The R9 295 thread - Reviews are in - Quiet, cooler, fast, $1500

[DarkKnightDude]

AMD's new ad for the card is hilarious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9pB2IYOI9Q

 

[TreVader]

it's a great card as a luxury product like Titan, also it makes Titan Z even more ridiculous for anything other than CUDA programmers, Nvidia should now be planing the GTX 790 if they want to sell dual GPU cards for gamers,

oh and they really fixed the cooling problems, that's for sure, but I wonder if partners can released a custom air cooler version for less money? because it's a shame that it costs so much more than the older dual GPU cards like the 5970-6990-7990.... but so do the single version...

I would expect nvidia to release a GTX-790 within the next two months. They'll have to clock it at 1100+ Mhz to beat AMDs better scaling. That shouldn't be a problem as long as they water-cool it.



It will perform 0-10% better and cost 50% more.

 

[3DVagabond]

It would be awesome if they would bundle 2 of these for $2500. I doubt that would ever happen tho.

How about buy 2 and get a free 1300W+ Platinum (Antec/Enermax/*) PSU.

 

[3DVagabond]

I wonder how many GPUs OSx or Linux support (for gaming scenarios). Since you can mine with more then 4 apparently they are recognized it's just not supported for gaming.

You don't run crossfire while mining with multiple cards. For compute purposes you can run as many GPU's as you would like.

 

[3DVagabond]

So according to AT review, on most resolutions the 3Gb TI has a 5% lead, and at high resolutions (4k) this has a 5% lead.......

Is that really worth it over the cost of 2x 290x for identical performance?

If you want the best value get 2x780 (non ti) or 2x 290 (non X), depending on preference, and O/C them. Nothing has really changed as far as the best high end value. The 295X2, 2x290X, or 2x780ti aren't good value propositions. The 295x2 has the advantage of ease of setup and use over the dual card setups, mainly because of it's cooler.

Nice card. Pleasantly surprised. Now put a proper WC cooling on this beast B)

With a low profile output plate and make it single slot. That would be cool.

 

[Wild Thing]

Long time lurker here...hello all
That's one hell of a fast card,surprised they listened to complaints and went with water cooling.:thumbsup:
What a beauty!

 

[DigDog]

^ what vagabond said.

i don't see a use for this. i'm sure since this is AT someone with 4k screens will buy it but for us dirt-covered peasants a 290 or two will kill anything.

great card though.

@vagabond : dude. EVGA PSU yo. its superflower stuff. jonnyguru it.

 

[Erenhardt]

$1500? Wouldn't it be the same for 2x 290X and custom loop?
I was sure that multi gpu cards are cheaper than their single GPU counter-parts.

I'm definetely not targeted with this product, but I'm sure there are many people comfortable with spending more than $1000 for graphics cards

 

[DownTheSky]

If it was 1000-1200 they'd be selling like hotcakes. Hell @ $999 even I'd buy one.

 

[Sinthoras]

This 14.4 driver that the reviewers are using has to improve crossfire setups. That may also be the reason why the dual-gpu scores higher than the R9 290X crossfire setups.

 

[davie jambo]

This 14.4 driver that the reviewers are using has to improve crossfire setups. That may also be the reason why the dual-gpu scores higher than the R9 290X crossfire setups.

Wonder if the new driver will help crossfire 7970s also

Hope so

May buy one of these when it comes out in UK and if it is less than £1000

 

[Shmee]

If it was 1000-1200 they'd be selling like hotcakes. Hell @ $999 even I'd buy one.

at $999 it becomes cheaper than 290x crossfire, becoming a no brain-er

 

[Silverforce11]

This 14.4 driver that the reviewers are using has to improve crossfire setups. That may also be the reason why the dual-gpu scores higher than the R9 290X crossfire setups.

290X CF throttles in a lot of games, so far from most review sites, 295X2 maintains its clocks in games (except for Anno2070, which may not even push it enough due to being a complex RTS CPU bottlenecked to trigger top boost). That difference in clocks would explain the performance edge of the 295.

Very sexy card for people without a water loop, its cost effective compared to a full loop for 2 cards and much much less hassle. Slap on another good 120mm fan and its good to go.

 

[bigi]

Can you put 4 of these in a rig? What mobo is needed?

Will the drivers support 8 cores, or 'just' 4?

 

[DarkKnightDude]

Well at that point with 4-8 you're going to hit a CPU wall.

 

[Silverforce11]

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2013/01/28/asus_rog_ares_ii_video_card_review/10#.U0ViafmSxSk

There's an interesting result here for the ARES II that is similar to the 295, a 2nd 120mm fan on the radiator for a push/pull config drop temps significantly. So there's room for some extra OC.. lol @ PCIE specs and imagine the wattage to one PCB with a heavy OC 295 X2.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Asus R9 295X2 8GB was listed on "Webhallen", Sweden biggest hardware retailer, before it was taken down earlier today.
Price? 17 990 SEK ($2789]

I crosschecked prices against NewEgg, and "Webhallen" is about 10-15% more expensive on R9 290X.


So expect around $2499 for the R9 295X2

Source: http://www.sweclockers.com/nyhet/18562-amd-radeon-r9-295x2-kostar-17-990-kronor

Just pointing this out, since I see this from time to time. No one should use other country pre-launch pricing to guess what the price will be domestically on a piece of hardware once officially launched. It simply doesn't correlate.

 

[bigi]

Well at that point with 4-8 you're going to hit a CPU wall.

Did you understand the question?

 

[Vesku]

Just pointing this out, since I see this from time to time. No one should use other country pre-launch pricing to guess what the price will be domestically on a piece of hardware once officially launched. It simply doesn't correlate.

That and people should perhaps check out people's post histories if they are considering that persons guesses and estimates. Wouldn't mind the 295 MSRP being a couple hundred less but with that cooling solution it's easy to see why there is a bit of extra premium over two 290X cards.

 

[3DVagabond]

Did you understand the question?

What task are you going to use them for? For gaming, then no, you can't use more than 2 (4xGPU total). If you are going to use them for a compute task that scales beyond 4x GPU's, then yes you could use 4 on a single motherboard. For that I would recommend something like this Asus or this Asrock.

There are plenty of other boards, but these are 2 that are probably the best optimized for 4x cards and are solid performing boards, overall.

 

[3DVagabond]

That and people should perhaps check out people's post histories if they are considering that persons guesses and estimates. Wouldn't mind the 295 MSRP being a couple hundred less but with that cooling solution it's easy to see why there is a bit of extra premium over two 290X cards.

Because they can.

I've never approved of the dual GPU solution costing more than 2x single card equivalents. At least this card does offer a more effective cooling solution, therefore not sacrificing any performance. Still, it's a bit of a money grab tactic like any kind of "halo pricing" always is.

 

[jackstar7]

Can you put 4 of these in a rig? What mobo is needed?

Will the drivers support 8 cores, or 'just' 4?

Crossfire maxes out at 4 GPUs. If you're not using Crossfire, then it should be possible to have 4 work.

You'd likely want to look at Workstation-level mobos for PCIE lanes and stability.

 

[Kenmitch]

What task are you going to use them for? For gaming, then no, you can't use more than 2 (4xGPU total). If you are going to use them for a compute task that scales beyond 4x GPU's, then yes you could use 4 on a single motherboard. For that I would recommend something like this Asus or this Asrock.

There are plenty of other boards, but these are 2 that are probably the best optimized for 4x cards and are solid performing boards, overall.

AMD stated 1 open slot required between cards. Read it it one of the reviews or AMD's site. Guessing it's for the vrm cooling.

 

[videogames101]

those noise and temp figures are beautiful at the given power draw, nice work on the cooler by amd

 

[sushiwarrior]

AMD stated 1 open slot required between cards. Read it it one of the reviews or AMD's site. Guessing it's for the vrm cooling.

I'm pretty sure that's something they suggest with any multi-GPU config, but it will almost certainly work fine without any open slots.