We tested all of the cards in today's story with each company's latest beta drivers: Catalyst 14.1 beta 6 from AMD and 334.67 beta from Nvidia. Moreover, we used medium- to high-detail settings at 1920x1080 to give the Radeon R7 265 and its competition a realistic workload, which should strike a good balance between image quality and performance for this class of card. I'm also including screenshots to demonstrate how these detail levels appear in-game.
| Test System | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CPU | Intel Core i5-2550K (Sandy Bridge), Overclocked to 4.2 GHz @ 1.3 V | ||||
| Motherboard | Asus P8Z77-V LX. LGA 1155, Chipset: Intel Z77M | ||||
| Networking | On-Board Gigabit LAN controller | ||||
| Memory | Corsair Performance Memory, 4 x 4 GB, 1866 MT/s, CL 9-9-9-24-1T | ||||
| Graphics | Sapphire Radeon R7 260X 1100 MHz GPU, 2 GB GDDR5 at 1625 MHz (6500 MT/s) XFX Radeon HD 7850 860 MHz GPU, 1 GB GDDR5 at 1200 MHz (4800 MT/s) Sapphire Radeon R7 265 925 MHz GPU, 2 GB GDDR5 at 1400 MHz (5600 MT/s) Reference Radeon R9 270 925 MHz GPU, 2 GB GDDR5 at 1400 MHz (5600 MT/s) Reference Nvidia GTX 650 Ti 925 MHz GPU, 1 GB DDR3 at 1350 MHz (5400 MT/s) Reference Nvidia GTX 650 Ti Boost 980/1033 MHz GPU, 2 GB GDDR5 at 1502 MHz (6008 MT/s) Reference Nvidia GTX 660 980/1033 MHz GPU, 2 GB GDDR5 at 1502 MHz (6008 MT/s) | ||||
| Hard Drive | Samsung 840 Pro, 256 GB SSD, SATA 6Gb/s | ||||
| Power | XFX PRO850W, ATX12V, EPS12V | ||||
| Software and Drivers | |||||
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows 8 Pro x64 | ||||
| DirectX | DirectX 11 | ||||
| Graphics Drivers | AMD Catalyst 14.1 Beta 6, Nvidia GeForce 334.67 Beta | ||||

We've almost completely eliminated mechanical storage in the lab, and instead lean on solid-state drives to alleviate I/O-related bottlenecks. Samsung sent all of our offices 256 GB 840 Pros, so we standardize on these exceptional SSDs.

Naturally, discrete graphics cards require a substantial amount of stable power, so XFX sent along its PRO850W 80 PLUS Bronze-certified power supply. This modular PSU employs a single +12 V rail rated for 70 A. XFX claims that this unit provides 850 W of continuous power (not peak) at 50 degrees Celsius (a higher temperature than you'll find inside most enclosures).
| Benchmark Configuration | |
|---|---|
| 3D Games | |
| Metro: Last Light | Version 1.0.0.14, Built-in Benchmark |
| Grid 2 | Version 1.8.85.8679, Built-in Benchmark Scene D6 |
| Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag | Version 1.05, Custom THG Benchmark, 40-Sec |
| Battlefield 4 | Version 1.0.0.1, Custom THG Benchmark, 90-Sec |
| BioShock Infinite | Version 1.1.24.21018, Built-in Benchmark |
- Radeon R7 265: Pitcairn's Second Lease On Life
- Test Setup And Benchmarks
- Results: Battlefield 4
- Results: Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
- Results: Metro: Last Light
- Results: BioShock Infinite
- Results: Grid 2
- Power And Temperature Benchmarks
- Better Than Radeon HD 7850 Performance At $150? We Want To Believe...
http://www.guru3d.com/news_story/amd_radeon_r9_280_in_the_works.html
AMD does not set the retail price and neither does Nvidia, it is entirely up to the board partners and retailers what is charged. If you have a complaint about the price of these boards then moan at whoever you would buy it off, they are the ones screwing you for the cash. AMD is not making more profit from it they are.
I've honestly had enough of everyone bitching about AMD for the price of their boards, i'm sure they are just so upset that they made such an awesome compute capable GPU that they cant cant make them fast enough to keep the price down. It must be such a depressing situation for them to be in *rolls eyes*
AMD does not set the retail price and neither does Nvidia, it is entirely up to the board partners and retailers what is charged. If you have a complaint about the price of these boards then moan at whoever you would buy it off, they are the ones screwing you for the cash. AMD is not making more profit from it they are.
I've honestly had enough of everyone bitching about AMD for the price of their boards, i'm sure they are just so upset that they made such an awesome compute capable GPU that they cant cant make them fast enough to keep the price down. It must be such a depressing situation for them to be in *rolls eyes*
Exactly -- it's the retailers that are the problem -- figure Newegg has to cover the market fluctuations in the Bitcoin market now as well, which is the main reason for the demand on the 290s, since they are now taking Bitcoin for payment and the extra $100-$150 increase in the market price of the cards helps cover the loss in the exchange rate of the coins from day to day so they still make their profit margin.
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AMD is still getting the same $ for the parts they are shipping to the manufacturers of the cards. It is the manufacturers and retailers that are increasing their prices and limiting the availability.
Yes, if it makes it to market at $150.
Nope - it is more the bitcoin miners buying up as many of the high end cards as they can get their hands on to mine more coins to buy more cards with causing the price increases at the moment - once the bitcoin market settles down and the price of the coins stabilizes there will be a flood of used cards available bringing the price way down but for now the high end cards are in short supply and thus the mid range cards are now increasing as well since those that would normally buy the higher end cards are being priced out and the supply is limited so they are now buying 2 mid level cards for crossfire setups rather than a single high end card they can not get so the mid level cards are also seeing higher demand in the short run.