AMD Radeon R9 270 Review: Replacing The Radeon HD 7800s
AMD packages up another sub-$200 graphics card, this time calling it the Radeon R9 270. We expected a Radeon HD 7850 replacement, but received something quite different. Is it a worthwhile step up, or just a familiar piece of hardware with a paint job?
Power And Temperature Benchmarks
Our German team received a factory-overclocked card from Asus, so while our reference-clocked card reflects baseline performance, Igor's measurements are going to look a little bit higher.
There's a lot to like about AMD's single-monitor idle power result. However, AMD's cards are penalized with higher power readings when you plug in multiple screens.
The GeForce cards excel when it comes to low-power Blu-ray playback, but AMD claws back some ground in our gaming and compute-based power tests.
Specifically, the new Radeon H9 270 does well in these disciplines, particularly when remember that the benchmarks are taken from a factory-overclocked board.
This tells us nothing about AMD's reference Radeon R9 270 cooler, but Asus' Direct CU II does a great job of keeping the GPU at low temperatures during a prolonged gaming run. It never exceeds 70 degrees Celsius under load.
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16bit Seems like a pretty solid card, but I would like to see benchmarks that include some of the higher end cards. Curious how big the gap between the 280x and the 270 is.Reply -
esrever I feel like they don't need a 270x now since board partners could just have released OCed versions of this to fill the slot. Strange that they don't have a 7850 replacement.Reply -
m32 11925880 said:I actually like this card... Make an overclocking review!
I doubt this card has too much headroom in that department. The 6-pin is a gift and a curse.
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wdmfiber The chart need a typo fixed. The 7870 is I incorrectly labeled as 40nm, but it's built on the 28nm fab process; just like everything else. .Reply
Frig... we've been stuck at 28nm for so long it's just "understood". You could get-away with leaving that whole column out. -
Sakkura Wonder if there'll be any versions with two 6-pin power connectors. They could be great value for overclocking.Reply -
bustapr I wonder, how exactly does overclocking work with these cards? Wouldnt it just be varying its fan speeds whenever it hits a certain temperature and sends clockspeeds all over the place?Reply -
AMD Radeon i am waiting for a price cut for R9 seriesReply
the previous version, 7870 GHz edition and 7870 XT is now so cheap -
tomfreak I will not be surprise they gonna release a R9-260X (R9 version of 260X) that is a rebrand of 7850. A curacao chip with a broken CU has to go somewhere.....Reply
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