PowerColor Radeon R9 390 PCS+ 8 GB

[W1zzard]

PowerColor introduces a new triple-fan, triple-slot, full-metal cooler with their R9 390 PCS+. The card comes overclocked out of the box, and PowerColor is asking a small $10 premium over reference-design pricing. Like all R9 390 cards, it features 8 GB of VRAM, which is twice that of the R9 290.

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[mroofie]

If one would look more at price/performance it could have gotten a 9/10
Since its another re-brand it deserves 8.0
No VGA

 

[zzzaac]

All the stores where I'm at are quickly taking the 290/290X's off the shelf. Urgh

 

[btarunr]

R9 390 looks like a reasonable alternative to GTX 970, and is 1440p-worthy. It made NVIDIA cut GTX 970 price from $330 to $310. So unless you go 4K, you can get a decent setup for 1440p at $300 ±$30.

 

[Hiryougan]

Too bad there are games like The New Order or CARS that distort the real performance of AMD cards.

Still, i think that with this 390 released, there is no reason to buy 970 anymore, especially if you go 1440p. Then, it's the perfect bang4buck card for you.

 

[mroofie]

Too bad there are games like The New Order or CARS that distort the real performance of AMD cards.

Still, i think that with this 390 released, there is no reason to buy 970 anymore, especially if you go 1440p. Then, it's the perfect bang4buck card for you.

only if you want a heater in you're room

 

[Hiryougan]

onlu if you want a heater in you're room

I have R9 290, i don't really see a problem. 390 has lower power consumption than 290 when being faster than 290X. That's a big improvement.

Also it's "Only if" and "your", not "you are"(you're).

 

[Mathragh]

onlu if you want a heater in you're room

Yep, those 70 watts extra will really make all the difference to your room temperature. Better keep yourself hydrated!

Question to Wizzard: I always found those "(All resolutions)" summary plots very helpfull to get a more balanced oversight of performance (like used in this review), any reason why they're not there anymore in current day reviews? Thanks for all the work you're doing!

 

[GhostRyder]

onlu if you want a heater in you're room

I am guessing you live on the surface of the sun since that small wattage difference is enough to count as a heater.

As a card, the 390 is not a bad deal currently considering its performance levels match or beat the GTX 970. Since the price is right I see it as a good buy for those wanting a middle ground card with performance to spare. But still the 8gb is wasted on this card as it might have been a better idea to drop it to 4gb though I bet some people may grab 2- 3 of these for a cheap enough price and make an overkill system which might benefit from the extra vram.

 

[Hiryougan]

I am guessing you live on the surface of the sun since that small wattage difference is enough to count as a heater.

As a card, the 390 is not a bad deal currently considering its performance levels match or beat the GTX 970. Since the price is right I see it as a good buy for those wanting a middle ground card with performance to spare. But still the 8gb is wasted on this card as it might have been a better idea to drop it to 4gb though I bet some people may grab 2- 3 of these for a cheap enough price and make an overkill system which might benefit from the extra vram.

Although there are some games that exceed 4GB of vram. They are few, i agree, but they exist(probably because of lazy devs, Witcher 3 didn't even use 2GB )

 

[mroofie]

I am guessing you live on the surface of the sun since that small wattage difference is enough to count as a heater.

As a card, the 390 is not a bad deal currently considering its performance levels match or beat the GTX 970. Since the price is right I see it as a good buy for those wanting a middle ground card with performance to spare. But still the 8gb is wasted on this card as it might have been a better idea to drop it to 4gb though I bet some people may grab 2- 3 of these for a cheap enough price and make an overkill system which might benefit from the extra vram.

I live on Vega very hot

 

[yogurt_21]

I have an R9 290 and live in AZ, pretty hot here (june had 11 days north of 110 degree F highs and we're above 50% humidity atm) and the card makes zero difference in room temperature. Considering the amount of power the sun has at this uv index you're basically saying you can tell the difference between 10,000,000 watts and 10,000,070 watts. I call bull shit.

Also for those who live in hotter areas we run the A/C pretty much non-stop during the hottest summer months. That means a 3-5KW always on. 96Kwh a day just from A/C. So an extra .28 Kwh a day (assuming you game 4 hours a day) isn't going to even register on your electricity bill.

The only people complaining about the extra power are ones who really should have a Nuc based machine anyways. If power is so expensive that your graphics card is the main concern, you likely will be better off gaming at 720P or less on a 15w machine.

No the problem with this card is that the 970 is actually cheaper, meaning the savings are free. When the power and heat savings are free you might as well go with that option, no matter how little effect it has it promotes better tech in that area.
As I've said before if the 970 was out when I bought my R9 290 I would have one of those instead.

But right now at 250$ the R9 290 seems a better buy than the rebrand, or the 970.

 

[Air]

I have an R9 290 and live in AZ, pretty hot here (june had 11 days north of 110 degree F highs and we're above 50% humidity atm) and the card makes zero difference in room temperature. Considering the amount of power the sun has at this uv index you're basically saying you can tell the difference between 10,000,000 watts and 10,000,070 watts. I call bull shit.

Also for those who live in hotter areas we run the A/C pretty much non-stop during the hottest summer months. That means a 3-5KW always on. 96Kwh a day just from A/C. So an extra .28 Kwh a day (assuming you game 4 hours a day) isn't going to even register on your electricity bill.

The only people complaining about the extra power are ones who really should have a Nuc based machine anyways. If power is so expensive that your graphics card is the main concern, you likely will be better off gaming at 720P or less on a 15w machine.

No the problem with this card is that the 970 is actually cheaper, meaning the savings are free. When the power and heat savings are free you might as well go with that option, no matter how little effect it has it promotes better tech in that area.
As I've said before if the 970 was out when I bought my R9 290 I would have one of those instead.

But right now at 250$ the R9 290 seems a better buy than the rebrand, or the 970.

I dont get it. Are you saying his room is recieving 10 MW from the sun...?

I think the main problem with having a higher tdp is the higher noise levels. But an extra 77w can make a difference in a small room.

 

[newtekie1]

If one would look more at price/performance it could have gotten a 9/10

The price to performance is horrible on this card...how would that make the score better?

Still, i think that with this 390 released, there is no reason to buy 970 anymore, especially if you go 1440p. Then, it's the perfect bang4buck card for you.

No reason unless you want a card with the same performance, that costs less, with less power draw, less heat, is quieter, overclocks better, and only takes up 2 slots.

Yeah, I guess if you ignore all those benefits, there really isn't any reason to get a 970 anymore...

 

[GhostRyder]

No reason unless you want a card with the same performance, that costs less, with less power draw, less heat, is quieter, overclocks better, and only takes up 2 slots.

Yeah, I guess if you ignore all those benefits, there really isn't any reason to get a 970 anymore...

Couple of reasons like more high speed vram (4.5gb more) just for starters. Then when you factor it starts lower in performance (Even with boost 2.0), its going to need some overclocks to catch up which will increase its power output closing that gap a bit, its noise is on par with others including the 0db at idle argument which this card has, and there are two slot models of the card.

In short, they are both pretty well even...

 

[mroofie]

The price to performance is horrible on this card...how would that make the score better?



No reason unless you want a card with the same performance, that costs less, with less power draw, less heat, is quieter, overclocks better, and only takes up 2 slots.

Yeah, I guess if you ignore all those benefits, there really isn't any reason to get a 970 anymore...

chill! was trying to make the R9 390 seem more competitive with the gtx 970

 

[haswrong]

I live on Vega very hot

i live on evga. (it goes upto 75°C at times.. oh the blower, the blower..)

 

[cokker]

So this PowerColor 390 consumes ~100w less than the MSI 390, I'm guessing that 1100MHz (+100MHz) MSI core clock eats power.

 

[DidoD]

Anyone notice that?
--> "The GDDR5 memory chips are by Hynix and carry the model number H5GC4H24AJR-T2C. They are specified to run at 1250 MHz (5000 MHz GDDR5 effective)."
so over overclocked out of the box?

 

[Assimilator]

Every 390/390X review should just consist of the text "Slightly faster than the below" with a link to the last 290/290X review.

Couple of reasons like more high speed vram (4.5gb more) just for starters.

Oh you're one of those people who doesn't know the difference between 3.5 and 4. Plus it's already been proven time and time again that 8GB is a waste.

Then when you factor it starts lower in performance

GTX 970 and R9 390 are pretty even in performance, thanks to nVIDIA's drivers not being a cesspool.

its going to need some overclocks to catch up which will increase its power output closing that gap a bit

A highly overclocked GTX 970 will easily outperform a stock R9 390, while consuming less power.

In short, they are both pretty well even...

Not even close.

 

[Casecutter]

I don't know when you put this against the PC 290 PCS 4Gb that was a $230 card -AR most all of May and even lately $240 -AR, I think the price is just not aggressive.

I want to believe the PCS 290 had 1500 MHz (6000 MHz) same as a reference 290 received, along with W1zzards 290X PCS review. Sad most of the 8Gb now are like this, specified to run at 1250 MHz (5000 MHz effective). For these 390 I'd rather it have 4Gb of even better memory than 8Gb lower grade. That said, I was surprised W1zzard got them to 1730 MHz; 15% overclock that's just crazy.

There must be a improvement in ACIS quality on the power side, but seeing we're looking at original Hawaii @947Mhz and this now at 1010 Mhz (7% increase), that bump in clock and the extra memory used the improvement, while the 290 PCS was 1040Mhz and honestly looking at a recent Hexus review (Feb 2015) on the 290 PCS I think you could see it was receiving that same power improvement at that point. I see little news on that front.

What is interesting is the 290 PCS at Hexus offered up a 1110MHz core/1415MHz memory OC, while W!zzard we see a 1090MHz core/1730 MHz. The core is not all that out of bounds, but dang that memory I was not anticipating. Who cares if there was a bios-wall, isn't that like 38% over it's "lower grade" 1250 Mhz specification? This memory is running like crazy as it did with the MSI 390X W1zzard tested. It seem this lower-grade memory is better than older better spec stuff.

All said I'd rather the 390 (non X) like this been a 4Gb card and a MSRP of like $270. Adding the extra 4Gb of memory and jacking it in price to 970 level tells me AMD knew it didn't want to make this into a War. Just offer same performance and use 8Gb as their point of difference... and hold to a similar profit. Perturb/disturbed Nvidia and they can eat Hawaii pricing in one mouth full, given the volume and slightly smaller die size.

I agree with W1zzard if AMD might've had a $300 MSRP, that could've made a 390 the germane and affordable card for 1440p; as it seems to be out in front of the 970 more then not, especially in the trenches at 30-40 FpS.

 

[Cheeseball]

If they had aimed this at $260 to $270 for the extra 4GB VRAM, this would've been the perfect contender for the GTX 970 at 1440p.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

So this PowerColor 390 consumes ~100w less than the MSI 390, I'm guessing that 1100MHz (+100MHz) MSI core clock eats power.

It eats up power because it needed a voltage bump to hit that. On a big core that's already power hungry, a small amount of adtl. voltage results in much higher power consumption.

 

[GhostRyder]

Oh you're one of those people who doesn't know the difference between 3.5 and 4. Plus it's already been proven time and time again that 8GB is a waste.

The 8gb is a bit overkill, but the beyond 3.5gb part is not considering where games today are going. Oh and yes I do know the difference but claiming its a normal 4gb card is not true dude.

GTX 970 and R9 390 are pretty even in performance, thanks to nVIDIA's drivers not being a cesspool.

So your saying the drivers are bad and causing it to perform badly? So it will only get better with better drivers in the long run???

A highly overclocked GTX 970 will easily outperform a stock R9 390, while consuming less power.

I am shocked an overclocked card in the same area as another card will beat said card at its stock settings. Stop the presses

Not even close.

You just said they were even in performance not to mention it has more VRAM for the around 70watt power difference. So how is it not even close?

 

[Xzibit]

Even though Batman Arkham Knight is considered broken, If its any indication of the direction games are going

Batman Arkam Knight VRAM usage
1080p @ 4.2 GB
1440p @ 5.0 GB
2160p @ 6.1 GB

This would be the only card able to run it under $350 decently.