How We Tested Sapphire's Dual-X R9 280 OC
In this single-product review, we'd like to focus on how Sapphire's Dual-X R9 280 OC fares against its predecessor, the Radeon HD 7950 Boost reference card, and Nvidia's similarly-priced competition, the GeForce GTX 760.
Nvidia GeForce GTX 760
Radeon HD 7950 Boost
Sapphire's Dual-X R9 280 OC
Two of the games we're testing have an option to use a Mantle code path, so we're running those benchmarks (Thief and Battlefield 4) with Mantle enabled and disabled to measure the API's impact.
Graphics cards like the Radeon R9 280 require a substantial amount of power, so XFX sent us its PRO850W 80 PLUS Bronze-certified power supply. This modular PSU employs a single +12 V rail rated for 70 A. XFX claims continuous (not peak) output of up to 850 W at 50 degrees Celsius.
We've almost exclusively eliminated mechanical disks in the lab, preferring solid-state storage for alleviating I/O-related bottlenecks. Samsung sent all of our labs 256 GB 840 Pros, so we standardize on these exceptional SSDs.
Samsung 840 Pro (256GB)
XFX PRO850W
| Test System | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CPU | Intel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E), 3.3 GHz, Six Cores, LGA 2011, 15 MB Shared L3 Cache, Hyper-Threading enabled. | ||||
| Motherboard | ASRock X79 Extreme9 (LGA 2011) Chipset: Intel X79 Express | ||||
| Networking | On-Board Gigabit LAN controller | ||||
| Memory | Corsair Vengeance LP PC3-16000, 4 x 4 GB, 1600 MT/s, CL 8-8-8-24-2T | ||||
| Graphics | Sapphire Dual-X R9 280 OC850/940 MHz GPU, 3 GB GDDR5 at 1250 MHz (5000 MT/s)Reference AMD Radeon HD 7950 Boost 850/925 MHz GPU, 3 GB GDDR5 at 1255 MHz (5000 MT/s)Nvidia GeForce GTX 760 980/1033 MHz GPU, 2 GB GDDR5 at 1502 MHz (5008 MT/s) | ||||
| SSD | 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 Catalyst14.7 RC 1Nvidia 340.52 WHQL | ||||
| Benchmarks | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Watch Dogs | Version 1.04.497, Custom THG Benchmark, 90-second Fraps run, Driving | ||||
| Arma 3 | V. 1.26.126.789, 30-sec. Fraps "Infantry Showcase" | ||||
| Battlefield 4 | Version 1.3.2.3825, Custom THG Benchmark, 90-Sec | ||||
| Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag | Custom THG Benchmark, 40-Sec | ||||
| Thief | Version 1.6.0.0, Built-in Benchmark | ||||
| Titanfall | Version 1.0.5.7, Demeter Map, Custom THG Benchmark | ||||