Any MSI r9 290 gaming and Sapphire tri-x here? please share your experience here

[NirHahs]

I'm getting my new card on this Monday. but i'm still in dilemma whether to pick MSI or Sapphire, I dont want other brand and please do not suggest me. If u are using the card mentioned above, please share your experience about Temp, OCing, noise and most important is the performance of each games u played.

 

[IEC]

I have 2x Sapphire Tri-X 290 and 2x MSI 290 Gaming. Here's what I've found with my samples for gaming:

MSI Gaming 290 (2 samples, consecutive serial numbers and nearly identical OCs):
-Stock speed is 977/1250 with 1007/1250 boost clock
-Hynix memory
-Very quiet while gaming
-No noticeable throttling while gaming (stays under 75C with a 25C ambient)
~1125/1400 maximum OC with stock BIOS
~1160/1625 maximum OC with ASUS (290) BIOS - but you lose automatic fan control, and it runs a few degrees C hotter - ran at 85C so getting close to throttle range with high OCs

Sapphire 290 (2 samples):
-Stock speed is slighly higher than the MSI @ ~1000/1300
-Hynix memory
-Very quiet while gaming
-No noticeable throttling while gaming (stays under 67C with a 25C ambient)
~1225/1650 maximum OC with stock BIOS (sample 1)
~1100/1625 maximum OC with stock BIOS (sample 2)

Since I run two cards in crossfire I actually leave the cards at stock speeds most of the time. Even a single card is enough at 1920x1200.

If the price is very close, I would suggest the Tri-X as the cooler is equally quiet at stock speeds, and much better when overclocked or you have a high ambient temperature (IIRC you are in Malaysia). However, my revised opinion of the MSI Gaming 290 after using it for a month is that it is also a good choice for gaming. Can't go wrong with either for gaming, in my opinion.

 

[NirHahs]

I have 2x Sapphire Tri-X 290 and 2x MSI 290 Gaming. Here's what I've found with my samples for gaming:

MSI Gaming 290 (2 samples, consecutive serial numbers and nearly identical OCs):
-Stock speed is 977/1250 with 1007/1250 boost clock
-Hynix memory
-Very quiet while gaming
-No noticeable throttling while gaming (stays under 75C with a 25C ambient)
~1125/1400 maximum OC with stock BIOS
~1160/1625 maximum OC with ASUS (290) BIOS - but you lose automatic fan control, and it runs a few degrees C hotter - ran at 85C so getting close to throttle range with high OCs

Sapphire 290 (2 samples):
-Stock speed is slighly higher than the MSI @ ~1000/1300
-Hynix memory
-Very quiet while gaming
-No noticeable throttling while gaming (stays under 67C with a 25C ambient)
~1225/1650 maximum OC with stock BIOS (sample 1)
~1100/1625 maximum OC with stock BIOS (sample 2)

Since I run two cards in crossfire I actually leave the cards at stock speeds most of the time. Even a single card is enough at 1920x1200.

If the price is very close, I would suggest the Tri-X as the cooler is equally quiet at stock speeds, and much better when overclocked or you have a high ambient temperature (IIRC you are in Malaysia). However, my revised opinion of the MSI Gaming 290 after using it for a month is that it is also a good choice for gaming. Can't go wrong with either for gaming, in my opinion.

nice OC for sapphire. that card is awesome, but the price in my country different 50$ for both card, which is the sapphire abit expensive. but i heard there is a problem with MSI, auto shut off pc after stress it for half an hour.

 

[IEC]

I have not experienced any kind of shutdown or crash with my MSI Gamings. YMMV.

 

[NirHahs]

I have not experienced any kind of shutdown or crash with my MSI Gamings. YMMV.

lol :whiste:
btw, ur temp for both cards is excellent. what is ur room temp? how about benchmarking? does MSI got a nice score?

what is the temp for MSI while gaming at OC 1125/1400?

 

[Mondozei]

I have the Sapphire Tri-X R290.

It is shockingly quiet, the most silent card I've ever had or even heard overall from all cards I've heard(from friends, relatives, random strangers on LAN parties).

It has a Hynix memory and an ASIC score of slightly over 80%, but I haven't tried to overclock it yet simply because I'm on a 500 Watt PSU and while I've seen that people have gotten decent overclocks if they have a really good PSU, for those of us who are at the threshold of an acceptable PSU, I'd rather not try.

Also, frankly, I haven't felt I have even needed to OC the card yet. I'm running everything on ultra and I am getting really good fps. I'm less sensitive to maximum fps than I am to minimum fps. I'm seeing a very good and smooth experience and there's zero throttling as IEC previously pointed out.

The card is also running at very low temperatures. I'm getting sub-70 Celsius on demanding games. The most demanding is still mostly sub-75. That's pretty amazing.

I paid the U.S dollar equivalent of 430 dollars, when you strip out the shockingly high VAT and import tax that affects all electronics goods here in Sweden. That's about 20-30 dollars higher than the MSRP for the stock 290 with the notoriously lousy cooler.

I can recommend the card with zero ambivalency. I would, add, however that the card is quite long. So make sure you know that you'll fit it in your PC beforehand. There have been a few cases of people buying the card and then finding out they can't fit it in their cases, which is clumsy and embarrassing.

 

[Mondozei]

Just one small note. Most of the people who have been posting in the Sweclockers forum on the 290/290X thread have posted that they had Hynix memory. So it seems like these cards are prioritized as they come out of the gate. Much like the GTX 780 series were. (These days, a lot of buyers of the GTX 780 complain of Elpida memory). So it seems like a good time to get one and not wait and get worse quality cards as priorities shift.