AMD Launches Radeon R7 260 Graphics Card

[N.Broekhuijsen]

AMD's Radeon R7 260 has been unleashed!

AMD Launches Radeon R7 260 Graphics Card : Read more

 

[robax91]

Hopefully it's really cheap, otherwise it will have no place in the already bogged market for low end GPUs whose price doesn't make sense.

 

[tsnor]

@ robax91 who said "... otherwise it will have no place in the already bogged market for low end GPUs whose price doesn't make sense..." This could be a yield management/manufacturing decision rather than a product roadmap point people wanted. The chip used is just a sort of failed R7-260Xs (couldn't hit frequency or had a bad core). "... based on the 28 nm Bonaire silicon, which is the same die as featured in the R7-260X or HD 7790. That said, it does feature fewer stream processors, as only 768 out of the 896 cores are enabled...."

 

[Onus]

Hmmm, looks like a HD7770 replacement. The pic appears to show a 6-pin PCIe connector; too bad about that, but a low-profile single-slot version would still be sweet for TINY (i.e. not Prodigy-huge) mini-ITX builds.
Hopefully, AMD will get their Bonaire driver problems sorted too.

 

[robax91]

@ robax91 who said "... otherwise it will have no place in the already bogged market for low end GPUs whose price doesn't make sense..." This could be a yield management/manufacturing decision rather than a product roadmap point people wanted. The chip used is just a sort of failed R7-260Xs (couldn't hit frequency or had a bad core). "... based on the 28 nm Bonaire silicon, which is the same die as featured in the R7-260X or HD 7790. That said, it does feature fewer stream processors, as only 768 out of the 896 cores are enabled...."

As I said, if the price doesn't make sense, it has no place. Using left over chips that failed spec doesn't change the fact that unless it has a decent price, there is no point to the product. Also, I was referring to the Linus Catchphrase "Why does this exist?" as he has done benchmarks/reviews for several newer cards from AMD and some of the x and non x versions are so similar in performance (but not price) it makes you question half of their line. The answer was money, btw.

 

[bob hays]

@ robax91 who said "... otherwise it will have no place in the already bogged market for low end GPUs whose price doesn't make sense..." This could be a yield management/manufacturing decision rather than a product roadmap point people wanted. The chip used is just a sort of failed R7-260Xs (couldn't hit frequency or had a bad core). "... based on the 28 nm Bonaire silicon, which is the same die as featured in the R7-260X or HD 7790. That said, it does feature fewer stream processors, as only 768 out of the 896 cores are enabled...."

As I said, if the price doesn't make sense, it has no place. Using left over chips that failed spec doesn't change the fact that unless it has a decent price, there is no point to the product. Also, I was referring to the Linus Catchphrase "Why does this exist?" as he has done benchmarks/reviews for several newer cards from AMD and some of the x and non x versions are so similar in performance (but not price) it makes you question half of their line. The answer was money, btw.

I agree with what you're saying, but tsnor's answer makes a lot of sense, try to understand his comment before going against it.

 

[Lightbulbie]

Looks like an AMD version of NVIDIA's 650 Ti..

 

[Amdlova]

but 650ti don`t SLI and that can do crossfire... Nvidia only want tons of money. i think will this crossfire with 260x and 7790

 

[Onus]

I don't think Robax91 is arguing against tsnor; tsnor is just offering a reason why these products were released rather than "failed" but usable silicon being tossed.
And, I doubt tsnor will disagree that the price has to make sense, or no one will buy it. "Why does this exist?" is indeed a very good question. Just add "What price makes sense for this product?"

 

[beoza]

is it just me or does the bottom left corner (PCIE Connector) not look right? The HSF shroud extends over the connector.

 

[Onus]

Looks like parallax to me...you can see where the shroud takes a 90 degree bend back toward the board at the bottom. The connector no doubt extends below that.

 

[blubbey]

Interesting to note that the Xbox One's GPU component is this downclocked. Both are 768:48:16, with a 147MHz core clock difference. Just an idea, maybe some platform comparisons Tom's?

 

[knowom]

Pretty much any graphics card under $125's isn't even worth purchasing I'm still making due with a 8800GT and 260GTX perfectly fine.

 

[rolandzhang3]

Well there are those without big budgets or incomes so lower end offerings with decent performance do make sense

Price it competitively and it'll take the place of the 7770 as the budget gamer's best friend

 

[Lessthannil]

Pretty much any graphics card under $125's isn't even worth purchasing I'm still making due with a 8800GT and 260GTX perfectly fine.

Agreed. Even with people with small budgets (me included), there is little reason to get something under 125$. At 125$ and above is where you want to start. The HD 7850 and the 650 Ti Boost both are around that price and they are excellent. Below that price, GPUs start to lose performance faster than price.

 

[Onus]

Building new, I'd probably put the HD7750 at the minimum end-point, especially if size is a concern (there are low-profile versions), and the intent doesn't include the latest games on "gorgeous" settings. Older games, and even newer ones on lowered settings will run well on this card (remember how graphics cards used to struggle with Oblivion...) With no size or power constraints, a HD7770 or GTX650Ti is still a decent card, able to play any game, and ought to manage "sufferable" settings even for new titles.
There are still a lot of people upgrading out there, who have older IGP's and/or limited OEM PSUs for whom the HD6670, HD6570, or even (for Blu-Ray) HD6450 remains a valid upgrade.