Gaming Benchmarks
Battlefield 4
Battlefield 4 is several years old, but it's still a great workload for even the most powerful graphics cards. PowerColor's Devil R9 390X, with its aggressive overclock, fares well against the competition.
In stock form, PowerColor's card performs as expected. It's slightly slower than the Fury X, and considerably faster than the Radeon R9 390. This game is one where Nvidia's GeForce GTX 970 outperforms the R9 390, matching the Devil at its factory clock rates.
QHD is where the Radeon R9 390X really shines, though. The R9 390X Devil performs well here, keeping pace with Nvidia's GeForce GTX 980 and the Fury Tri-X. If your native resolution is 2560x1440, you have to love a graphics card averaging right around 60 FPS.
Although 4K gets a lot of attention for its ability to punish even high-end hardware, it's still fairly rare (under .1%, according to Steam's most recent hardware survey), likely owing to the resolution's requirements for fluid game play. Despite the R9 390X Devil's 8GB of memory and modest overclock, a Grenada GPU isn't fast enough to drive 4K on its own. You'd need a faster processor or multiple cards in CrossFire.
Far Cry 4
Far Cry 4 is much newer, and it is written using some of Nvidia's GameWorks technologies. You'd naturally expect it to favor that company's hardware. But Radeon owners still play the game, so we need to know what to expect.
The Devil R9 390X performs well at 1920x1080, averaging around 2 FPS less than Sapphire's Fury Tri-X. After overclocking, we even got the Devil card to lead.
Nvidia's GeForce GTX 970 averages roughly the same performance, but achieves a much higher minimum frame rate, staying above 60 FPS at all times.
As we increase the resolution, Nvidia's boards start to slip. Meanwhile, the Devil manages 66 FPS in its stock form and 72 FPS after overclocking. The Fury Tri-X is marginally faster, managing 12 more frames per second at the top end.
The Devil R9 390X fares well in Far Cry 4 at 4K. At no point does the frame rate dip below 30, and it's usually in the mid- to high-30s. Those numbers aren't great, but at 3840x2160, it's what we've come to expect. Still, you'd be happier with a faster card or multiple GPUs rendering cooperatively.
Grand Theft Auto V
GTA V is notorious for utilizing a lot of graphics memory. If any title is going to benefit from the 390X's 8GB, this should be it.
In stock form, PowerColor's R9 390X Devil manages a significant lead over the Fury, averaging approximately 10 FPS more. It goes without saying that the card we're reviewing handles these settings with ease at 1080p.
With the resolution cranked up to 1440p, the gap between PowerColor's Devil R9 390X and Sapphire's R9 Fury Tri-X disappears. While the Devil continues to lead, the difference is negligible. The Fiji GPU and its 4GB of HBM are not yet a bottleneck.
At 3840x2160, HBM's superior bandwidth allows the Fury to extend its advantage of the Devil R9 390X. More capacity doesn't seem to help the Grenada GPU. Regardless, the minimum frame rates from both cards are too low for this to be a viable setup. You'd want to scale back on the detail settings or add hardware.
Metro: Last Light
Running Metro: Last Light at 1080p yields well over 100 FPS from the entire field.
For gamers playing on QHD displays, the Devil R9 390X is an excellent option. We measured frame rates in the low 70s, with minimums that remain north of 40. The Fury card enjoys a sizable lead over PowerColor's card, while Nvidia's GeForce GTX 980 trails by nearly 8 FPS.
The Devil R9 390X doesn't do as well at 4K compared to the Fury, which isn't constrained by its 4GB of HBM, and seems to really benefit from its extra shading resources. Interestingly, the GeForce GTX 980 and 780 Ti are in the same league as PowerColor's board.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor
In stock form, PowerColor's Devil R9 390X handles 1920x1080 as well as Sapphire's Fury Tri-X; overclocking pushes it ahead of the Fiji-based board.
Running at 2560x1440, the Devil loses its edge over the Fury, which assumes the lead. Still, the Devil R9 390X is best suited to this resolution. You pay less money for playable frame rates at QHD.
Another resolution bump takes us to 4K, where the Devil catches back up to Sapphire's Fury. Prior to overclocking, the Devil R9 390X lands within one frame per second of the HBM-equipped board on average. After tuning PowerColor's card, they're almost indistinguishable.
Tomb Raider
As you can see from the graphs, our short benchmark run in Tomb Raider features highly variable frame rates. PowerColor's Devil R9 390X outpaces the Fury by an average of 4 FPS, though the Fury doesn't dip as low as the Devil.
At 2560x1440, the difference between 390X and Fury closes (though overclocked settings confer an advantage to PowerColor's card). With an average frame rate in the 70s, Tomb Raider can easily be considered playable, despite minimums that drop into the 30s.
If you want a decent frame rate at 4K, you'll need to lower this game's detail settings. Though the Devil R9 390X manages to pass the Fury, neither card touches 60 FPS on the high side. Averages approaching 40 aren't bad, but those minimums are jarring, to be sure.
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