Monday, September 23rd 2013
Radeon R9 290X Pictured, Tested, Beats Titan
Here are the first pictures of AMD's next-generation flagship graphics card, the Radeon R9 290X. If the naming caught you off-guard, our older article on AMD's new nomenclature could help. Pictured below is the AMD reference-design board of the R9 290X. It's big, and doesn't have too much going on with its design. At least it doesn't look Fisher Price like its predecessor. This reference design card is all that you'll be able to buy initially, and non-reference design cards could launch much later.
With its cooler taken apart, the PCB is signature AMD, you find digital-PWM voltage regulation, Volterra and CPL (Cooperbusmann) chippery, and, well, the more obvious components, the GPU and memory. The GPU, which many sources point at being built on the existing 28 nm silicon fab process, and looks significantly bigger than "Tahiti." The chip is surrounded by not twelve, but sixteen memory chips, which could indicate a 512-bit wide memory interface. At 6.00 GHz, we're talking about 384 GB/s of memory bandwidth. Other rumored specifications include 2,816 stream processors, four independent tessellation units, 176 TMUs, and anywhere between 32 and 64 ROPs. There's talk of DirectX 11.2 support.
It gets better, the source also put out benchmark figures.
The R9 290X is significantly faster than NVIDIA's GeForce TITAN graphics card among the two games it was tested on, Aliens vs. Predators 3, and Battlefield 3. It all boils down to pricing. AMD could cash in on its performance premium, by overpricing the card much like it did with HD 7990 "Malta," or it could torch NVIDIA's high-end lineup by competitively pricing the card.
Source:
DG's Nerdy Story
With its cooler taken apart, the PCB is signature AMD, you find digital-PWM voltage regulation, Volterra and CPL (Cooperbusmann) chippery, and, well, the more obvious components, the GPU and memory. The GPU, which many sources point at being built on the existing 28 nm silicon fab process, and looks significantly bigger than "Tahiti." The chip is surrounded by not twelve, but sixteen memory chips, which could indicate a 512-bit wide memory interface. At 6.00 GHz, we're talking about 384 GB/s of memory bandwidth. Other rumored specifications include 2,816 stream processors, four independent tessellation units, 176 TMUs, and anywhere between 32 and 64 ROPs. There's talk of DirectX 11.2 support.
The R9 290X is significantly faster than NVIDIA's GeForce TITAN graphics card among the two games it was tested on, Aliens vs. Predators 3, and Battlefield 3. It all boils down to pricing. AMD could cash in on its performance premium, by overpricing the card much like it did with HD 7990 "Malta," or it could torch NVIDIA's high-end lineup by competitively pricing the card.
142 Comments on Radeon R9 290X Pictured, Tested, Beats Titan
I agree that would be awesome.
I hope that AMD will put the new GPU around $650,00 and it beat GTX 780,because Nvidia will drop the price of GTX 780 and I will buy a Classified for less than $600,00 :nutkick:.
AMD drivers suck and I want buy a GTX 780 Classy to replace my old GTX 580.
If AMD refrains/redirects from a direct conjectures to Titan, and just via to emphasize its' performance/value comparative to the GTX780 they'll hold the upper hand. At this point it's hard to tell if Nvidia will or capable to contend on price, it depends if GK110 production provides for a good volume of 12-SMX spec parts. My thinking is Nvidia will come to market with a 10 or 11-SMX part to fill the nothingness between the GTX770-780. Figure AMD will have probably 3, perhaps 4 cards holding between $370-550. I think Nvidia hopes there's enough faithful that believe GK110's that if even further gelded offer virtue just based on its' thoroughbred stock.So, if they drop 15% after 4 months or basically you would be paying $6.25 a week since the release that feels like a better deal? To me you would've been better off jumping in right away, and unload the GTX580 at that time, as now you'll get less (than the $100 savings) for the GTX580 in a resale. Plus I'll be surprise if a EVGA Classified drops to $600 before say November and then you're even more upside down.
"That card is made for LN2 overclocking, why would you pay the premium for that card when others will reach the same clocks for less money? Just get an EVGA 780 with the ACX cooler and save yourself some money."
I read that Classy parts are better quality and durability than GTX reference parts.
In Portugal during Summer we have temperatures around 45º and GPU's suffer badly during gameplay and reach 85º and more on air (depends of model).
My GTX 580 died this year with 2,5 years and I sent it to EVGA for RMA (10 year guarantee) and yhey gave me a new one :rockout:.
Sure i like see lower prices but i bet it's cost nVidia and AMD money trying to get some thing new released.
Just hope it not silly TITAN pricing as they do nd to make a good profit too and as seen as you want them to b as good or better than nVidia they need good profit.
I just hope it's on par and the reference gets company's making 3rd party coolers for it
I expect this card to cost between $549-$599. If not? Oh well, I'll let the market settle for a month or so and see where prices are then.
step 1: Go to these 2 forums (threads are sorted by date):
forums.amd.com/game/categories.cfm?catid=454&FTVAR_SORT=date&FTVAR_SORTORDER=asc
forums.geforce.com/default/board/33/geforce-drivers/?orderBy=created-DESC
step 2: Compare the seriousness of issues.
step 3: Profit!
I wasn’t happy with AMD’s Tahiti XT release part price, but at the time given lots of things like TSMC 28Nm production issues/yield, the price increase TSMC piled on, and other things like increase in memory and Bus there were some defense. This time AMD just needs to stick to their winning formula.
I am hoping this happens again and Nvidia's current pricing is just the high point in a succession of peaks and valleys. Fingers crossed AMD doesn't base pricing on that structure.
Tahiti:
Hawaii: (same VRM setup and more caps)
Matt Skynner said, "So this next-generation line is targeting more of the enthusiast market versus the ultra-enthusiast one."
AMD sat by and watch Nvidia sell GTX480/580 for $500, while their 6970 with 10% less performance asked $380 and they didn't get earn much traction for it even in a down economy. I think that was part of AMD's motivation for the Tahiti XT price which was justified to bring price parity. And, yes Nvidia pulled the rug from under them when a GK104 size chip got them, this time the tables are turned…
Most likely availability will coincide with Battlefield 4
DIGITIMES - AMD Hawaii-based graphics cards to mass ship in October
Troll!!