AMD Announces the R9 280 Graphics Card
AMD has filled up yet another gap in its Rx-2xx series graphics cards with the R9 280.

AMD has announced a new graphics card, the Radeon R9 280, based on the same Tahiti GPU as the older Radeon HD 7950. It operates a little faster, though, filling in the high-end R9 line-up.
The board features a total of 1792 stream processors, along with 112 TMUs and 32 ROPs. The GPU is now clocked at a frequency of up to 933 MHz.
Memory aboard the card remains set at 3 GB, and still runs over a 384-bit memory interface at an effective speed of 5.0 GT/s.
The R9 280's power needs are satisfied through a PCI Express x16 slot, along with eight- and six-pin auxiliary connectors. Despite the trimmed-back performance, this board bears the same 250 W TDP as the higher-end R9 280X. Cooling is taken care of by the same reference cooler as found on reference R9 280X cards, though we'll probably be seeing more cards with custom cooling solutions since AMD's solution is derided for being noisy.
Support is present for AMD's Mantle API, as well as DirectX 11.2 and OpenGL 4.3.
The card is set to come to shelves over the coming weeks with an MSRP price of $279. It remains to be seen whether AMD will be able to satisfy demand or hit its estimated price target. Both have been a problem for the company in recent months, and Radeon R9 270X cards are selling in the same range already.
If it were not for the mining craze they may have done it at a much lower price. But would it matter if miners go crazy and buy them all up?
The pricing makes sense in an attempt to discourage needless purchases. But it won't make a difference at the end of the day.
Either BTC dies and the price of it comes down to the 200-250$ range or BTC continues and the price goes to 400$ +.
While AMD may not set retail prices, AMD certainly does set rates for GPU chips they ship to AIB partners and AIB partners certainly do set rates for boards shipped to distributors and retailers so it would be well within AMD's capabilities to raise rates for future GPU orders from AIB partners and and within AIB partners's capabilities to increase their rates on future board orders to carve themselves a slice of the retailers' grossly inflated profit margin.
BTW, noticed how AMD's R9-280's suggested retail price is ~$20 higher than one might expect based on the R9-280X's launch price? Want to bet this is because AMD and AIBs have adjusted their markups on the basis that it will actually end up retailing over $300?
And how will that help the consumer in the long run?
AMD will then be selling no cards, which puts them in a very bad place.
Nvidia has ALWAYS been the preferred graphics card maker. I do not think AMD ever had more market share for any length of time in the discreet market.
Live with it...