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AMD fans have been waiting on this for a long time, the eagerly awaited Sapphire custom version of AMD's R9 290X, featuring their cutting edge Tri-X cooling system. Sapphire have not only adopted their impressive three fan cooler, but they have tweaked the core and memory speeds a little, offering higher ‘out of the box' performance. Is this the fastest, most powerful (single GPU) AMD video card that money can buy?
Today we supplement our tests by analysing performance at 3840×2160 (4k HD) on the Asus PQ321QE. We recently acquired one of these screens for high end graphics card reviews. Sure, the £2999.99 asking price will mean very few can afford the upgrade right now, but in the next year we expect the cost to drop.
Setting up this monitor is simple with both AMD and Nvidia hardware (via DisplayPort cable) and we didn’t experience any issues. To achieve a refresh rate of 60hz after the Forceware or Catalyst drivers were installed we enable the Multi Stream Transport mode within a submenu of the Asus PQ321QE.
On paper there is no doubt that the R9 290X is a monster, clocked at 1GHZ. The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X core is clocked higher, to 1,040mhz out of the box, and the memory speeds are set at 1,300mhz (5.2Gbps effective), a 50mhz overclock on the reference card (1,250mhz).
The Hawaii GPU is built on the 28nm process and the card comprises 6.2 billion transistors. The R9 290X has 64 ROP’s, 176 TMU’s and 2,816 unifed shaders. The 4GB of GDDR5 memory runs at 1,250mhz (5Gbps effective) and is connected via an ultra wide 512 bit memory interface. We have tested the reference card when it launched and while we were impressed – the cooling solution was woefully inadequate.
The R9 290X, along with the R7 260X features a programmable audio pipeline. The R9 270X and R9 280X don’t. This new TrueAudio technology is designed for game audio artists and engineers, so they can ‘bring their artistic vision beyond sound production into the realm of sound processing’. This technology is intended to transform game audio as programmable shaders transformed graphics in the following ways:
- Programmable audio pipeline grants artistic freedom to game audio engineers for sound processing.
- Easy to access through popular audio libraries used by top game developers.
- Fundamentally redefines the nature of a modern PC graphics card.
- Spatialization, reverb, mastering limiters and simultaneous voices are only the beginning.
We received one of the first samples out of Sapphire's HQ in the Far East and as such it wasn't shipped in a retail box.
We did however get the image above direct from Sapphire PR, highlighting the new ‘robot' box artwork.
The bundle includes a software disc, product literature, an HDMI cable and some power converter cables.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC is built on a black PCB and features the Tri-X cooler which we have seen in recent months on the excellent R9 290X Toxic Edition and R9 290 Tri-X OC models.
The card has a DVI-I, DVI-D, full sized HDMI and DisplayPort connectors.
R9 Series graphics cards can now support up to three HDMI/DVI displays for use with AMD Eyefinity technology. A set of displays which support identical timings is required to enable this feature. The display clocks and timing for this feature are configured at boot time.
As such, display hot‐plugging is not supported for the third HDMI/DVI connection. A reboot is required to enable three HDMI/DVI displays.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X takes power from an 8 pin and a 6 pin power connector, the same as the AMD R9 290X reference card.
There is no Crossfire connector on the R9 290X Tri-X Edition. The 290X and 290 offer Bridgeless Crossfire capabilities. In the picture above you can see a BIOS switch however unlike the reference 290X, this switch doesn’t change any settings. Those who have read our previous editorials will already be aware that the BIOS switch on the 290X would shift between a 40% and a 55% maximum fan profile.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X offers UEFI compatibility via this BIOS switch. With the enhanced cooler Sapphire should not need to set multiple fan speeds via BIOS profiles.
The card disassembled, highlighting the excellent TriX cooler which features monster 10mm heatpipes. The Tri-X cooler comprises five 10mm copper heatpipes – two of which bend 180 degrees backwards from the core block into a secondary set of aluminum fins.
An overview of the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC graphics card. The Hawaii CPU is built on the 28nm process and has 24 ROPS, 176 Texture units, and 2816 Stream processors. The 4GB of GDDR5 memory is connected via a wide 512 bit memory interface. Sapphire have overclocked both core and memory from 1,000mhz to 1,040mhz and 1,250mhz to 1,300mhz respectively.
On this page we present some super high resolution images of the product taken with the 24.5MP Nikon D3X camera and 24-70mm ED lens. These will take much longer to open due to the dimensions, especially on slower connections. If you use these pictures on another site or publication, please credit Kitguru.net as the owner/source. You can right click and ‘save as’ to your computer to view later.
Today we slot the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC into a series of tests we have ran on other cards over the last 2 weeks. We are using the latest AMD Catalyst 13.11 beta driver and the Nvidia ForceWare 331.82 driver.
We are using one of our brand new test rigs supplied by PCSPECIALIST and built to our specifications. If you want to read more about this, or are interested in buying the same Kitguru Test Rig, check out our article with links on this page.
We are featuring results today with an Apple 30 inch Cinema HD Display at 2560×1600 resolution and an Asus PQ321QE Ultra HD 4K screen running at 4K 3840 x 2160 resolution.
Room ambient was held at 23c throughout testing.
Comparison cards:
AMD R9 290X (1000mhz core / 1,250mhz memory)
AMD R9 290 (947mhz core / 1,250mhz memory)
Palit JetStream GTX780 Ti OC (980mhz core / 1,750mhz memory)
Nvidia GTX780 Ti (876mhz core / 1,750mhz memory)
Nvidia GTX Titan (837mhz core / 1,502mhz memory)
Nvidia GTX780 (863mhz core / 1,502mhz memory)
MSI GTX780 Lightning (980mhz core / 1,502mhz memory)
Sapphire R9 290 Tri-X OC Edition (1000mhz / 1300 mhz memory)
Sapphire R9 280X Toxic Edition (1,150mhz core / 1,600mhz memory)
Palit GTX770 OC (1046mhz core / 1753mhz memory)
Software:
Windows 7 Enterprise 64 bit
Unigine Heaven Benchmark
Unigine Valley Benchmark
3DMark Vantage
3DMark 11
3DMark
Fraps Professional
Steam Client
FurMark
Games:
Sleeping Dogs
Total War: Rome 2
Dirt Showdown
Tomb Raider
Metro Last Light
GRID 2
Splinter Cell Blacklist
Batman Arkham Origins
Battlefield 4
All the latest BIOS updates and drivers are used during testing. We perform generally under real world conditions, meaning KitGuru tests games across five closely matched runs and then average out the results to get an accurate median figure. If we use scripted benchmarks, they are mentioned on the relevant page.
Unigine provides an interesting way to test hardware. It can be easily adapted to various projects due to its elaborated software design and flexible toolset.
A lot of their customers claim that they have never seen such extremely-effective code, which is so easy to understand.
Heaven Benchmark is a DirectX 11 GPU benchmark based on advanced Unigine engine from Unigine Corp. It reveals the enchanting magic of floating islands with a tiny village hidden in the cloudy skies. Interactive mode provides emerging experience of exploring the intricate world of steampunk.
Efficient and well-architected framework makes Unigine highly scalable:
- Multiple API (DirectX 9 / DirectX 10 / DirectX 11 / OpenGL) render
- Cross-platform: MS Windows (XP, Vista, Windows 7) / Linux
- Full support of 32bit and 64bit systems
- Multicore CPU support
- Little / big endian support (ready for game consoles)
- Powerful C++ API
- Comprehensive performance profiling system
- Flexible XML-based data structures
We use the settings shown above at 2560×1600.
The latest Nvidia cards score better in these tessellation heavy benchmarks, claiming all of the top positions. The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC however takes the top AMD position in the chart, averaging 53.8 frames per second.
Valley Benchmark is a new GPU stress-testing tool from the developers of the very popular and highly acclaimed Heaven Benchmark. The forest-covered valley surrounded by vast mountains amazes with its scale from a bird’s-eye view and is extremely detailed down to every leaf and flower petal. This non-synthetic benchmark powered by the state-of-the art UNIGINE Engine showcases a comprehensive set of cutting-edge graphics technologies with a dynamic environment and fully interactive modes available to the end user.
We test with the settings above both at 2560×1600.
Again, the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X takes top AMD position in this benchmark, averaging 65.6 frames per second.
Futuremark released 3DMark Vantage, on April 28, 2008. It is a benchmark based upon DirectX 10, and therefore will only run under Windows Vista (Service Pack 1 is stated as a requirement) and Windows 7. This is the first edition where the feature-restricted, free of charge version could not be used any number of times. 1280×1024 resolution was used with performance settings.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC Edition scores very well in this benchmark – 48,028 points. The fastest AMD card in our test, and only 1,400 points behind the reference clocked GTX780 Ti.
3DMark 11 is designed for testing DirectX 11 hardware running on Windows 7 and Windows Vista the benchmark includes six all new benchmark tests that make extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. After running the tests 3DMark gives your system a score with larger numbers indicating better performance. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.
A score of 15,826 points puts the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC around 300 points behind the overclocked Asus GTX780 Ti Direct CU II OC.
3DMark is an essential tool used by millions of gamers, hundreds of hardware review sites and many of the world’s leading manufacturers to measure PC gaming performance.
Futuremark say “Use it to test your PC’s limits and measure the impact of overclocking and tweaking your system. Search our massive results database and see how your PC compares or just admire the graphics and wonder why all PC games don’t look this good.
To get more out of your PC, put 3DMark in your PC.”
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC beats the reference GTX 780 Ti in the latest Direct X 11 Futuremark benchmark, scoring 11,413 points.Aliens V Predator has proved to be a big seller since the release and Sega have taken the franchise into new territory after taking it from Sierra. AVP is a Direct X 11 supported title and delivers not only advanced shadow rendering but high quality tessellation for the cards on test today. To test the cards we used a 2560×1600 resolution with DX11, Texture Quality Very High, MSAA Samples 1, 16 af, ambient occlusion on, shadow complexity high, motion blur on.
Excellent performance, averaging 80 frames per second, around 8 frames per second slower than the reference clocked GTX 780 Ti.
Aliens V Predator has proved to be a big seller since the release and Sega have taken the franchise into new territory after taking it from Sierra. AVP is a Direct X 11 supported title and delivers not only advanced shadow rendering but high quality tessellation for the cards on test today.
To test the cards we used a ULTRA HD 4K resolution (3840×2160) with DX11, Texture Quality Very High, MSAA Samples 1, 16 af, ambient occulsion on, shadow complexity high, motion blur on.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC just manages to beat the Nvidia GTX Titan at Ultra HD 4k, equaling the average frame rate, but commanding a single frame per second in minimum frame rates.
Sleeping Dogs started development as an original title, but was announced in 2009 as True Crime: Hong Kong, the third installment and a reboot of the True Crime series.As a result of the game’s high development budget and delays, it was canceled by Activision Blizzard in 2011. Six months later, it was announced that Square Enix had picked up the publishing rights to the game, but the game was renamed Sleeping Dogs in 2012 since Square Enix did not purchase the True Crime name rights.
This game is still a system killer at these maximised settings. We test at 2560×1600.
An engine that responds well to the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC, holding a small minimum frame rate lead over the reference clocked GTX780 Ti.
Sleeping Dogs started development as an original title, but was announced in 2009 as True Crime: Hong Kong, the third installment and a reboot of the True Crime series.As a result of the game’s high development budget and delays, it was canceled by Activision Blizzard in 2011. Six months later, it was announced that Square Enix had picked up the publishing rights to the game, but the game was renamed Sleeping Dogs in 2012 since Square Enix did not purchase the True Crime name rights.
We used the ‘HIGH’ graphics level setting at 4K- 3840×2160. This uses a mixture of high and extreme graphics settings, detailed above.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC falls behind the overclocked GTX780 Ti graphics cards at Ultra HD 4k, although the all important minimum frame rate is very closely matched.
Total War ROME 2 is the eighth stand alone game in the Total War series, it is the successor to the successful Rome: Total War title. The Warscape Engine powers the visuals of the game and the new unit cameras will allow players to focus on individual soldiers on the battlefield, which in itself may contain thousands of combatants at a time. Creative Assembly has stated that they wish to bring out the more human side of war this way, with soldiers reacting with horror as their comrades get killed around them and officers inspiring their men with heroic speeches before siege towers hit the walls of the enemy city. This will be realised using facial animations for individual units, adding a feel of horror and realism to the battles.
We test with the ULTRA profile at 2560×1600. Details shown in the screenshots above.
Excellent performance at 2560×1600, averaging 62 frames per second.
Total War ROME 2 is the eighth stand alone game in the Total War series, it is the successor to the successful Rome: Total War title. The Warscape Engine powers the visuals of the game and the new unit cameras will allow players to focus on individual soldiers on the battlefield, which in itself may contain thousands of combatants at a time. Creative Assembly has stated that they wish to bring out the more human side of war this way, with soldiers reacting with horror as their comrades get killed around them and officers inspiring their men with heroic speeches before siege towers hit the walls of the enemy city. This will be realised using facial animations for individual units, adding a feel of horror and realism to the battles.
We test at 4K – 3840×2160 with the Very High Preset selected, as shown in the screenshots above.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC matches the reference clocked GTX780 Ti at Ultra HD 4K, holding a 46 frames per second average rate.
Dirt Showdown is the latest title in the franchise from Codemasters, based around the famous Colin McRae racing game series, although it no longer uses his name, since he passed away in 2007.
Today we test the hardware at 2560×1600 with the Ultra profile and 8 x MSAA.
An engine will runs exceptionally well on AMD graphics cards. The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC takes top position in this benchmark.
Dirt Showdown is the latest title in the franchise from Codemasters, based around the famous Colin McRae racing game series, although it no longer uses his name, since he passed away in 2007.
Today we test with the ULTRA profile, at 4K 3840×2160 resolution and with 8 times Anti Aliasing.
The AMD hardware still holds the top positions at this resolution, followed in third by the overclocked Palit GTX780 Ti JetStream.
After a delayed release from late 2012 to March 2013, the game received much anticipation and hype. Tomb Raider received much acclaim from critics, who praised the graphics, the gameplay and Camilla Luddington’s performance as Lara with many critics agreeing that the game is a solid and much needed reboot of the franchise. Much criticism went to the addition of the multiplayer which many felt was unnecessary. Tomb Raider went on to sell one million copies in forty-eight hours of its release, and has sold 3.4 million copies worldwide so far.
We use the ULTIMATE profile shown above and test at 2560×1600.
A game that runs very well on both AMD and Nvidia hardware. The recent GTX780 Ti claims top position at 1600p, although the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC is the fastest AMD based solution on test today.
After a delayed release from late 2012 to March 2013, the game received much anticipation and hype. Tomb Raider received much acclaim from critics, who praised the graphics, the gameplay and Camilla Luddington’s performance as Lara with many critics agreeing that the game is a solid and much needed reboot of the franchise. Much criticism went to the addition of the multiplayer which many felt was unnecessary. Tomb Raider went on to sell one million copies in forty-eight hours of its release, and has sold 3.4 million copies worldwide so far.
We test at 4K 3840×2160 resolution with the ULTRA profile setting enabled – details in the images above.
Great performance at Ultra HD 4k, holding a 35+ frame rate at all times.
Metro: Last Light takes place one year after the events of Metro 2033, proceeding from the ending where Artyom chose to call down the missile strike on the Dark Ones. The Rangers have since occupied the D6 military facility, with Artyom having become an official member of the group. Khan, the nomad mystic, arrives at D6 to inform Artyom and the Rangers that a single Dark One survived the missile strike. 4A Games’ proprietary 4A Engine is capable of rendering breathtaking vistas, such as those showing the ruined remnants of Moscow, as well as immersive indoor areas that play with light and shadow, creating hauntingly beautiful scenes akin to those from modern-day photos of Pripyat’s abandoned factories and schools.
We test this game with the built in benchmark with very high quality settings at 1920×1080 – details shown in the image above.
A very tightly run result between the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC and the reference clocked Nvidia GTX780 Ti.
Metro: Last Light takes place one year after the events of Metro 2033, proceeding from the ending where Artyom chose to call down the missile strike on the Dark Ones. The Rangers have since occupied the D6 military facility, with Artyom having become an official member of the group. Khan, the nomad mystic, arrives at D6 to inform Artyom and the Rangers that a single Dark One survived the missile strike. 4A Games’ proprietary 4A Engine is capable of rendering breathtaking vistas, such as those showing the ruined remnants of Moscow, as well as immersive indoor areas that play with light and shadow, creating hauntingly beautiful scenes akin to those from modern-day photos of Pripyat’s abandoned factories and schools.
We test this game with the built in benchmark, with the settings detailed above. Direct X 11 mode, Quality is set at medium, 16 AF, normal Motion blur, Tessellation Normal, Advanced PhysX disabled and SSAA disabled.
The performance variable narrows between GTX 780 Ti and the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC, dropping to a single frame.
Grid 2 is the sequel to the racing video game Race Driver: Grid. It was developed and published by Codemasters. The game includes numerous real world locations such as Paris, numerous United States locations, and many more, and also includes motor vehicles spanning four decades. In addition, it includes a new handling system that developer Codemasters has dubbed ‘TrueFeel’, which aims to hit a sweet spot between realism and accessibility.
We test at 2560×1600 with the Ultra image quality preset, as shown above. 8x MSAA was enabled to improve image quality.
The overclocked Nvidia GTX780 Ti partner cards take top positions with this engine at these settings, although yet again, the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC claims top AMD position.
Grid 2 is the sequel to the racing video game Race Driver: Grid. It was developed and published by Codemasters. The game includes numerous real world locations such as Paris, numerous United States locations, and many more, and also includes motor vehicles spanning four decades. In addition, it includes a new handling system that developer Codemasters has dubbed ‘TrueFeel’, which aims to hit a sweet spot between realism and accessibility.
We select 4K 3840×2160 resolution and enabled the ULTRA profile with 8 times anti aliasing, as shown in the screenshots above.
The Sapphire R9 290x Tri-X OC moves up the chart slightly as we increase the resolution from 1600p to Ultra HD 4K, sitting just behind the Palit GTX780 Ti JetStream.
Splinter Cell Blacklist is the sixth installment in the series. The game begins with Sam Fisher and his old friend Victor Coste who are about to depart from Andersen AFB in Guam when an unknown enemy force destroys the entire base. Assisted by hacker specialist Charlie Cole, Sam and Vic manage to escape, although Vic is injured after protecting Sam from a grenade. Soon after, a terrorist group calling itself “The Engineers” assumes responsibility for the attack and announce that it was the first of a deadly countdown of escalating attacks (called “The Blacklist”) on United States assets, declaring that they will halt the attacks only after the U.S. government accomplish the demand of calling back all American troops deployed abroad.
We test with a series of high image quality settings as shown above and with 4x MSAA and 16 x Anisotropic filtering enabled.
The Nvidia GTX780 Ti takes the top positions with the Blacklist engine at these settings. The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC puts in a good showing however, averaging 62 frames per second.
Splinter Cell Blacklist is the sixth installment in the series. The game begins with Sam Fisher and his old friend Victor Coste who are about to depart from Andersen AFB in Guam when an unknown enemy force destroys the entire base. Assisted by hacker specialist Charlie Cole, Sam and Vic manage to escape, although Vic is injured after protecting Sam from a grenade. Soon after, a terrorist group calling itself “The Engineers” assumes responsibility for the attack and announce that it was the first of a deadly countdown of escalating attacks (called “The Blacklist”) on United States assets, declaring that they will halt the attacks only after the U.S. government accomplish the demand of calling back all American troops deployed abroad.
We selected 4K – 3840×2160 resolution and the ‘High’ Graphics quality preset. Screenshots shown above.
The Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X OC frame rate is held above 40 at all time, averaging around 50 frames per second.
Batman Arkham Origins moved development away from series creators Rocksteady Studios, and is written by Corey May and Dooma Wendschuh. The game’s main storyline is set five years before that of 2009′s Batman: Arkham Asylum and follows a younger and less refined Batman who has a bounty placed on his head by crime lord Black Mask, drawing eight of the world’s greatest assassins to Gotham City on Christmas Eve. The game is presented from the third-person perspective with a primary focus on Batman’s combat and stealth abilities, detective skills, and gadgets that can be used in both combat and exploration. Arkham Origins is the first game in the series to feature multiplayer gameplay.
We test at Ultra HD 4K with a mixture of high image quality settings and 2 MSAA, shown above.
A demanding game at Ultra HD 4K, and an engine that has clearly been developed well on Nvidia hardware – they hold all the top positions.
Battlefield 4 (also known as BF4) is a first-person shooter video game developed by EA Digital Illusions CE (DICE) and published by Electronic Arts. The game is a sequel to 2011′s Battlefield 3. Battlefield 4 is built on the new Frostbite 3 engine. The new Frostbite engine enables more realistic environments with higher resolution textures and particle effects. A new “networked water” system is also being introduced, allowing all players in the game to see the same wave at the same time.Tessellation has also been overhauled.
We test at Ultra HD 4K with the high image quality profile, shown above. This was tested on the pre-16th December patch.
Performance is smooth throughout, averaging over 30 frames per second at all times.
The tests were performed in a controlled air conditioned room with temperatures maintained at a constant 24c – a comfortable environment for the majority of people reading this.Idle temperatures were measured after sitting at the desktop for 30 minutes.Load measurements were acquired by playing Crysis Warhead for 30 minutes and measuring the peak temperature.
We also have included Furmark results, recording maximum temperatures throughout a 30 minute stress test. All fan settings were left on automatic.
The Tri-X cooler has proven already to be an exceptional design and this is further verified by the results today. The cooler performs at an identical level to the Sapphire R9 290 model which we reviewed last week.
We have built a system inside a Lian Li chassis with no case fans and have used a fanless cooler on our CPU. The motherboard is also passively cooled. This gives us a build with almost completely passive cooling and it means we can measure noise of just the graphics card inside the system when we run looped 3dMark tests.
We measure from a distance of around 1 meter from the closed chassis and 4 foot from the ground to mirror a real world situation. Ambient noise in the room measures close to the limits of our sound meter at 28dBa.
Why do this? Well this means we can eliminate secondary noise pollution in the test room and concentrate on only the video card. It also brings us slightly closer to industry standards, such as DIN 45635.
KitGuru noise guide
10dBA – Normal Breathing/Rustling Leaves
20-25dBA – Whisper
30dBA – High Quality Computer fan
40dBA – A Bubbling Brook, or a Refridgerator
50dBA – Normal Conversation
60dBA – Laughter
70dBA – Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA – City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA – Motorcycle or Lawnmower
100dBA – MP3 player at maximum output
110dBA – Orchestra
120dBA – Front row rock concert/Jet Engine
130dBA – Threshold of Pain
140dBA – Military Jet takeoff/Gunshot (close range)
160dBA – Instant Perforation of eardrum
The Tri-X cooler is audible under gaming load, but it isn't intrusive thanks to the clever tri fan implementation.
To test power consumption today we are using a Keithley Integra unit and we measure power consumption from the VGA card inputs, not the system wide drain. We measure results while gaming in Crysis Warhead and the synthetic stress test Furmark and record both results.
Power consumption falls in line with the AMD reference design, demanding 237 watts under gaming load.
To overclock today, we used the dedicated overclocking tools within the latest version of AMD's Catalyst Control Center.
We achieved almost 10 percent extra from the core on the Sapphire card, settling on a final figure of 1,134mhz. It was possible to overclock past this point but we did notice some very minor artifacting between 1,134mhz and 1,160mhz before the card would hardlock. Increasing the power settings further didn't help stability.
Memory could be overclocked to 1,335mhz, but it was close to borderline out of the box, so we would recommend just running at the Sapphire default overclocked settings of 1,300mhz. We are more interested in listing overclocked settings that could be used 24/7, rather than just trying to break benchmark figures.
The additional overclock on the R9 290X core helped to push the performance just below the reference GTX 780 Ti when we overclocked it to 1,122mhz core and 1,800mhz via the GDDR5 memory.
When AMD released their flagship R9 290X back on October 30th there was no doubt in my mind that the company had delivered an incredibly capable graphics card. Unfortunately I was forced to conclude the review by delving into negative points around their reference cooling solution. Cooler issues dominated the review, which was doubly frustrating as the performance was very satisfying.
To say the R9 290/X reference cooler was ‘ill performing' would be a massive understatement. In my view AMD completely destroyed their own launch by not spending more research and development time creating a decent reference cooler from the ground up, or by working with their partners to bring custom solutions to market immediately.
Instead of potentially dominating the market with a competitively priced flagship graphics card, many AMD followers ended up waiting for custom R9 290/X solutions to hit the market. They have been waiting for almost two months.
AMD gamers will definitely be pleased with the new Sapphire R9 290 and R9 290X solutions. We have already reviewed the Sapphire R9 290 Tri-X earlier this week and I left the review with positive thoughts in my mind. The Sapphire Tri-X cooler has been one of the best technology advances in 2013. The change in construction and the adoption of triple high grade fans, with huge 10mm heatpipes has ensured that Sapphire have ended the year on a very high note.
The R9 290X we reviewed today is an exceptional video card. Sapphire have addressed all our concerns which we detailed extensively in October. Please do read this page, if you missed them first time around.
So how is Sapphire's R9 290X Tri-X OC better than the AMD reference R9 290X?
Well it thankfully doesn't sound like a lawnmower when loaded for hours. The thermal curve has also been reduced significantly. Most importantly, the cooler is able to ensure that the core won't down clock at any time.
AMD may still claim it is fine to run at 95c all the time but on launch day KitGuru argued the point with our own indepth analysis. We know PR spin when we hear it, and we make sure you guys always know our honest feelings. Luckily for us all, Sapphire agreed with Kitguru and they have dropped load temperatures from 95c to 68c – a staggering 27c.
Sapphire's R9 290X Tri-X does not suffer from thermal throttling and we aren't forced to spend ages in the Catalyst Control Center, trying to find a half way ground between minimal throttling and the lowest possible fan noise. Sapphire's solution? Just put the card in the system, install the drivers and play games. Very simple, and the way it should have been right from the start.
Without any throttling problems the overclocked R9 290X is able to perform at a very high level indeed, and while it is not as fast as the new Nvidia GTX780 Ti, it can outperform the GTX780 Lightning Edition from earlier in the year and often outperform the GTX Titan, depending on the game engine and settings. It is a fantastic solution for 1600p and Ultra HD 4K resolution gaming, but if you are using a 1080p monitor then we suggest you save some money and opt for the non X version (Or Sapphire R9 280X Toxic Edition) – which is still going to give you plenty of future proofing for upcoming Direct X 11 titles throughout 2014.
Overclockers UK have listed the Sapphire R9 290X Tri-X ‘Battlefield 4' edition for £489.95 inc vat. It may not be quite at the same performance level as the latest overclocked GTX 780 Ti cards from the likes of Asus or Palit, but considering the £140 savings, it will certainly be difficult to ignore.
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Pros:
- very competitive price point.
- 27c cooler than the AMD reference R9 290X.
- no throttling.
- low noise.
- 10% core headroom available on our sample.
- superb Ultra HD 4K performance.
Cons:
- At the price, none.
Kitguru says: The best AMD based gaming card yet.
Ordering one, but I doubt OCUK will get them in on the 27th, will be first week in 2014 I reckon.
Good value really considering the price of GTX780 Ti, which ive seen for £650. AMD have the price right and finally the right card. two months after launch day though? what a complete fuc*ing mess they made of such a good card.
About bloody time, longest wait for a fixed 290X ever.
I have to ask, why the Titan is never overclocked in these tests ?
Great card, a little power hungry but it’s worth it looking at these results.
OC.uk actually have gigabyte R9 290X windforce in stock now….I bought one this morning….8 left.
“At the price, none”. my first time seeing it. LOL. Nice card, really. Now if only it available in my country i will definitely buy it
Well thats impressive by any stretch of the imagination. 27c cooler than AMDs part and no need to balance fan speeds against noise.
Im tempted in January now, dont think OCUK will have stock in until the new year anyway
I don’t understand whats with the fuss about the heat on R9 290/x cards. I have been using MSI OC Edition GTX 670 previously, and they run 97c most of the time while I do gaming. It’s not a big deal to me, as I understand that the cards has been designed to run hot because they eventually will with a load on them.
I can understand the noise issue ONLY if you crank up the fan settings to 100%, but that won’t be necessary. I run the card, with custom fan profie from inside MSI after burner for 55% max fan speed, the card was quite to me. Maybe because of my big case, but really, I don’t see the what’s with the fuss all about.