Partner Cards: One Radeon R9 290 And Three 290Xes, Reviewed

[FormatC]

AMD's partners started shipping their own takes on Radeon R9 290 and 290X last month. We have one 290, three 290Xes, the reference card with our Arctic Accelero Extreme III modification, and another home-grown config that employs NZXT's Kraken G10 cooler.

Partner Cards: One Radeon R9 290 And Three 290Xes, Reviewed : Read more

 

[yannigr]

You can write as many articles as you want about 290/290X coolers. You can write as many excuses as you want. You can continue reminding us that there was/is a problem with Hawaii every 15 days for the whole 2014. That "victory dance" that "excitement" that you found(?) AMD cheating(?) back then, all that rage against AMD, can not be unwritten.

 

[FormatC]

all that rage against AMD

I would like to know this more precisely please... I can't found any rage in my articles, only a chip with a very high temperature density and a lot of unusable coolers because the engineers were not able to build a matching cooler for this cards. This high density will be a global problem for all next-gen chips too. Without a vapor chamber this won't work.

 

[outlw6669]

Good job on the review Tom's German team and great work from AMD's partners!

Coupled with other recent reviews, Sapphire's Tri-X OC series looks to be great cards, especially when you make a custom fan curve to further reduce idle and load noise.
I can not wait to see the 20nm updates, especially if AMD gets around to pulling a Titan with their reference coolers!

 

[rdc85]

It's here!! I'm been waiting for this review... going to read (twice) now..

 

[FormatC]

I will add in the next days more cards like Gigabyte's R9 290 (without X), the MSI R9 290X and something other (secret)

 

[rdc85]

I think this card is made/means to be WC -ed..... 290 in Kraken looks promising.. (trying imagine how good if in full water block, good radiator)

 

[roymustang]

The main problem with the 290 and 290X isn't the cooling, it's the fact that bitcoin and litecoin miners have driven the price of these cards up by $100-150; to the point where they are no longer a good deal at all.I was waiting for the custom cooled 290s to come out to upgrade my GTX 670 but now I may just wait for the next cards and maybe stick with nVidia.

 

[Phillip Wager]

i want so badly the 290 to go back to 400 bucks cuz that is like my hard limit on a video card ive been waiting but i don't think i can wait much longer and i guess i'll just get a 770. i'm even willing to put up with the reference coolers bah.

 

[hytecgowthaman]

Sapphire wins in this competition now !!!

 

[patrick47018]

"You can see this in the image below, where two of the heat pipes don't **tough** Hawaii at all, and two others make partial contact. " Spelling mistake, on topic I like the Sapphire Toxic's design and performance.

 

[bustapr]

yes, bitcoin miners made these cards prices skyrocket. its really made these cards non viable upgrade for some compared to the competitions cards. which is a pain since these were the best cards at launch. Either bitcoin prices crash or nvidia comes up with a competitor to GCN. these prices are getting ridiculous.

 

[Jan Mortensen]

The Price is still steady here in Denmark...But with 25% VAT this just mean that now you guys are getting to pay European prices for once 😉

 

[cpm1984]

The peak power draws on these cards are scary (way over 300 watts!) but they only last 1-2 milliseconds. Does the PSU have to be rated to handle the peak levels or just the average power draw under peak load?

 

[FormatC]

The peak power draws on these cards are scary (way over 300 watts!) but they only last 1-2 milliseconds. Does the PSU have to be rated to handle the peak levels or just the average power draw under peak load?

A good PSU has a lot of primary caps inside to compensate this peaks without any problem. The question should better be: What's about the life-span of this caps under this conditions? This is one of the reasons to buy a PSU with good and not with so-called "bad" caps. If you buy cheap you buy twice... 😉

But Nvidia is not much better. I've checked this in another article:

 

[patrick47018]

The peak power draws on these cards are scary (way over 300 watts!) but they only last 1-2 milliseconds. Does the PSU have to be rated to handle the peak levels or just the average power draw under peak load?

A good PSU has a lot of primary caps inside to compensate this peaks without any problem. The question should better be: What's about the life-span of this caps under this conditions?

But Nvidia is not much better. I've checked this in another article:

FormatC your avatar gave me cancer...

 

[FormatC]

FormatC your avatar gave me cancer...

Ok, use 8x MSAA to prevent you before edge flares 😀

 

[cpm1984]

The peak power draws on these cards are scary (way over 300 watts!) but they only last 1-2 milliseconds. Does the PSU have to be rated to handle the peak levels or just the average power draw under peak load?

 

[vmem]

All I can say is "I think NZXT is onto something here with a $30 Kraken add-on"

 

[Cirdan87]

The graph for the Asus 290x temperature doesn't appear to match the tables. The graph shows a peak temp for gaming of around 76 degrees, while your table says it was 85 degrees. Is this an error?

 

[Gurg]

@ Roymustang" it's the fact that bitcoin and litecoin miners have driven the price of these cards up by $100-150; to the point where they are no longer a good deal at all.I was waiting for the custom cooled 290s to come out to upgrade my GTX 670 but now I may just wait for the next cards and maybe stick with nVidia"The premium at Microcenter for a 290x reference card is now only $50 at Microcenter. and at least in Denver the cards are staying in stock. Most likely the premium will go away in the next month or so.

 

[Cirdan87]

Ah, I see you've updated your tables to specify closed vs. open containment. That explains the graph.

 

[FormatC]

The graph for the Asus 290x temperature doesn't appear to match the tables. The graph shows a peak temp for gaming of around 76 degrees, while your table says it was 85 degrees. Is this an error?

There are two values in the table - 76°C for open bench table and and 85°C for a closed midi-.case.
The graph is for open bench table

 

[Gurg]

Great review. I'll be buying a reference 290x and a Kracken G10 in a month or so when the bitcoin premium goes away ($50 over MSRP @ Microcenter now). With the lower temps both on the VRM and GPU it should have a lot of overclock room available. I all ready have a Kuhler 620 from a previous "RedMod" that will work with the Kracken. Note, this review was run at a much more reasonable 72º room temp.

 

[Tree_Hugger]

FormatC, can you give more info on the r9 290 with the G10 + X40 like vrm temps and noise?