (by currency conversion) and indeed it can be had for £430 at some retailers. Of course when we factor in the margins that retailers and distributors add-on to these items we can expect to see final retail prices that are a little higher than £430 for most R9 290Xs, maybe up to 5% more. The main competition to AMD is arguably Nvidia’s GTX 780 and GTX Titan which cost $499 and $999 respectively (or £380~ and £780~ in the UK) thanks to recent Nvidia price cut on the GTX 780. Of course it’s worth noting that Nvidia are by no means down and out as Nvidia’s GTX Titan offers more frame buffer, lower power consumption and has quieter & cooler operation, but whether that’s worth $450 more is contestable, something Nvidia may address with future price cuts. Factoring in Nvidia’s most recent GTX 780 price cuts and the revelation that the GTX 780 Ti will cost $699 we can see that the R9 290X from AMD is still a very competitive card. However, we’ve yet to see how it will stack up against the GTX 780 Ti so judgement is reserved on that one.

Final Thoughts

AMD’s R9 290X has really impressed me a lot. Our results show it performs consistently better than the GTX Titan in the vast majority of benchmarks and pretty much blows the GTX 780 out of the park (we tested using the “quiet mode” BIOS switch, not the “Uber mode” BIOS switch which would of given more performance). The performance of the AMD R9 290X is “throttled” by the excessive heat build-up and poor cooling of the reference design cooler so the custom cooled R9 290X graphics cards consumers will buy from the likes of MSI, ASUS, Gigabyte, Sapphire, XFX and so on will be much cooler, and as a result, have much more performance. This is due to the way the new AMD PowerTune works – lower temperatures result in higher clocks – meaning AMD’s AIB partners have never had such a big role to play. All of this also comes in at an immensely attractive price point of $549, which is still high absolutely but relative to the current competition – this is a steal. Referring back to the new features of the R9 290X we definitely feel the new CrossFire system is an advantageous design aspect and the strive towards greater 4K compatibility is beneficial. AMD’s TrueAudio and Eyefinity enhancements are also welcomed, though these are only minor offerings in my opinion – despite how important AMD thinks TrueAudio will be.

The AMD R9 290X isn’t perfect though and we can see room for improvement – which AMD’s AIB partners will be able to offer. Firstly, it runs really hot at 95 degrees, which is its temperature threshold. AMD says 95 degrees is safe for 24/7 lifetime operation and we believe them but I’m not so sure consumers will, not to mention the fact having a GPU that hot is just not a sensible idea for longevity. Of course AMD’s partners will address this and once we see “Twin Frozr”, “WindForce”, “Direct CU II”, “Vapor-X” and “Double Dissipation” variants from partners such high temperatures are unlikely to be a problem. In effect I can confidently say the reference cooler is mediocre – it is loud and pretty inefficient – but you most likely won’t be buying the reference cooler anyway. The reference cooler “does the job” and you can reduce the fan noise or temperature levels but all this will sacrifice a lot of performance (due to the way AMD PowerTune operates) so I’d say wait for custom cooled solutions to get the most bang for your buck. Next I believe the power consumption is quite high but in a sense it is still acceptable. We saw it consuming about the same as a modestly overclocked GTX 780 but it does consume more than its biggest rival the GTX Titan (but also offers more performance so you win some, you lose some). It is also worth noting that vendors like ASUS will be able to work on this, they always use dramatically more efficient power componentry than reference design PCBs so in their own offerings they may be able to shave about 20 watts off.

Pros

• Class leading performance for a single GPU graphics card
• New PowerTune enhancements pave the way for stress free performance boosts
• CrossFire no longer needs a bridge/connector
• Well priced relative to the competition

Cons

• Slightly high (relative) power consumption
• “Only 4GB” of frame buffer, doesn’t match the 6GB offered by the GTX Titan
• Reference cooler isn’t that great – it does run hot and quite loud

“It is official: AMD’s R9 290X graphics card has reclaimed the single GPU crown from Nvidia’s GTX Titan. There is no doubting it boasts the performance credentials of a class leading graphics card and with AMD’s new PowerTune, Eyefinity, 4K and TrueAudio tweaks the functionality-aspect of AMD’s new flagship is highly attractive. We look forward to seeing what AMD’s graphics card partners can offer in the way of innovative cooling and PCB designs and additional features or overclocks. Whatever they choose to do they’ve got one mighty fine GPU to work with and a price that will take most people by surprise (in a positive way).”

Thank you to AMD for providing this review sample.