I need opinions on the R9 290X black display issues

Trent Smith

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Jul 7, 2014
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I'm getting back into PC gaming after a ten year hiatus and for the longest time I have been set on buying the R9 290X. In particular I wanted to buy the Sapphire Vapor-X OC R9 290X. That was, until someone here on Tom'sHardware pointed out that the R9 cards have been having "screen blackout" issues. I have been doing a lot of searches and boy were they right. I love the 512 bit bus. I love the 4 GB of VRAM. I love the numbers it gets on 4k in crossfire (http://www.anandtech.com/show/7492/the-geforce-gtx-780-ti-review/4).

But I can't handle screen flickering and system instability. I'm set on the Gigabyte 780 TI OC if the R9 cards are too problematic.

So my question is this: do the R9 cards still have the "black screen" issue? How much of a problem is it? I'm looking to hear from everybody, but I'm really interested in R9 owners. Thanks in advance for your answers!
 

Montyzone

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Sep 28, 2014
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I had this issue only yesterday with the same r9 290x (I think all r9 200series) will be the same - black screen/No signal. with hdmi cable (I think all cables are the same)
- First flip the switch at the roof of the GPU as you see it over your case - very very tiny switch - make sure its flipped to the side of the ports rather than the fans, this supports standard/Legacy BIOS, switching it towards the fans will trigger what msi calls: Hybrid BIOS
- install hardware GPU - both molex and PCIe cables must be attached between graphics card and PSU/Fan
- Connect hdmi/dp/dvi to graphics
- bootup pc - you should get display now - install updated amd catalyst driver 14.4 (14.7 is beta) as of this date, but its up to you what to run.

...that's IT!!!
 

Alex Kelly

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Go for the GTX 970, it performs better than the 290X, consumes less power, runs quieter and cooler, has Nvidia exclusive features and isn't known to have artifacting and black screen issues.
 

Trent Smith

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Jul 7, 2014
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Thank you all for your answers, I actually built my computer already and I went for a 780 ti dual classified. It's sweet!