New R9 290 Troubleshooting.

mingsoup

Golden Member
May 17, 2006
1,295
2
81
I installed my Sapphire Vapor-X R9 290 this week however I've been having problems with it.

I have the card hooked up to the PCI Express 6 pin cables using the additional 2 pins which hang off the original connector. The card takes 2 8 pins total. I think the extra two pins can only be inserted in the right most 2 pins and not the left most.

The card is performing slowly. I am also confused by the UEFI button on the card. I've uninstalled my previous drivers and updated to 14.4 beta. I am running the card on a Corsair TX850 and Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD5H alongside a i7-4770k which had been overclocked, but then I returned it to stock hoping that was my issue. It wasn't. The card interacts with the UEFI bios in an odd way. Its almost as if alot of handshaking goes one before the card goes to windows....based on if the UEFI button has changed recently.

I've done an AVP benchmark and only recorded 20fps @ 1920*1080 max settings. That was with the UEFI button off. With the UEFI button on I was getting better results at maybe 70fps. However, I should be getting ~ 95fps.

Desktop composition is also slow. Sometimes on boot the rendering of the windows boot logo is frame by frame until the login screen where the speed increases but its still not the silky smooth I should get and sometimes get with the UEFI button.

I'm almost thinking this is a bios issues, that or my PSU is not good enough for this card.


Any ideas?
 
Last edited:

VulgarDisplay

Diamond Member
Apr 3, 2009
6,188
2
76
Install hwinfo and use it to keep an eye on your temps, clocks, and voltages. It may show you something you are missing.
 

Kenmitch

Diamond Member
Oct 10, 1999
8,505
2,250
136
I doubt it's your power supply unless you got a lemon or loose connection. I'm running a XFX DD 290 along with a i3-4130 on a Rosewill Capstone 450m without issues during gaming or even mining when I was into that.

I'll second the monitor the temps and clockspeeds. I doubt it's throttling but one never knows unless they check.

You switched from another AMD card?

OS?

Did you use a driver sweeper?

How old is your MB's bios? Possibly a issue if it's really old as the UEFI version is also updated during the process.
 
Last edited:

96Firebird

Diamond Member
Nov 8, 2010
5,731
325
126
I have the card hooked up to the PCI Express 6 pin cables using the additional 2 pins which hang off the original connector. The card takes 2 8 pins total. I think the extra two pins can only be inserted in the right most 2 pins and not the left most.

I'm confused by this... Do you have all the power pins plugged in? All 16?

What PSU wattage do you have?

Says he is running it on a TX850.
 

Termie

Diamond Member
Aug 17, 2005
7,949
48
91
www.techbuyersguru.com
Your PSU should have no trouble with the card, but double-check that you've inserted the 8-pin PCIe power cables correctly. The additional 2-pin extension definitely only fits on one side of the connector on the card, and then you push in the 6-pin main cable to lock it in.

Also do a driver sweep, and then install the WHQL drivers that were released yesterday.
 

Despoiler

Golden Member
Nov 10, 2007
1,967
772
136
My guess is BIOS issue. I would either clear your CMOS and/or flash the latest BIOS.
 

mingsoup

Golden Member
May 17, 2006
1,295
2
81
Hmmm. Reseated the power pins using the technique of inserting the stray 2 pins and then coming in with the latching 6 pins to hold the other 2 pins in place.

I did a benchmark now. 102fps @ 1920*1080 max. Thats 9 more fps than the benchmark I'm referencing gives a R9 290 reference. My old 6990 got 89.5. I'm going to benchmark a bit more, but I'll keep my eye on it. This is with the UEFI button pushed on.

If I run into further issues BIOS and Drivers are my next step. Very odd, I thought for sure the power was in there. But those extra dangling 2 power are kinda a jip job. Wish I just had an 8 pin, but then it wouldn't work for 6 pins.

PS Thanks everyone for all the great suggestions! You helped me fix my problem. Just did 10 consecutive tests and the results are latched.

EDIT: Now I'm thinking it actually was BIOS. I restarted my computer and the lag came back. Flash a new bios and I"m good between restarts. It seems I also halved my boot time and supposedly my overclock will go farther now. Odd. So I guess it was the BIOS.
 
Last edited: