Price performance ratio is incredible, but I will definitely wait for cards with an aftermarket cooling solutions. The heat and noise from the stock cooler do not look like they would be something I'd want to put with. Once again, AMD is that close to having something special, and some how manages to screw it up. Let's see what the board makers come up with.
From the THG review:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-r9-290x-hawaii-review,3650.html
"We decided to forgo the video demonstrating what a 95% duty cycle sounds like. It’s pointless and potentially bad for your long-term hearing. The noise is simply unbearable without commercial-grade ear protection."
"The 225 W we measured using a compute-heavy load and stock settings can be pushed as high as 295 W by giving the fan more room to spin up and targeting a lower thermal ceiling. Unfortunately, those conditions don't last. Once the Radeon R9 290X hits its target temperature, power consumption drops considerably. This explains the card’s relatively low performance in our GPGPU benchmarks."
"AMD says it gives you total control over this and, thanks to an updated PowerTune technology that defines maximum fan speed (rather than dialing in an absolute value), indeed it does. But you also get stuck with the same noisy thermal solution that makes reference Radeon HD 7970s so acoustically grating. Company engineers insulate you from having the same loud experience by implementing two firmware modes: Quiet and Uber. Quiet keeps the fan under 40% duty cycle. Uber lets it get up to 55%, and that’s too loud for me. So, I stick with Quiet mode. Once Hawaii is at 95 °C and the fan hits 40%, frequencies start retreating quickly. It’s not uncommon to see them bouncing between mid-700 to mid-800 MHz in single-card configs. In CrossFire, they’ll drop to 727 MHz and stay there. The bummer is that a more effective thermal solution could keep acoustics down and allow Hawaii to operate toward the top of its range more consistently."
As someone else mentioned, this looks like an engineering train wreck.
"In the spirit of getting massive performance at a substantial discount, then, Im giving AMDs Radeon R9 290X Toms Hardwares Elite awardthe first time a graphics card has received this honor, I believe, during my tenure"Whoops, I just posted this in the wrong thread. So I'll cut and past it here.
Price performance ratio is incredible, but I will definitely wait for cards with an aftermarket cooling solutions. The heat and noise from the stock cooler do not look like they would be something I'd want to put with. Once again, AMD is that close to having something special, and some how manages to screw it up. Let's see what the board makers come up with.
From the THG review:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...view,3650.html
"We decided to forgo the video demonstrating what a 95% duty cycle sounds like. Its pointless and potentially bad for your long-term hearing. The noise is simply unbearable without commercial-grade ear protection."
"The 225 W we measured using a compute-heavy load and stock settings can be pushed as high as 295 W by giving the fan more room to spin up and targeting a lower thermal ceiling. Unfortunately, those conditions don't last. Once the Radeon R9 290X hits its target temperature, power consumption drops considerably. This explains the cards relatively low performance in our GPGPU benchmarks."
"AMD says it gives you total control over this and, thanks to an updated PowerTune technology that defines maximum fan speed (rather than dialing in an absolute value), indeed it does. But you also get stuck with the same noisy thermal solution that makes reference Radeon HD 7970s so acoustically grating. Company engineers insulate you from having the same loud experience by implementing two firmware modes: Quiet and Uber. Quiet keeps the fan under 40% duty cycle. Uber lets it get up to 55%, and thats too loud for me. So, I stick with Quiet mode. Once Hawaii is at 95 °C and the fan hits 40%, frequencies start retreating quickly. Its not uncommon to see them bouncing between mid-700 to mid-800 MHz in single-card configs. In CrossFire, theyll drop to 727 MHz and stay there. The bummer is that a more effective thermal solution could keep acoustics down and allow Hawaii to operate toward the top of its range more consistently."
As someone else mentioned, this looks like an engineering train wreck.
Whoops, I just posted this in the wrong thread. So I'll cut and past it here.
Price performance ratio is incredible, but I will definitely wait for cards with an aftermarket cooling solutions. The heat and noise from the stock cooler do not look like they would be something I'd want to put with. Once again, AMD is that close to having something special, and some how manages to screw it up. Let's see what the board makers come up with.
From the THG review:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...view,3650.html
"We decided to forgo the video demonstrating what a 95% duty cycle sounds like. Its pointless and potentially bad for your long-term hearing. The noise is simply unbearable without commercial-grade ear protection."
"The 225 W we measured using a compute-heavy load and stock settings can be pushed as high as 295 W by giving the fan more room to spin up and targeting a lower thermal ceiling. Unfortunately, those conditions don't last. Once the Radeon R9 290X hits its target temperature, power consumption drops considerably. This explains the cards relatively low performance in our GPGPU benchmarks."
"AMD says it gives you total control over this and, thanks to an updated PowerTune technology that defines maximum fan speed (rather than dialing in an absolute value), indeed it does. But you also get stuck with the same noisy thermal solution that makes reference Radeon HD 7970s so acoustically grating. Company engineers insulate you from having the same loud experience by implementing two firmware modes: Quiet and Uber. Quiet keeps the fan under 40% duty cycle. Uber lets it get up to 55%, and thats too loud for me. So, I stick with Quiet mode. Once Hawaii is at 95 °C and the fan hits 40%, frequencies start retreating quickly. Its not uncommon to see them bouncing between mid-700 to mid-800 MHz in single-card configs. In CrossFire, theyll drop to 727 MHz and stay there. The bummer is that a more effective thermal solution could keep acoustics down and allow Hawaii to operate toward the top of its range more consistently."
As someone else mentioned, this looks like an engineering train wreck.
"In the spirit of getting massive performance at a substantial discount, then, Im giving AMDs Radeon R9 290X Toms Hardwares Elite awardthe first time a graphics card has received this honor, I believe, during my tenure"
From Toms.
So it's an awesome card but also super hot, power hungry, and loud? Bleh, count me out. CF 280 sounds wiser, and probably far far faster $ for $.
Let me get this straight. You cherry pick quotes from the article to try and prove a point, then go on to discredit the same author? Nice job.So, pretty much all negative. The bolded part in particular is ridiculous. The guy is admitting he's not even that interested in the card as it is, but some how he is giving it the "best" award for any video card he has given? It appears the only thing the reviewer based his award on was price performance. That's rather shortsighted.
How about posting the rest of that paragraph?
"The decision was controversial. Nvidia still does thermals, acoustics, and aesthetics better. But now its also charging a hefty premium for those luxuries. AMDs card is faster, cheaper, and it makes an effort to keep acoustics under control, so long as you stick with its Quiet mode. AMD reworked its approach to CrossFire and now has a more elegant solution that, while not perfect (we still measured dropped and runt frames in Skyrim, along with notable variance in other titles), does facilitate frame pacing right out of the gate at resolutions all the way up to 7680x1440. Ill get more enthusiastic about the R9 290X if third-party designs start showing up with better cooling. Until then, itd be downright negligent to not recognize this cards class-leading performance at a price we paid for Radeon HD 7970 two years ago."
So, pretty much all negative. The bolded part in particular is ridiculous. The guy is admitting he's not even that interested in the card as it is, but some how he is giving it the "best" award for any video card he has given? It appears the only thing the reviewer based his award on was price performance. That's rather shortsighted.
Let me get this straight. You cherry pick quotes from the article to try and prove a point, then go on to discredit the same author? Nice job.
He gave the best award.
He says he will get more enthusiastic.
Imagine what he will do then.
Holy smokes can't belief how much faster it is in some games (NV favored ones) than the 7970 Ghz ed..
It's matching CF 7970s!!
1600p is a small niche, 4k isn't consumer ready.
Considering how many people I see around here with two or three Titans, I'd say it depends on the consumer.
So it's an awesome card but also super hot, power hungry, and loud? Bleh, count me out. CF 280 sounds wiser, and probably far far faster $ for $.