R260/270/280/290/290x Review thread

[Phynaz]

I think the real story is going to be the non-X version. Assuming it has the same power limit, performance when overclocked should be the same. For less $$$.

Called it :awe:

 

[blackened23]

Anandtech review gave 290 way more flak than they did the GTX 480, and that's with the 480 costing MORE than the card it beat in performance.

The GPU landscape has changed since then, understand that it isn't 2010 anymore. Every reference blower in 2010, quite frankly, sucked - whether it was AMD or nvidia. Being that nvidia upped the ante so high in this respect, people expected AMD to do the same especially given that the Hawaii chip directly ties cooling into performance. But they didn't.. And it isn't excusable. So we have a situation now where because AMD cheaped out on the cooler, we can overlook that because hey. The 290 is only 400$. Personally I wouldn't blink an eye if it were 420$ with a Titan-esque reference shroud, that is actually what AMD should have done.

The landscape has changed. The blower may not matter to some, but it definitely matters to quite a few people - user experience matters, as i've mentioned numerous times. This becomes quite obvious when reading user reviews at amazon and newegg, and quietness is a metric mentioned quite often. This is something matters to a lot of people. Still, the 290 is value king and performs exceptionally well so people will overlook that, and I think that's cool. I think that AMD should have made the card 20$ more expensive and put a better cooler on it, period. If they had done that, this thread would be 20 pages instead of 80 and nobody would complain about the 290 or 290X - except the obvious NV fans who will bad mouth anything AMD no matter what, be it power consumption or whatever. Personally I don't give a flying EF about power usage, but I do care about acoustics these days.

AMD could have offset this either by 1) allowing AIBs to release aftermarket cards on day one or 2) having a better reference shroud. IMHO they should have done both.

 

[Erenhardt]

But I can't see why anyone would defend that cooler AMD decided to use. It's mind boggling.

No one is defending the poor cooler. It is expected that reference design is loud, but it looks like it is end of the world to some.

Again - it's a valid criticism. I love aftermarket coolers myself but I should point out that the 7970s I used, were reference. NV just upped the ante in this respect and AMD should have matched it -

No, they should not! I want to have a choice. Why take it away from consumer? Want if I'm on budged and can live with louder fan and would happily keep ~$40 in my pocket than spend it on better cooler?

Again, why making a competition for your own partners? $10 more expensive ACX cooler was enough to steal the sale from nvidia, wasn't it? Why wasting money then?
Looks like AMD learned from nvidia mistake. Wasting money just to loose with your board partner is not a good idea.

 

[stahlhart]

Stop the thread crapping, callouts, taunting and personal attacks immediately, or this thread will be locked for cleaning.
-- stahlhart

 

[ICDP]

The GPU landscape has changed since then, understand that it isn't 2010 anymore. Every reference blower in 2010, quite frankly, sucked - whether it was AMD or nvidia. Being that nvidia upped the ante so high in this respect, people expected AMD to do the same especially given that the Hawaii chip directly ties cooling into performance. But they didn't.. And it isn't excusable. So we have a situation now where because AMD cheaped out on the cooler, we can overlook that because hey. The 290 is only 400$. Personally I wouldn't blink an eye if it were 420$ with a Titan-esque reference shroud, that is actually what AMD should have done.

The landscape has changed. The blower may not matter to some, but it definitely matters to quite a few people - user experience matters, as i've mentioned numerous times. This becomes quite obvious when reading user reviews at amazon and newegg, and quietness is a metric mentioned quite often. This is something matters to a lot of people. Still, the 290 is value king and performs exceptionally well so people will overlook that, and I think that's cool. I think that AMD should have made the card 20$ more expensive and put a better cooler on it, period. If they had done that, this thread would be 20 pages instead of 80 and nobody would complain about the 290 or 290X - except the obvious NV fans who will bad mouth anything AMD no matter what, be it power consumption or whatever. Personally I don't give a flying F about power usage, but I do care about acoustics these days.

This 100%

People who actually claim just purchase an aftermarket cooler need to wise up. A decent after market cooler will push the price up to $450 and invalidate your warranty, not to mention you run the risk of killing your GPU.

AMD should have upped the price slightly and included a better cooler. Even the current cooler with quieter fans would have done the job because it would have been quiet at ~60% fan.

Though I believe these cards will be amazing once custom cooled versions get released.

 

[blackened23]

No one is defending the poor cooler. It is expected that reference design is loud, but it looks like it is end of the world to some.


No, they should not! I want to have a choice. Why take it away from consumer? Want if I'm on budged and can live with louder fan and would happily keep ~$40 in my pocket than spend it on better cooler?

Again, why making a competition for your own partners? $10 more expensive ACX cooler was enough to steal the sale from nvidia, wasn't it? Why wasting money then?
Looks like AMD learned from nvidia mistake. Wasting money just to loose with your board partner is not a good idea.

Do you really honestly feel like EVGA isn't selling enough ACX cards? Because I can absolutely assure you, you are incorrect on this. EVGA is selling a ton of both reference *and* ACX cards. NV isn't losing AIB makers - There isn't an overlap here. Good blower and good aftermarket can co-exist, they're both selling equally well with the GTX 700 series of cards. Reference and aftermarket are designed for different users - reference is better for SLI and small form factor while aftermarket is better those with single cards going for maximum overclocks. There is no overlap. Both co-exist and both sell well, and the suggestion that a good reference cooler "steals" sales is quite ridiculous IMHO. People buy reference for a reason, and for those folks they would never consider aftermarket because of the reasons mentioned above - reference is better for mGPU and small form factor. Aftermarket would never even be a consideration for these buyers.

 

[Lonyo]

13.8 was the frame pacing driver, and it doesn't work with three cards.

I seem to be enjoying single card actually, but that is neither here nor there unless you want to buy a 6+6 7950 TF 3 for $200.

Has 1100/1500 1.2v on bio switch 1 and 800/1250 950mv on bios switch 2, both verified stable through hours of gameplay :thumbsup:

Nah, I'm considering buying a new one and getting some free games with it instead, although I don't know if I have a Crossfire bridge anywhere.

The 290 is overpriced in the UK compared to what it should be (20% higher than it should be, since the 290X is £430, so the 290 should be 430*400/650 or £265, but it's £320 instead), so that's out, and the GTX780 is even more expensive that that by a large margin at £400.
A second HD7950 is only £185 and comes with free games, so potentially it's only half the price of a 290.

Does the frame pacing driver work at 2560x1440 single card?

 

[BallaTheFeared]

No one is defending the poor cooler. It is expected that reference design is loud, but it looks like it is end of the world to some.


No, they should not! I want to have a choice. Why take it away from consumer? Want if I'm on budged and can live with louder fan and would happily keep ~$40 in my pocket than spend it on better cooler?

Again, why making a competition for your own partners? $10 more expensive ACX cooler was enough to steal the sale from nvidia, wasn't it? Why wasting money then?
Looks like AMD learned from nvidia mistake. Wasting money just to loose with your board partner is not a good idea.

You're on a budget that includes a $400 video card that is 30% faster than one that was selling for $185 a few weeks ago?

Does the frame pacing driver work at 2560x1440 single card?

Yes.

Which is also why I find myself in a weird situation. I see you're running low clocks on your 7950, as am I. 200w system draw in Crysis 3, 150w in SWTOR single card... I just don't have it anymore I guess, somewhere along the lines i lost my enthusiast.

 

[Vesku]

The GPU landscape has changed since then. Every reference blower in 2010, quite frankly, sucked - whether it was AMD or nvidia. Being that nvidia upped the ante so high in this respect, people expected AMD to do the same especially given that the Hawaii chip directly ties cooling into performance. But they didn't.. And it isn't excusable. So we have a situation now where because AMD cheaped out on the cooler, we can overlook that because hey. The 290 is only 400$. Personally I wouldn't blink an eye if it were 420$ with a Titan-esque reference shroud, that is actually what AMD should have done.

The landscape has changed. The blower may not matter to some, but it definitely matters to quite a few people - user experience matters, as i've mentioned numerous times.

Sorry, I don't want my reviews to be written by politicians. The negativity in the Anandtech 290 review conclusions is way out of proportion. If they'd just said "AMD missed an opportunity by not following Nvidia's lead with a better blower", sure. But look at how many negative phrases are in the final words page:

"it’s admittedly not very often that we write a negative video card review"

"great deal of confusion and a tinge of sadness"

"At 57.2dB the 290 is a loud card. A very loud card. An unreasonably loud card."

"this is one of a handful of cards we’ve ever had to recommend against"

"point where a video card is simply too loud"

"an unreasonable level of noise."

"the reference 290 untenable as a purchase"

I mean, wtf, that is an amazing amount of criticism for a review conclusion.

Meanwhile, in the GTX 480 original review the 480 was actually 64.1dB to the 5870s 59.3dB and the entire tone of the conclusion is extremely neutral with a few positives. From the same reviewer.

I actually agree in a much milder manner, I did not buy a 480 and I'm not going to get a reference 290. It's just reading a conclusion that basically consists of "it's loud" "did I mention it's loud" "it's the greatest price/perf in the high end since the 5850/70 but hey IT IS LOUD, MAKES A LOT OF NOISE, THE FAN RUNS 7% FASTER THAN I WOULD HAVE ACCEPTED" is way overboard. Enough so to make me go back to that 480 review because I knew they didn't call it out much at all.

 

[MrK6]

Also couple in that other reviews didn't find the card nearly as loud. Wonder what AT did wrong.

 

[Face2Face]

I hope the AIB's step up their VRM cooling on the R 290 and R 290X. There is a user on [H] that has installed Arctic Accelero's on two 290X's only to rip them off because the vrm cooling is horrible and won't even suffice at stock clocks. Seeing this makes me wonder how hard it's going to be to get a decent overclock on air out of these cards. My other thought is at what Mhz is 95c acceptable to? I mean you can run Tahiti all day @ 80c @ around 1100-1200 Mhz, when you start going higher the more unstable it becomes for long periods of gaming as Tahiti is very temp sensitive. I am looking forward to seeing some AIB solutions to see what they do to tame this hot monster. The performance for $400 is hard to ignore... Being the avg OC on a GTX 780 is 1124/2255 how is that going to stack up against a 290 running @ 1050Mhz, which I hope is obtainable with AIB setups....?? I think pretty well on the performance front.. making the card a steal with close to Titan performance for $400, but with the drawback of higher power consumption and more heat to tame.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Meanwhile, in the GTX 480 original review the 480 was actually 64.1dB and the entire tone of the conclusion is extremely neutral with a few positives. From the same reviewer.

You can't pick from two reviews.

From the 290 review they added the 480 just to show you the difference.

Power:

Noise:

 

[SlowSpyder]

I think some of you guys are looking at this card from the wrong angle. You can buy this card, adjust the fan speed down and have GTX780 performance for $100 less. You can adjust the fan speed up and have Titan+ performance for $600 less (but of course more noise). This card allows the user to decide what they want at a lower price point.

The GTX780 needs another price cut, AMD is simply out flanking Nvidia on the big 28nm front.

 

[Vesku]

You can't pick from two reviews.

Meanwhile, in the GTX 480 original review the 480 was actually 64.1dB to the 5870s 59.3dB and the entire tone of the conclusion is extremely neutral with a few positives. From the same reviewer.

Original 480 review, 480 vs 5870 was 4.8dB yet no tirade against the 'terrible droning, incessant noise, haunting siren call' anywhere to be found in the conclusion.

 

[24601]

I think some of you guys are looking at this card from the wrong angle. You can buy this card, adjust the fan speed down and have GTX780 performance for $100 less. You can adjust the fan speed up and have Titan+ performance for $600 less (but of course more noise). This card allows the user to decide what they want at a lower price point.

The GTX780 needs another price cut, AMD is simply out flanking Nvidia on the big 28nm front.

I have lost count of the number of people on >>ANANDTECH FORUMS<< that haven't actually read the >>ANANDTECH ARTICLE<<.

I mean seriously? Come on.


The thread crapping needs to stop now.

-Rvenger

 

[blackened23]

Original 480 review, 480 vs 5870 was 4.8dB yet no tirade against the 'terrible droning, incessant noise, haunting siren call' anywhere to be found in the conclusion.

Again, GPU landscape changed. What was acceptable nearly 4 years ago isn't acceptable now - as i've said before *every single* blower sucked in 2010. There wasn't a single blower that provided quiet acoustics in 2010.

Things have changed. I still cannot figure out why this design decision is being defended, if AMD had put a GOOD blower on the 290/290X who would have anything bad to say? Maybe a few die hard NV fans but the average buyer would have absolutely no bad things to say had AMD not gone cheap. This thread would be like 20 pages instead of 80 if AMD had the foresight to match nvidia in acoustics. It was just a bad design decision. Period. Status quo in 2010 is not status quo in 2013.

I'm not saying the 290 is a bad card, clearly the performance at 400$ is insanely good. What I *am* saying is that AMD compromised in ways that they should not have, they could have created the ultimate graphics cards for the respective price levels but instead we have 80 page thread with complaints about noise and heat. Could AMD have prevented with better design decisions? Yes, yes they could have.

 

[Leadbox]

Original 480 review, 480 vs 5870 was 4.8dB yet no tirade against the 'terrible droning, incessant noise, haunting siren call' anywhere to be found in the conclusion.

I think they're trying to hard to show that they are NOT an AMD site by being nit-picky

 

[Vesku]

Again, GPU landscape changed. What was acceptable nearly 4 years ago isn't acceptable now - as i've said before *every single* blower sucked in 2010. There wasn't a single blower that provided quiet acoustics in 2010.

Things have changed. I still cannot figure out why this design decision is being defended, if AMD had put a GOOD blower on the 290/290X who would have anything bad to say? Maybe a few die hard NV fans but the average buyer would have absolutely no bad things to say had AMD not gone cheap. This thread would be like 20 pages instead of 80 if AMD had the foresight to match nvidia in acoustics. It was just a bad design decision. Period. Status quo in 2010 is not status quo in 2013.

No, people thought the 480 was loud to the point that they didn't buy it. It's just the review conclusion gave it the most mild call out for being noisier and less price/perf than the competition. What has changed is the review style. Being negative on the 290 noise is reasonable, repeating the criticism 7+ times in the one page conclusion is unreasonable given the overall tone and style of Anandtech reviews.

 

[Phynaz]

2) having a better reference shroud. IMHO they should have done both.

I wonder why AMD didn't use a fan instead of a blower? Can you not use a fan on an enclosed card?

 

[ICDP]

The 290 is overpriced in the UK compared to what it should be (20% higher than it should be, since the 290X is £430, so the 290 should be 430*400/650 or £265, but it's £320 instead), so that's out, and the GTX780 is even more expensive that that by a large margin at £400.
A second HD7950 is only £185 and comes with free games, so potentially it's only half the price of a 290.

It's 20% higher than it should be in the UK because of the 20% VAT. US prices at store front do not include taxes.

 

[24601]

I wonder why AMD didn't use a fan instead of a blower? Can you not use a fan on an enclosed card?

The orientation of the airflow. Ask XFX 7970 owners how well that works out.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

480 wasn't much louder than the 5870, 290 and 290x are louder than the 480.

What's not to get? The difference between the 480 and 5870 isn't nearly as big, and the 780 is much quieter than either.

Obviously Ryan is probably a bit miffed by the 7950 boost bios, and now the boost driver, the card is louder for a minor performance difference and from his perspective it is unacceptably loud compared to the competition which offers similar performance at 10 db less noise levels... Which is a huge difference to the ear.

It's just opinion, Ryan is entitled to his.

 

[Rvenger]

Reopened



Let's not derail the thread this time around.


-Rvenger

 

[blastingcap]

You are expecting too much. All signs lead to 20nm as being super expensive and a long time coming.

Do you have citations from credible sources?

 

[Elfear]

280X, 290, and 290X reviews are consolidated in OP. 260X and 270X reviews to follow.

-Elfear