The ASUS RX 480 STRIX OC is the first custom-design Radeon RX 480 we are reviewing. ASUS has given their card a relatively modest overclock out of the box by bumping the clock up to 1310 MHz from the 1266 MHz on the reference design. Memory remained at stock. In our test suite, this results in an actual average clock frequency of 1291 MHz, which is 52 MHz higher than what the reference ran at. At 1920x1080, the performance uplift of the ASUS STRIX is 3%, which is not a whole lot. This makes the card 8% slower than the GTX 1060 and 8% faster than the GTX 970.

AMD's reference design heatsink was plagued by high noise and temperatures, running well above 80°C, which is probably why ASUS has decided to use the same thermal solution for their custom card as on their GeForce GTX 1080 STRIX - a wise choice. With that heatsink, temperatures are now as low as 68°C during heavy gaming, which is excellent. The company also included the idle-fan-off feature we love so much since it provides a perfect noise-free experience during desktop work, Internet browsing, and even light gaming. During gaming, noise levels are quite high though. They certainly are improved over the AMD reference card, but nowhere near what we've seen on cards using NVIDIA GPUs. To me, it looks as though ASUS has tuned their fan profile with a focus on very low temperatures instead of providing a good balance between heat and noise. Out of the box, the card emits 39 dBA - more than the GTX 1060/1070/1080 reference boards and much more than the custom variants of those cards we've reviewed. I did a quick test with the temperature target set to 75°C instead of 65°C, and here, the STRIX goes down to around 30 dBA, which is what I would have expected of the card. Let's hope ASUS addresses this with a BIOS update soon.

Compared to the reference design, the ASUS STRIX ticks a lot of checkboxes. It comes with a metal backplate and includes adjustable RGB lighting - especially the backlit ASUS ROG logo looks great, and the card even has solder points for overclockers who are not afraid of voiding their warranty. ASUS has replaced one of the three DP outputs of the reference design with an HDMI port, just like on the GTX 1080 STRIX. This brings the number of HDMI outputs to two, which, according to ASUS, was done to let people connect a VR headset and a TV at the same time, or two VR headsets. Another feature we first saw on the GTX 1080 STRIX are the two fan headers, which can be used to run two case fans at the same speed as the graphics card's fans. They include the idle-fan-off feature too, which makes this a simple way to reduce your system's noise output - case fans stopped while not gaming and overall heat output is low. Once you start gaming and the graphics card starts putting out heat, the case fans will start turning as well to ensure hot air is pushed out of your case; I like it.

Power efficiency of the RX 480 has been improved over previous generations, but is nowhere near what NVIDIA offers. ASUS has traded some efficiency for higher performance, which is reasonable, just a few percent. They also upgraded the card's power input circuitry to use an 8-pin, which ensures plenty of power headroom is available. In absolute numbers, the RX 480 STRIX uses 177 W during gaming, which is 10 W more than the GTX 1080, which is much faster. Furmark maximum power suggests a board power limit of around 175 W, which, given the card's power capabilities, is a bit low in my opinion.

We don't have any pricing yet from ASUS, so we assumed a price of $259 for our performance-per-dollar charts, which is probably a bit on the low side. ASUS also offers a variant of the RX 480 STRIX which runs at AMD reference clocks that's probably cheaper. With a price in that range, I would say the RX 480 STRIX is a reasonable alternative to the reference design assuming ASUS fixes their fan profile. The GTX 1060 is the better alternative in my opinion if the card is priced much higher, though, close to $300, as it provides better noise and thermals and higher performance; the difference between 6 GB and 8 GB has no effect on 1080p gaming, not even in the most demanding titles. I'm slightly undecided on DirectX 12, which is currently in its infancy, and only time can tell how much the power balance will shift in 2017 when more DX12 titles will be released and developers have had time to garner more experience with the API.