Well the R9700Pro should be a bit faster, and hopefully final drivers will offer a boost.... maybe that will get it up to levels at which you consider it playable.
Personally I'm less interested in the specific frame rate as I am in the relative performance boost over the Ti4600. As I have no interest in FPS (First Person Shooter) games, the specific frame rate attained means little to me.
At 1024x768 the R9700 is often only a few FPS ahead of the Ti4600, once bandwidth and graphics card limitations push to the fore-front it quickly broadens that lead as evidenced by 1600x1200 performance.
The R9700 evidently loves FSAA, often pushing 1.5-2X the Ti4600's #'s.
That doesnt necessarily mean much right now though as we have no idea as to the visual quality it can offer.
Nor have we the faintest hint as to how FSAA is implemented besides some form of MultiSampling which really only gives us a superficial impression.
Unfortunate that no DX9 apps are available to show the R9700's performance in apps that fully utilize it's capabilities.
Too bad there were only a few apps tested, and the fact that nothing besides FPS were tested is less then pleasing also.
I so wish more reviewers would notice that not everyone plays or even gives a damn about FPS.... a little more variety in testing would be a huge addition.
Ah well, at least it gives us a bit better impression of the performance of the R9700. We likely won't know much more until we see full reviews.