For today’s review we will be looking at the Radeon R9 290X reference design from Sapphire  and we’ll see just how well the R9 290X shapes up in how AMD envisioned it to be. The Radeon R9 290X's full specifications, thanks to GPUz. Miller sends Artyom to the surface with a mission to kill the Dark One; he is accompanied by Anna, Miller's sarcastic daughter and the Rangers' best sniper. After five minutes of that we get a bit more serious and place the device two CM away from the fan on the card to find the maximum noise level of the card when idle (2D mode) and in load (3D mode). Because it's also our first R9 290X, we'll be covering some of the main features that the new model brings to the table. Outside of the main specifications and the two big main features mentioned just before in the form of the Dual BIOS switch, which allows "Quiet Mode" and "Uber Mode" along with the new Bridgeless CrossFire technology, we've got support for both Mantle and AMD True Audio. Here is a list of all of the R9 290X reference design cards I could find: Sapphire (21226-00-40G) Diamond (R9290XD54G) ASUS (R9290X-4GD5) XFX Core Edition (R9-290X-ENFC) PowerColor (AXR9 290X 4GBD5-MDH/OC) Gigabyte (GV-R929XD5-4GD-B) The game was released on 20 November 2012, which is in the 47th week of the year (in reference to the protagonist, Agent 47). It wasn’t stable at 1150 MHz, so instead he kept overclocking the memory, which we have to say has some potential, but not as much as we expected. There are three numbers we're looking out for when it comes to our benchmarks. AMD Radeon R9 290X 4GB Overclocked Reference Video Card We fire up MSI Afterburner and see what the brand new AMD Radeon R9 290X 4GB can do when overclocking is thrown into the mix. Comparing Quiet and Uber mode against each other, you can see at 1680 x 1050 little changes. Fire Strike is our new showcase DirectX 11 benchmark designed for high-performance gaming PCs. Version and / or Patch Used: Standalone Benchmark, Timedemo or Level Used: Built in Benchmark, Developer Homepage: http://www.sega.com/?t=EnglishUSA, Product Homepage: http://www.pso2.com/us/html/index.html. AMD R9 290x 4GB Reference style cooler: Condition: Used. Designed to measure your PC's gaming performance 3DMark 11 makes extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. Guaranteed to provide players with the most realistic simulation of military sharpshooting yet available. 3DMark 11 is the latest version of the world's most popular benchmark. Score explanation: Less than 2000: Please adjust your game settings because the processing load is quite heavy. Developer Homepage: http://eu.square-enix.com/en, Product Homepage: http://www.sleepingdogs.net/. But if that was honestly the case, I'd point you in the direction of the cheaper Sapphire R9 280X 3GB TOXIC for instance, which is a truly fantastic card with fantastic performance and an unreal cooler. Today, though, is all about the newest high-end GPU from AMD. AMD’s R9 290X is the company’s top-tier GPU offering in the R9 series and is its fastest single GPU to date. BioShock Infinite is not part of the storyline of previous BioShock games but features similar gameplay concepts and themes. Moving across to the front of the card, you would normally expect to be greeted with a pair of CrossFire connectors here, and while you can see the points where they would go, they're clearly not present. Rico Rodriguez returns as the protagonist, aiming to overthrow the evil dictator Pandak "Baby" Panay and confront his former mentor, Tom Sheldon. I understand Quiet Mode, but I don't really accept it. We finish off the AMD side of things with the Sapphire R9 280X 3GB TOXIC, which did an awesome job of impressing us, while we've also included the MSI R9 280X 2GB Twin Frozr Gaming OC cards in CrossFire. We have one more reference review for you, this is the Gigabyte Radeon R9-290X. It's not too important, though, as both cards struggle to hit 60 FPS at this resolution, and while in Uber Mode we see the R9 290X take out the win here, again, the card doesn't hit that playable 60 FPS number we want. Adding new game benchmarks is a long, tedious and time consuming task as every video card has to be re-tested in those new benchmarks. At $549, the R9 290X 4GB feels like the easier choice when compared against the GTX 780. First, some nuts and bolts: Our Radeon R9 290X reference design carries a 1000MHz GPU clock, a 1250MHz memory clock, and 4GB of DDR5 memory. Of course being a Lightning card, we overclocked it, and as you'll see in our graphs today, the core was pushed to 1020MHz, while the 3GB of GDDR5 was pushed to 6540MHz QDR. While many may argue that the human eye can't see over 24 FPS or 30 FPS, any true gamer will tell you that as we climb higher in Frames Per Seconds (FPS), the overall gameplay feels smoother. Finally we finish off the NVIDIA side with the pre-overclocked EVGA GTX TITAN 6GB SuperClocked. After being rescued, they find out their evacuation point (Where the Category-G appeared) was a set-up and no pick up team awaited them. The AMD R9 290X, a 2013 release, was the once-flagship of the 200 series, later superseded by the 390X refresh, (sort of) the Fury X, and eventually the RX-series cards. 60 FPS - It's the average we look for when we don't have a minimum coming at us. Along with comparing the card against itself, though, we've got a number of AMD offerings including the PowerColor PCS HD 7950 2GB overclocked to over 1100MHz, while the reference HD 7970 GHz Edition rounds off our collection of previous generation AMD cards. Via the Hardware FMA engine inside the CrossFire compositing block, we no longer have the need for an external connector. Our benchmark line up will progress and be updated as newer more intensive games with benchmarks comes to light. The Dunia Engine was built specifically for Far Cry 2 by the award-winning Ubisoft Montreal development team. Sniper Elite V2 features detailed sniping simulation with advanced ballistics, taking into account gravity, wind, velocity, bullet penetration, aim stability and more. As for the NVIDIA side of things, we've got the reference GTX 770 2GB, along with the MSI GTX 780 3GB Lightning we just finished looking at. At the moment, though, we can't really take advantage of the technology in a big way. This $429 MSI R9 390X Gaming has a silent mode which runs the clocks at the reference 1050/1500MHz, but out of the box it is clocked at 1080MHz/1500MHz, and MSI guarantees an overclock of 1100MHz/1525MHz that is supported by its 3-year warranty. With the R9 290X in Uber mode, you can see performance is very close to the heavily overclocked MSI GTX 780 Lightning, which also sees that at the higher resolution, it's ahead of the much more expensive GTX TITAN 6GB SuperClocked from EVGA. Using our PROVA Power Analyzer WM-01 or "Power Thingy" as it has become quickly known as to our readers, we are now able to find out what kind of power is being used by our test system and the associated graphics cards installed. Is there a difference between, say, Sapphire's and XFX's reference R9 290X? Shopping is an inevitable part of our lives in today’s times, but what can make this a successful venture? Nexuiz is fast paced with extremely competitive game play. As stated it is a reference design of the original Radeon R9-290X. Developer Homepage: http://www.unigine.com, Product Homepage: http://unigine.com/press-releases/091022-heaven_benchmark//. R9 390x BIOS has different RevID=(80) compared to r9 290 RevID=(00) which means drivers for R9 390x won't work unless you inf mod it. The player controls Wei Shen, a Chinese-American police officer, as he goes undercover to infiltrate the Sun On Yee Triad organization. Nexuiz for consoles is powered by CryENGINE 3. Compared to the top NVIDIA offerings, though, you can see the setups are fairly close to each other, with no major changes being seen. It is worth noting that, despite AMD's 4GB HBM solution in Fiji and the Fury X, the R9 390X sticks with 8GB of GDDR5 memory. Power draw numbers are at almost 500w when under load. As we move further and further up the resolution table, and more and more pressure is placed on the GPU, Uber mode starts to make a difference. Especially when we're under 60 FPS to over 60 FPS or move from the lower 60 FPS range to the higher-end of it. Switching to Uber Mode, you can see that the card gets a nice boost in performance at both resolutions that puts it ahead of our heavily overclocked MSI GTX 780 3GB Lightning at both resolutions. It reveals the enchanting magic of floating islands with a tiny village hidden in the cloudy skies. Maybe "Quieter" Mode would've been a more appropriate name for it. Today, though, one more of those pieces gets filled with the release of the new single GPU high-end option from AMD, the R9 290X. While the clock rates don't change, "Quiet Mode" focuses on keeping noise down, while "Uber Mode" focuses on keeping performance up. Published by Square Enix, Tomb Raider is the fifth title developed by Crystal Dynamics in the Tomb Raider franchise. From what I understand there is around a 10% difference between the cards. It is the fifth entry in the Hitman game series, and runs on I/O Interactive's proprietary Glacier 2 game engine. Core clock which was supposed to be 1Ghz, often dropped as low as 870Mhz due to the temperatures rising to 95 degrees. It's fairly safe to assume that NVIDIA is going to drop the price of the GTX 780 in the coming week or weeks, for one reason and one reason only. The Quiet profile makes the card run quieter at the cost of performance, but we have found that online reviews show much less of a performance drop than we tested ourselves. We would like to thank the following companies for supplying and supporting us with our test system hardware and equipment: Intel, ASUS and Corsair. We test at the exact same stage every time; therefore tests should be very consistent and accurate. Along with these higher-end models, there's also a few lower-end ones we've got to look at including the lower-end R7 250 which we've also got on hand and carries with it a price tag of under $100. Please note you may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. Developer Homepage: http://www.alientrap.org/. BioShock Infinite is a first-person shooter video game and the third installment in the BioShock series. At 2560 x 1600, you can see we move from a 78 FPS average to a more comfortable 88 FPS. Details about AMD R9 290x 4GB Reference style cooler See original listing. Let's see what happens with the NVIDA offerings in the coming weeks, though. Developer Homepage: http://irrationalgames.com/, Product Homepage: http://www.bioshockinfinite.com. The main difference is the size of the card. More than 10-year of corporate IT experience as well as consumer IT journalism. The R9 290X … These new cards featuring the Hawaii Island GPU bring to the table a variety of new technologies such as the Mantle API, TruAudio and DirectX 11.1/11.2. The Radeon R9 290 and R9 290X were announced on September 25, 2013. Developer Homepage: http://www.rebellion.co.uk/, Product Homepage: http://sniperelitev2.com/us/age.html. AMD’s R9 290X is the company’s top-tier GPU offering in the R9 series and is its fastest single GPU to date. Uber Mode, on the other hand, sees it perform much better. This is compatible with the AMD frame pacing technology inside the Catalyst driver suite and brings with it no reduction in performance when compared to having an external bridge. All of these technologies currently have games adopting them but that will surely change in the coming months as more and more developers adopt them in their games. Through its advanced renderer, Unigine is one of the first to set precedence in showcasing the art assets with tessellation, bringing compelling visual finesse, utilizing the technology to the full extend and exhibiting the possibilities of enriching 3D gaming. There are a few important notes to remember though; while our maximum power is taken in 3DMark06 at the same exact point, we have seen in particular tests the power being drawn as much as 10% more. Hello, In General, can the r9 290x be compared to the gtx 980 or to the gtx 970? The R9 290X has 64 ROP’s, 176 TMU’s and 2,816 unifed shaders. This is set under the Catalyst Control Center, though. 120 FPS - The new number that we've been hunting down over recent months. Considering you're going to have to go into your case to switch modes, I'm not sure why you would really opt for Quiet Mode over Uber Mode when there's really quite a decent difference in performance, especially when it matters. The memory side also changes. Tomb Raider was released on 5 March 2013 for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows to universal critical acclaim. AMD has completely changed how frequencies work in the Hawaii GPUs. The new CrossFire technology is also really cool and we're fortunate enough to have a second R9 290X 4GB on hand. In Uber Mode, we see a decent jump again in performance and it is now able to outperform both NVIDIA offerings at all resolutions. His extensive skill set and experience in communicating complicated technical details into easily understandable bits. At the lowest resolution, there's really nothing, moving to 1920 x 1200 and 2560 x 1600, though, you can really see quite a large increase in performance. Both technologies were already covered in our other launch coverage. The other main piece we're missing is the R9 290, which is due to be released roughly a week after the R9 290X, and as the name might suggest, falls just below this model. On foot, the player character has the ability to walk, run, jump, climb over obstacles and swim, as well as use weapons and martial arts in combat. If a reviewer switches it over and tries Uber Mode under just 3DMark 11 and 3DMark Fire Strike, they will see little difference in performance, which in turn could cause them to not extensively test the difference. The fan speed tops out at 55% as default but you can set it higher manually. The R9 290X comes in larger, as you'd expect. However, being above 60 FPS is something that every setup here has a problem with at this resolution, including the CrossFire 280X setup. Turning AA and AF on under Far Cry 2 sees little difference between Quiet and Uber modes. The main difference is that it is a bit more useful here. Stream processors go from 2.048 to 2,816, while Texture Units move from 128 to 176, and ROPs from 32 to 64. As the first entry in a new Tomb Raider continuity, the game is a reboot that emphasizes the reconstructed origins of the culturally influential lead character Lara Croft. This review compares the MSI R9 390X Gaming 8GB OC with the 290X 4GB (non-throttling) reference version, and with the GTX 980. F1 2012 will feature all of the official teams, drivers and circuits from the 2012 FIA FORMULA ONE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP, including the debut of the 2012 FORMULA 1 UNITED STATES GRAND PRIX at Austin, Texas and the return of Germany's famous Hockenheim circuit to the calendar. Metro: Last Light takes place one year after the events of Metro 2033, proceeding from the ending where Artyom chose to call down the missile strike on the Dark Ones. Radeon R9 290X overclocking. Just Cause 2 in Uber Mode sees some excellent performance jumps when compared to the card running in Quiet Mode. AMD's new Radeon R9 290X includes a hardware switch that changes the card between two fan profiles called "Quiet" and "Uber". What monitor should I consider to pair with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080? Are you purchasing the best asus r9 290x reference for yourself? With cards like the R9 280X 3GB TOXIC from Sapphire and the upcoming R9 290 coming, it feels like it's just a feature for the sake of saying they have the feature. Companies might choose to just offer two BIOS versions with different clock speeds, or a UEFI and non-UEFI one, like we've seen out of the switch on other cards. To further complicate the situation, the R9 280X and 270X are both rebrands of existing products making it seems like both AMD and NVIDIA (GTX770/760 are also rebrands) are really lazing off on development efforts in the mid-range desktop component sector. As for Quiet and Uber mode, you can see again very little difference is seen in both presets. Developer Homepage: http://www.4a-games.com/, Product Homepage: http://enterthemetro.com/ /. It's here where we really see the similarities stop, though. Compared to the quite heavily overclocked MSI GTX 780 Lightning, you can see that both cards are fairly close to each other. Reference design R9 290/R9 290X/R9 390/390X gpu VGA card protector backplate metal pad board video card protection Model #: EHD-RNU-ASD72149 Item #: 9SIAMYSBH18678 Just Cause 2 employs the Avalanche Engine 2.0, an updated version of the engine used in Just Cause. When it comes to heat, the R9 290X 4GB is a warm running video card with 94c being seen at load. While Heaven sees a nice boost in performance when switching between Uber and Quiet mode, you can see that the top NVIDIA offerings come out ahead. F1 2012 also makes good use of Uber Mode with a decent jump in performance when compared to Quiet Mode. We will be testing both modes today, and while the clock speed of the card doesn't change, it will be interesting to see what the difference between the two modes are. These are changes that really make a difference to your gaming experience and the testing can really change how you look at the card. A quick video showing the fan noise of AMD's R9 290 with the reference cooler. The story takes place back on E.D.N. The R9 290X then has a core clock of up to 1GHz and how quickly it runs depends on how close to the 95ºC temperature target the GPU is running at. Before release, the developers stated that Absolution would be easier to play and more accessible, while still retaining hardcore aspects of the franchise. The R9 290X sat at 320GB/s reference. Even R9 290x that has Hynix memory has problems being stable with downclocked memory (1250Mhz) and it is much worse if you have elpida. It's a pity we're still a few FPS shy of that 60 FPS number we're always on the hunt for. If we're getting an average of 60 FPS, we should have a minimum of 30 FPS or better and as mentioned above, it means we've got some smooth game play happening. AMD's Radeon R9 290X 4GB is set to hit at $549. His favorite animal is the scapegoat. We've already seen companies do some fantastic things with the models that have launched with the Sapphire TOXIC variants standing out and the MSI HAWK, which we're yet to test. The Difference Between My R9 290X And Yours. Watch Dogs: Legion Benchmarked at 1080p, 1440p, 4K on all new GPUs, Advice on a new kids gaming PC with decent graphics and no lagging. Checking out BioShock Infinite, you can again see in this case the NVIDIA offerings come out ahead. Product Homepage: http://www.futuremark.com/benchmarks/3dmark. For the money, it really feels like AMD is bringing more than just another video card that concentrates on pushing out a large amount of frames per seconds. Like we often see when it comes to moving to a wider bus and more memory, the default clock speed is down with the 4GB of GDDR5 carrying with it a default clock of 5000MHz QDR, instead of 6000MHz QDR, like we saw on the smaller-width 3GB R9 280X. Radeon R9 290. People with access to an XFX Radeon R9 390X graphics card, took it apart to take a peek at its PCB. Because of that reason we have always just evaluated our benchmark line up every six months. We can't wait to throw overclocking into the mix on the new R9 290X soon. Also no one has been able to change the RevID for r9 290 so fat. Here we see video cards go from playable FPS to an unplayable FPS and the real power houses continue to help break that 60 FPS mark we always aim for to provide a smooth gaming experience.