All of these cards are based on the same Hawaii GPU manufactured at 28 nm with either 2560 (in the case of the Radeon R9 290) or 2816 (for the Radeon R9 290X) shaders and a 512-bit memory bus. The differences between these cards, aside from their coolers, are limited to the core and memory clock frequencies.
| Radeon R9 290 | GPU Clock MHz (Boost) | Memory Clock MHz | Memory Bandwidth GB/s | Pixel Fillrate GPixel/s | Texture Fillrate GTexel/s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sapphire Tri-X OC R9 290 | 1000 | 1300 | 332.8 | 64.0 | 160.0 |
| Gigabyte GV-R929OC-4GD R9 290 Windforce OC | 1040 | 1250 | 320.0 | 66.6 | 166.4 |
| Radeon R9 290 Reference + Arctic Accelero Extreme III | 1100 | 1250 | 320.0 | 70.4 | 176.0 |
| Radeon R9 290 Reference + NZXT Kraken G10 + X40 | 1100 | 1250 | 320.0 | 70.4 | 176.0 |
| Radeon R9 290X | GPU Clock MHz (Boost) | Memory Clock MHz | Memory Bandwidth GB/s | Pixel Fillrate GPixel/s | Texture Fillrate GTexel/s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Asus R9290X-DC2OC-4GD5 R9 290X DirectCU II OC | 1050 | 1350 | 345.6 | 67.2 | 184.8 |
| Sapphire Tri-X OC R9 290X | 1040 | 1300 | 332.8 | 66.6 | 183.0 |
| Gigabyte GV-R929XOC-4GD R9 290X Windforce OC | 1040 | 1250 | 320.0 | 66.6 | 183.0 |
| HIS R9 290X IceQ X² Turbo | 1060 | 1350 | 345.6 | 67.8 | 186.6 |
| MSI R9 290X Gaming 4G | 1040 | 1250 | 320 | 66.6 | 183 |
Of course, there’s more to the overall performance story than just the maximum GPU clock rate. As we've already seen, calling your GPU a 1000 MHz part is pointless if it cannot maintain that frequency. This is precisely the problem AMD's reference design suffers from. Once its target temperature is hit, the clock rate starts scaling back and performance follows suit.
We warmed up our various contenders and ran them in a loop while we recorded their frequencies.
R9 290 GPU Clock Frequency




R9 290X GPU Clock Frequency





- Cooling The Radeon R9 290 And 290X
- Technical Specifications
- Dimensions And Weight
- Gaming Power Consumption
- Gaming Performance
- Temperatures
- Noise And Fan Speed
- Video Comparison
- Sapphire Tri-X OC R9 290
- Gigabyte GV-R929OC-4GD R9 290 Windforce OC
- Radeon R9 290 + Arctic Accelero Extreme III
- Asus R9290X-DC2OC-4GD5 R9 290X DirectCU II OC
- HIS R9 290X IceQ X² Turbo
- Gigabyte GV-R929XOC-4GD R9 290X Windforce OC
- MSI R9 290X Gaming 4G
- Sapphire Tri-X OC R9 290X
I would like to know this more precisely please... I can't found any rage in my articles, only a chip with a very high temperature density and a lot of unusable coolers because the engineers were not able to build a matching cooler for this cards. This high density will be a global problem for all next-gen chips too. Without a vapor chamber this won't work.
Coupled with other recent reviews, Sapphire's Tri-X OC series looks to be great cards, especially when you make a custom fan curve to further reduce idle and load noise.
I can not wait to see the 20nm updates, especially if AMD gets around to pulling a Titan with their reference coolers!
I would like to know this more precisely please... I can't found any rage in my articles, only a chip with a very high temperature density and a lot of unusable coolers because the engineers were not able to build a matching cooler for this cards. This high density will be a global problem for all next-gen chips too. Without a vapor chamber this won't work.
Coupled with other recent reviews, Sapphire's Tri-X OC series looks to be great cards, especially when you make a custom fan curve to further reduce idle and load noise.
I can not wait to see the 20nm updates, especially if AMD gets around to pulling a Titan with their reference coolers!
It is nice that a company has paid attention and we have a solution that doesn't involve a series of carefully engineered zip ties...
A good PSU has a lot of primary caps inside to compensate this peaks without any problem. The question should better be: What's about the life-span of this caps under this conditions? This is one of the reasons to buy a PSU with good and not with so-called "bad" caps. If you buy cheap you buy twice...
But Nvidia is not much better. I've checked this in another article:
A good PSU has a lot of primary caps inside to compensate this peaks without any problem. The question should better be: What's about the life-span of this caps under this conditions?
But Nvidia is not much better. I've checked this in another article:
FormatC your avatar gave me cancer...
Ok, use 8x MSAA to prevent you before edge flares