GFX card price drops

[71st_Mastiff]

The breadboard is same size, the heat-pipe system is larger.

[cichlidfan]

The breadboard is same size, the heat-pipe system is larger.

 

It doesn't matter what part is bigger if the side of your case won't go on! :P

[*Rage*]

R290 Pro is a performance bargain! Would wait for non reference coolers though..

[SkateZilla]

R9-290 is 399, should be out this week, and still beats the 780 for $100 less

[cichlidfan]

R9-290 is 399, should be out this week, and still beats the 780 for $100 less

 

Whose price is that? I haven't seen a vendor with a price yet.

[SkateZilla]

Whose price is that? I haven't seen a vendor with a price yet.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202043

 

I Simple Fan Curve Profile Change and a Healthy OC puts it on Par with the Reference R9-290X

 

 

 

For the Rest of the Brands:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=R9-290&N=-1&isNodeId=1

 

 

Also, 2nd wave R9-290X GPUs should be down to the $550-$580 MSRP (Based on Reference Clock)

Edited November 5, 2013 by SkateZilla

[cichlidfan]

For the Rest of the Brands:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=R9-290&N=-1&isNodeId=1

 

Yes. 'Coming Soon' is the price I saw. Sapphire isn't on my personal approved brand list. ;)

[SkateZilla]

The Sapphire's and MSI Reference Cards Are in Stock :p, Everything else is Coming Soon, Sold Out or $20 more.

 

 

Like I Said, I'm waiting to upgrade after the new year with a Non Reference Model.

[cichlidfan]

Yes. Here is an excellent in stock buy. :lol:

 

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FZN2LO0/ref=s9_simh_gw_p147_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1GHSGKHCPJZVR81QX9KD&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1630072222&pf_rd_i=507846

Edited November 5, 2013 by cichlidfan

[SkateZilla]

You are still looking at the limited BF4 Edition:

 

 

R9-290X:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=R9-290X&N=-1&isNodeId=1

[Rhinox]

Just checked prices here (at in €):

 

GTX 770: >280

GTX 780: >435

GTX 780 Ti: ~680 (pre-order)

GTX Titan: >870

 

R9 280X: >260

R9 290: >345

R9 290X: >480

 

Just a month ago I was decided to go for GTX 770 (~340 at that time). Thanks heaven I decided to wait! I'd bang my head against a wall had I bought it. Now for the ~same price I get R9-290 and that's exactly what I'm going for. I'm just waiting for models with better non-standard cooler. Or if I get impatient, I'll buy it anyway and switch cooler for i.e. Arctic Accelero Xtreme III myself. I love the competition! :-)

[SkateZilla]

The Arctic Accelero Xtreme III allowed the card to run cooler and maintain it's default clock (no throttling), and allowed the card to be Overclocked to 1.05 or so GHz

[SkateZilla]

780 Ti uses a full GK110 Chip for 2880 CUDA Cores

(something a lot of people swore wasn't possible due to quality of the GK110 yields)

 

$700, "stomps everything, Including the Titan."

 

Though the first 2 reviews I tried to read were nothing more than a shallow 290x Bashing attempt.

 

The Few benches I've seen it's roughly ~10% difference, at 1080p Benches, it's pointless, that extra $150 gets you 8 more FPS.

 

R9-290X still chews through 4K.

Edited November 7, 2013 by SkateZilla

[Rhinox]

GTX 780Ti is about 5-10% faster than R9-290X (and not always), but ~25% more expensive, so it has clearly worse price/performance ratio...

[SkateZilla]

like I said, $150 more for a Performance difference that you wont see on a 60Hz Screen with VSYNC On.

 

120/144Hz Screens would require 2 of the either card, and again both can easily do 120/144Hz in XFire/SLI and with VSYNC on, the extra 10-15 FPS wont mean didly.

 

Only Reason to go with the 780Ti is if you are a benchmarker that needs to absolute top score.

 

Infact, nVidia Crippled/disabled the double precision floating point on the 780ti, so the Titan still beats it when doing Pro/Workstation workloads.

 

Why Choose 290X Over 780 Ti?

-Cheaper

-4GB of VRAM (Versus 3GB on 780Ti)

 

-xDMA Crossfire-

Bridge Interlinking between cards has bandwidth restrictions,

As we move to 4k And Multiple displays for Gaming, this becomes a Bigger issue,

With R9-290X/R9-290 the xDMA removes the bandwidth issue, xDMA also supports Frame Pacing on Multiple Displays/4K Displays

 

-Upgraded Display Clocks

AMD's R9 Series now Allow 3 Screens to be used Without Display Port, Due to Addition of a 3rd Timing Pipeline from the VPU,

and up to 6 Displays. (3 from VPU Timing Pipes (DVI, DVI,HDMI)), and 3 from DisplayPORT2.0 MST Hubs ($~149)

 

-TrueAudio and Mantle (Meh, depends on how well they are used).

 

 

Why Choose 780Ti?

-Higher (~10%) Benchmark Numbers

-Less Power Consumption/Heat

-CUDA PhysX

-Shadow Play

 

(*Note, Some MMO's Actually ban users that use Screen recorders, SHADOWPLAY INCLUDED).

 

 

Alternate Notes:

AMD is Working on a Embedded Hardware H264 Recorder Like Shadow Play.

AMD's Card is 5-10% Slower in Some benches, and Matches Titan and 780 in other, while still having Cooling/Throttling Issues.

 

While people can say, 780Ti will be better with 3rd Party Cooling Too,

 

Fact Remains on the AMD 290s with AfterMarket Cooling, the Card no longer throttles and Stomps both the Titan and 780Ti,

 

That's not saying anything about Overclocking. Which I've already seen users on the AMD Gaming Boards that Switched out the Coolers and are getting 1.1 GHz and 6.5 Ghz Ram Easily with minimal Voltage adjustments. which their benches stomp 780Ti by over 15%.

 

The Limiting Factor of the 290x/290 is the Crappy Cooling Design, and the Crappy fan Profile they stuck into the Firmware.

Edited November 7, 2013 by SkateZilla

[outlawal2]

like I said, $150 more for a Performance difference that you wont see on a 60Hz Screen with VSYNC On.

 

120/144Hz Screens would require 2 of the either card, and again both can easily do 120/144Hz in XFire/SLI and with VSYNC on, the extra 10-15 FPS wont mean didly.

 

Only Reason to go with the 780Ti is if you are a benchmarker that needs to absolute top score.

 

Infact, nVidia Crippled/disabled the double precision floating point on the 780ti, so the Titan still beats it when doing Pro/Workstation workloads.

 

Why Choose 290X Over 780 Ti?

-Cheaper

-4GB of VRAM (Versus 3GB on 780Ti)

 

-xDMA Crossfire-

Bridge Interlinking between cards has bandwidth restrictions,

As we move to 4k And Multiple displays for Gaming, this becomes a Bigger issue,

With R9-290X/R9-290 the xDMA removes the bandwidth issue, xDMA also supports Frame Pacing on Multiple Displays/4K Displays

 

-Upgraded Display Clocks

AMD's R9 Series now Allow 3 Screens to be used Without Display Port, Due to Addition of a 3rd Timing Pipeline from the VPU,

and up to 6 Displays. (3 from VPU Timing Pipes (DVI, DVI,HDMI)), and 3 from DisplayPORT2.0 MST Hubs ($~149)

 

-TrueAudio and Mantle (Meh, depends on how well they are used).

 

 

Why Choose 780Ti?

-Higher (~10%) Benchmark Numbers

-Less Power Consumption/Heat

-CUDA PhysX

-Shadow Play

 

(*Note, Some MMO's Actually ban users that use Screen recorders, SHADOWPLAY INCLUDED).

 

 

Alternate Notes:

AMD is Working on a Embedded Hardware H264 Recorder Like Shadow Play.

AMD's Card is 5-10% Slower in Some benches, and Matches Titan and 780 in other, while still having Cooling/Throttling Issues.

 

While people can say, 780Ti will be better with 3rd Party Cooling Too,

 

Fact Remains on the AMD 290s with AfterMarket Cooling, the Card no longer throttles and Stomps both the Titan and 780Ti,

 

That's not saying anything about Overclocking. Which I've already seen users on the AMD Gaming Boards that Switched out the Coolers and are getting 1.1 GHz and 6.5 Ghz Ram Easily with minimal Voltage adjustments. which their benches stomp 780Ti by over 15%.

 

The Limiting Factor of the 290x/290 is the Crappy Cooling Design, and the Crappy fan Profile they stuck into the Firmware.

 

I really wish we could find some knowledgeable people to frequent these boards! (Yes that was a joke)

 

Great information Skate... I had a decent grasp of the GPU landscape but this is very specific and usable info. Thank you sir!

:thumbup:

[SkateZilla]

Arctic Accelero Xtreme III Coolers are $75 and Work with the 290/290X Cards.

 

You will have to run the fans manually as the Controller on the R9-290/X Boards wont run them higher than 23% due to the 95^C Target temp, and the Cooler does not allow the GPU to get anywhere near that temp, so it runs the fans at the lowest RPM, which is not enough to provide airflow to the VRM and Memory Heatsinks.

 

One could also do a bootleg/cheap "Red Mod" to it and get better performance

 

Red Mod Consists of a H50 Cooler of Equiv (any AIO Cooler with the the Circle Water Block/Pump and Tabs).

 

Edit: Link to Club instead of long description:

http://www.overclock.net/t/1203636/official-amd-ati-gpu-mod-club-aka-the-red-mod

Edited November 7, 2013 by SkateZilla

[159th_Falcon]

+1 Rep to you SkateZilla, that was an VERY informative post and well written at that to.

[SkateZilla]

The "Red Mod" Drops the 290X Load Temps from 95^C to About 50-55^C.

[metalnwood]

I am watching the new cards and the price of the 290 looks good for the speed but I still think that for some time I have suffered with worse image quality on sims like dcs, fsx, xplane by using AMD.

 

On a small screen it probably doesnt matter too much but better AA is more noticeable on a 42" screen

[Nopileus]

The "Red Mod" Drops the 290X Load Temps from 95^C to About 50-55^C.

 

And probably ups the VRM temps to over 9000°C

[SkateZilla]

And probably ups the VRM temps to over 9000°C

 

Not if you leave the Heatplate on the Ram and VRMs, and put Lil Copper Heatsinks on them with some airflow.

[agrasyuk]

hmmm... this Christmas i just might find 770 or maybe even 780 under the tree )