Swap Gigabyte 290 to Sapphire 290 Tri-X ?

[daterxies]

Hey. Basically im not very happy with the performance of my Gigabyte 290 windforce OC card. It runs BF4 fine and all, but games like ARMA 3 and Rome 2 it leaves a bit to be desired on 1080.

I started reading and the card i have has horrible reviews on newegg (which is odd because on amazon it has great reviews) But something with the temperature bringing down the clock speed.. dont really understand all that but i gather the hotter it gets the worse it performs.

Ive read nothing but great things about the Sapphire 290 TRI-X. I already got an RMA for my card and can return it, and the TRI-X is currently on sale for 20 dollars cheaper then my Gigabyte was.

Should i do this? Or is it doubtful ill see any better performance increase swapping to a more reliably built card?

 

[Damn_Rookie]

ARMA 3 (at very high settings) and Rome 2 are both heavily dependent upon the CPU, so it's not clear cut as to whether there's an issue with your current card, or whether you're being held back by your CPU/game settings. Are your results on those two games in keeping with any benchmarks that you find online (paying particular attention to the CPU being used)?

Unless there's a very real issue with your current card, I doubt you'll see much of an improvement in performance if you swap to the Tri-X. That's not to say there aren't other benefits from swapping though, like an apparently better performing cooler.

Regarding the temperature based throttling, that's a normal feature on the 290 and 290X; the clock speeds listed are of an "up to" kind, as in "up to 1000 MHz". The reference designed cards in particular could be throttled down 100, 200, or even 300 MHz in very demanding situations, and in relatively air constricted enclosures.

The alternative coolers put out by Gigabyte, Sapphire, etc, with their increased cooling capacities, largely get rid of this issue, and allow the GPUs to run at their maximum clock rate without any down-clocking, In certain situations (very demanding load, poor case airflow) they could still down clock a bit, but this can be fixed by simply increasing the fan speed, or upping the target temperature.

 

[daterxies]

I just realized, when i first put the card in i thought i switched it to "performance mode" but it turns out i switched it to silent. I was wondering why my fans never went like past 20%. So i will try again tomorrow with performance mode on.

 

[Damn_Rookie]

Ahh! Yes, with a bit of luck that should help, as on silent mode you naturally end up with the thermal throttling scenario I described above. I wish you luck, and I hope the performance is better tomorrow!