Radeon R9 290X non reference when?

[Mtt]

I cant wait to buy the 290X but I dont like its cooler. I had bad experence with reference design in the past. I read that there wont be a non reference designat release.(from http://www.techpowerup.com/191704/radeon-r9-290x-launch-date-revealed.html) Is it because designing non reference cards takes time? Anyone wanna predict when there will be non reference designs?

 

[3DVagabond]

Hopefully it won't take too long. What this suggests to me is AMD is only going to be selling complete cards and not raw GPUs. At least not at first. I'll guess that there aren't enough GPUs to make both reference designs and aftermarket cards. Might forewarn a supply shortage when first launched.

 

[powruser]

I hope there's not a supply shortage. I would have thought since the 28nm process is relatively mature they wouldn't have too many issues. Time will tell!