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Today we look at a sub £300 graphics card from AMD partner Sapphire. The R9 390 Nitro is a model from Sapphire's new range and features Black Diamond Chokes and a large triple fan cooler to keep temperatures in check. The card ships in an overclocked state and is priced to compete against the popular Nvidia GTX970.
It is not always possible for AMD or NVIDIA to release completely ‘fresh’ new hardware running on brand new architecture. My colleague Anton has detailed the new range of cards, alongside the previous 200 generation and you can recap on this, over HERE.
| GPU | R9 390X | R9 290X | R9 390 | R9 290 | R9 380 | R9 285 |
| Launch | June 2015 | Oct 2013 | June 2015 | Nov 2013 | June 2015 | Sep 2014 |
| DX Support | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 |
| Process (nm) | 28 | 28 | 28 | 28 | 28 | 28 |
| Processors | 2816 | 2816 | 2560 | 2560 | 1792 | 1792 |
| Texture Units | 176 | 176 | 160 | 160 | 112 | 112 |
| ROP’s | 64 | 64 | 64 | 64 | 32 | 32 |
| Boost CPU Clock | 1050 | 1000 | 1000 | 947 | 970 | 918 |
| Peak GFLOPS (SP) | 5914 | 5632 | 5120 | 4849 | 3476 | 3290 |
| Memory Clock | 6000 | 5000 | 6000 | 5000 | 5700 | 5500 |
| Memory Bus (bits) | 512 | 512 | 512 | 512 | 256 | 256 |
| Max Bandwidth (GB/s) | 384 | 320 | 384 | 320 | 182.4 | 176 |
| Memory Size (MB) | 8192 | 4096 | 8192 | 4096 | 4096 | 2048 |
| Transistors (mn) | 6200 | 6200 | 6200 | 6200 | 5000 | 5000 |
| TDP (watts) | 275 | 290 | 275 | 275 | 190 | 190 |
The 300 series launch around 18 months after the 200 series has meant that AMD have been able to enhance the ASIC design by implementing microcode enhancements and the manufacturing processes have improved. We can consider the 390 an ‘improved 290’ – with the added bonus of double the memory – an increase from 4GB to 8GB.
So what do I have in store for you today? For the last week I have been running a series of tests at both 1440p and Ultra HD 4K resolutions – with the latest AMD and NVIDIA drivers – to keep everything on a completely even footing. It is time consuming, but worth it, especially with the release of the new ‘tweaked’ hardware. All AMD video cards are tested with the 15.6 Catalyst Beta, and all Nvidia cards the Forceware 353.30 driver.
The R9 390 has been released to specifically target Nvidia’s GTX970 so it will be interesting to see how that battle shapes up – as well as being able to take a look at the new card within a broader selection of hardware. Our Fury X review is coming soon, we have had it for some time now.
All these benchmarks for games.. can anyone anywhere on the web give me information on using one of these cards in pro applications like Adobe Premiere Pro? I’m wondering how well the 8gb VRAM will help when scrubbing through an effect filled timeline, or if CUDA is still the way to go? I hear lots of opinions, but no testing results. Unfortunately I can’t afford to buy a card from either side and work it out myself.
email me at zardon(at)kitguru.net ill try and help James.
i wouldn’t mind knowing as well, i’m having to put together a workstation focused system for the first time
When do GPU maker stop using “CTRL+C” “CTRL+V” and then rename?
Not only AMD, Nvidia dose it also. but at lease the they go from 580 to 670.
290x to 390x with 99% same card? then make something like 290x boost or anything else then 390x :/
Thanks Allan, I have emailed you just now.
Damn, kinda wished I waited on that 970 I got, this non x version seems to be an excellent value card. Who cares if it’s a rebrand, it’s still relavent.
Seriously though, what do you do with all those cards? ‘Cause the way I look at it, you could have a serious “make a college student’s day” type of deal here. After all, in Graduate school we suffer to do our part to contribute to society, a pat on the back in the process never hurt.
Those chips arent the same thing. The GTX 670 is based on the GK104. You could say the same thing when nVidia moved from GTX 480 to GTX 580 which both were identical except some performance improvements and more shaders. Both are guilty of these practices and won’t go away any soon.
I’d liked to have seen Fury X numbers in the graphs too…
Yes, coming soon…… Bit of a backlog, sorry..
Ahhh right, that’s great thanks 🙂
Which card should i buy 39 or 970. I usually game at 1080p and use 550 watts PSU. Please advise anyone
it would be great if 1080 P benchmarks were available
550 is not enought for the 390 acording to shappire. The 970 is your card.
i just bought this card, but i’d really appreciate a compare between 390 nitro vs 970 g1, stock and oc.
Can you help me?
Ordered mine Yesterday, now I wait Oo
hey, is cx600m is enough for this card(sapphire r9 390)?
That psu isn’t very good.
An xfx is much better.
Anyway, 600W is plenty, unless you plan to OC and will use an OC’ed CPU.