R260/270/280/290/290x Review thread

[Shmee]

Looks like a decent deal, would be sweet if these re badges crossfire with current 79xx.

Also, sticking this as a review thread. OP will continue to be updated as new review links come.

 

[SolMiester]

Shame they didn't include the 7970....

 

[wand3r3r]

[h] did

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Shame they didn't include the 7970....

Meh, kinda pointless because I highly doubt a 7970 exists that can't reach ghz clocks.

 

[Shmee]

Meh, kinda pointless because I highly doubt a 7970 exists that can't reach ghz clocks.

This is pretty much my thinking, its really pretty much just all the same card with different clocks, voltages and BIOS.

 

[wand3r3r]

It's an ok card, I don't see why they didn't bump up the clocks even a little like 1100+.

At $300 compared to the $400-450 770 it's not even a competition, its value wipes the floor with 770's. The 760 and particularly the 770 are horrendous values and you'd think buyers would wise up. The 7970 already proved the 770 a bad value with the price cuts, but now it's official with the 280x.

 

[BrentJ]

Will R9 280X blend with 7970 GHz Edition in CrossFire? Tested - http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1784907

 

[24601]

Will R9 280X blend with 7970 GHz Edition in CrossFire? Tested - http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1784907

There was never any doubt.

You can even run 7970 with 7950 and 7870 Tahiti LE.

 

[Teizo]

It's an ok card, I don't see why they didn't bump up the clocks even a little like 1100+.

At $300 compared to the $400-450 770 it's not even a competition, its value wipes the floor with 770's. The 760 and particularly the 770 are horrendous values and you'd think buyers would wise up. The 7970 already proved the 770 a bad value with the price cuts, but now it's official with the 280x.

Meh, the 760 is not a horrendous value unless you are throwing in the 7950 price dumps which is only temporary. The 770 has clearly been shown to be a bad value. I would have bought one if it was $349 a while back, but no way in heck at $399. Now even more so.

 

[OVerLoRDI]

Yawn.... Where are the R9 290X reviews?

 

[beginner99]

Kind of off-topic but a question about the game bundles:

AMD list stores by country on there never settle bundles. Are only these stores supported or can I buy it from any store and profit?

 

[Fastx]

Meh, kinda pointless because I highly doubt a 7970 exists that can't reach ghz clocks.

I seen/read quite often the Sapphire 7970 (non GHZ) hitting 1100, 1150 and some hit 1175 1200 so they hit GHZ speed.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Will R9 280X blend with 7970 GHz Edition in CrossFire? Tested - http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1784907

Thanks Brent, so if these have bridges than they're not going to support 4K in CF.

Which also means they probably don't have hardware frame pacing, and I think we're all assuming 290X will at this point.

Does 280x have the audio, or is it a pure straight up rebadge of a high end part?

 

[Shmee]

good news on the crossfire compatibility. I will try to find something to go with my 7950 then

 

[BrentJ]

Thanks Brent, so if these have bridges than they're not going to support 4K in CF.

Which also means they probably don't have hardware frame pacing, and I think we're all assuming 290X will at this point.

Does 280x have the audio, or is it a pure straight up rebadge of a high end part?

Frame Pacing is a software solution, it will remain a software solution for the R7 and R9 series.

The only re-brand that has TruAudio is the 260X because it is GCN 1.1.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Awesome, thanks again for the information and great reviews.

 

[SolMiester]

[h] did

cheers, havent seen that review

 

[Gikaseixas]

Thanks for the info Brent, that means one can CF 280X with a 7970 GE, great
IMO they nailed it on the pricing, the GTX 770 needs to be adjusted to make any sense now.

 

[Silverforce11]

If anything its only the slight reduction in power use that make it interesting, since we all could get a cheap 7970 for a long time already.

 

[Gikaseixas]

On the other hand, it's a straight re-brand and the ASUS card is only faster because, well you know being a DirectCU II TOP means it's factory oced. I would prefer if AMD released the 280X with 1100mhz, memory @ 6500mhz.

 

[AtenRa]

Unacceptable, they will use the same chips(Tahiti and Pitcairn) for almost 4 years (early 2011 until the end of 2014).
They already made two new chips(260 and 290), they had to make another two and have the same features for the entire family.

Also, they really have to make bigger dies. They still have TDP left to go until the 300W for a single GPU. After two years i would expect 290X to replace the 7970GE at $299 and a new even bigger die to take the high end place at $549+.

NVIDIA can release a new GTX785 with the same specs as current TITAN at $699 and then even release a Full die specs TITAN 2 at the same $999.

 

[Staples]

I am interested to see what performance increases Mantle can give in Battlefield 4 because in Battlefield 3, And GPU perform pretty poorly. Am assuming they will perform similar in BF4 since Frostbite 3 is most likely based off a lot of the code in Frostbite 2.

 

[3DVagabond]

I am interested to see what performance increases Mantle can give in Battlefield 4 because in Battlefield 3, And GPU perform pretty poorly. Am assuming they will perform similar in BF4 since Frostbite 3 is most likely based off a lot of the code in Frostbite 2.

Why do you say performs poorly? Both brands are pretty much on par in BF3.

 

[hyrule4927]

Unacceptable, they will use the same chips(Tahiti and Pitcairn) for almost 4 years (early 2011 until the end of 2014).
They already made two new chips(260 and 290), they had to make another two and have the same features for the entire family.

Also, they really have to make bigger dies. They still have TDP left to go until the 300W for a single GPU. After two years i would expect 290X to replace the 7970GE at $299 and a new even bigger die to take the high end place at $549+.

NVIDIA can release a new GTX785 with the same specs as current TITAN at $699 and then even release a Full die specs TITAN 2 at the same $999.

Why would they charge $299 for a card that will supposedly compete with the GTX780 and Titan? And considering the Titan is only cut down from 15 to 14 SMXes, a fully enabled GK110 really wouldn't bring anything new to the table.

 

[3DVagabond]

Why would they charge $299 for a card that will supposedly compete with the GTX780 and Titan? And considering the Titan is only cut down from 15 to 14 SMXes, a fully enabled GK110 really wouldn't bring anything new to the table.

What, ~$100 per %/improvement? Sounds about right.