MSI 290x Lightning - Out of stock

[destrekor]

Is anybody seeing this card anywhere? I have one I'll be getting on Monday, and I plan to get a second one now that my income return has hit my account. However, now it appears to be out of stock or priced exorbitantly where I've looked.

Newegg apparently doesn't know whether they'll get more in stock, at least per the product page, which you can now only find through google.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127787

This really seemed like the card to go crossfire with. I hope stores get more in, but I'm worried that it appears all stores are sold out.

 

[Termie]

Of course it's out of stock. As you probably know, it was available for a few days at an absurdly-low price.

One would assume it will be restocked eventually, but it probably won't be available at the same price. The only reason MSI did that was to capitalize on the GTX 970 debacle.

 

[destrekor]

Of course it's out of stock. As you probably know, it was available for a few days at an absurdly-low price.

One would assume it will be restocked eventually, but it probably won't be available at the same price. The only reason MSI did that was to capitalize on the GTX 970 debacle.

It was that price for a few weeks at least. Maybe it was $350 to start before rebate instead of $330.

 

[RussianSensation]

I was surprised it took that long to sell out. It's basically the very best 290X and it's selling for $300.

There are other excellent deals on the 290X. You don't need to CF with the same card.
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2419835

I would be surprised if it's completely sold out though because it's still early Feb and R9 300 series is only slated to be announced around Computex 2015 -- June 2-6, 2015.

Surely they could have moved thousands more units in the next 4 months. Even at $330-350 the card would sell.

There are some eye-popping pricing data on the MSI Lightning R9 290X:

1) The listed prices on eBay are very high. This means you can probably flip a brand new R9 290X for $400-450 and that could actually be a smart strategy to get 2 cheaper R9 290Xs (like the MSI Gaming ones). Since most people buying R9 290/290X now are using them as stop-gap cards until 14nm, spending as least as possible on them is the best strategy imo

2) In Canada this card sells for crazy high prices. Even considering that 1 USD = 1.25 CDN, it's still very expensive here:

Newegg.ca - $499 CDN
Memoryexpress - $540 CDN
DirectCanada - $560 CDN (out of stock)
NCIX - $599 CDN (back-ordered!)

I think MSI underestimated demand for this card after the 970 fiasco. If they don't make anymore, that will be a total shame.

 

[destrekor]

I was surprised it took that long to sell out. It's basically the very best 290X and it's selling for $300.

There are other excellent deals on the 290X. You don't need to CF with the same card.
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2419835

I would be surprised if it's completely sold out though because it's still early Feb and R9 300 series is only slated to be announced around Computex 2015 -- June 2-6, 2015.

Surely they could have moved thousands more units in the next 4 months. Even at $330-350 the card would sell.

Yeah I have to pay full price on the second card anyhow, that rebate was only good for one card per household. I hear Amazon might have more on Monday, so I'll be taking a look then.

 

[RussianSensation]

Yeah I have to pay full price on the second card anyhow, that rebate was only good for one card per household. I hear Amazon might have more on Monday, so I'll be taking a look then.

I wouldn't pay too much for it. Remember, the beauty of CF is you don't need to pair the same cards at all. Even the clock speeds can be different. You can have the beefier 290X Lightning at the top and the MSI Gaming 290X at the bottom.

 

[destrekor]

I wouldn't pay too much for it. Remember, the beauty of CF is you don't need to pair the same cards at all. Even the clock speeds can be different. You can have the beefier 290X Lightning at the top and the MSI Gaming 290X at the bottom.

Yeah, I'll be keeping that in mind. And no, I don't care to pay a ridiculous amount, but I'll pay $350 or less. I'll wait a few days. I sort of wanted to wait a while longer to see if prices dropped further, but I have an ergotron tri-monitor mount on the way,so I can fit all three monitors on the desk I'm forced to use for the time being (and I wanted one for awhile anyway, three separate stands really sucks). That second card will be welcome very soon.

 

[Pneumothorax]

I went 'hybrid' with a Tri-X 290x on the bottom and a reference 290x with a HG10 + H90 AIO cooling setup. Seeing how cool the top card was running o/c, I got another H90 + Kraken G10 + Gelid VRM kit for only $40 on craigslist. Bolted right on the tri-x which is a reference design. Now I got a crazy setup. Both are running in CF with a 1100 o/c on stock volts and doesn't even break 55C on the slowest fan speeds. Now my PSU is the loudest lol

 

[Silverforce11]

I went 'hybrid' with a Tri-X 290x on the bottom and a reference 290x with a HG10 + H90 AIO cooling setup. Seeing how cool the top card was running o/c, I got another H90 + Kraken G10 + Gelid VRM kit for only $40 on craigslist. Bolted right on the tri-x which is a reference design. Now I got a crazy setup. Both are running in CF with a 1100 o/c on stock volts and doesn't even break 55C on the slowest fan speeds. Now my PSU is the loudest lol

Once you go water its hard to go back to air.

 

[Makaveli]

Once you go water its hard to go back to air.

True That!

 

[Elfear]

Once you go water its hard to go back to air.

Amen!

 

[guskline]

Amen!

I agree, especially with CF/SLI. On my second rig, 3770k, it's housed in a CM HAF932 Advanced and my cpu is cooled by a Kraken X60.

Stayed with an air cooled Sapphire Tri-X OC R9 290. (returned the GTX970!)

 

[destrekor]

Yuck, Amazon has 1 MSI 290X Lightning for $412 right now. "more on the way". Hopefully once stock is replenished elsewhere, that price comes down. Newegg is listing out of stock, "may or may not be restocked."

Getting a CLC water-cooler to add onto a different card, in addition to the aftermarket bracket, would cost more than the Lightning as listed today, or pretty damn close. :\

I still don't know if I can even find a 25 or 27mm thick 120mm radiator that would work in this situation.

Plus, in the event these cards survive to another case and that case has a side window, my OCD-like tendencies would prefer matching cards. Sad of me, but whatever. lol

If nothing else, I could do a 290X Tri-X on bottom and have the Lightning on top. I did read somewhere the Lightning performs better than other coolers as the top card in an air-cooled crossfire setup.
Do you think the tri-slot Lightning, which would leave only a minimal gap between the top and bottom slot (I have one full slot between two dual-slot GPUs right now; is the Lightning a FULL 3 slots, or more like 2.5 slots but obviously occupies all three?), might be better on bottom and a 2-slot cooler on top?